Prof. Dr. Cornelis Lay, MA or personally known as “Mas Conny”, left behind many happy memories and teachings for friends, colleagues, family, and especially the Department of Politics and Government. In the event “Remembering Mas Conny: Third Way Intellectual Thinking” with Pratikno, Jaleswari Pramodhawardani, and Ganjar Pranowo moderated by Abdul Gaffar Karim, the discussion triggers so that the participants have the opportunity to share memories with their respective versions of Mas Conny.
For his colleagues, Mas Conny is a leader who is egalitarian, patient, and known as a person who really avoids hurting the feelings of others so that his words and actions are always subtle. For his friends, Mas Conny is known as a person who always has jokes that often melts the atmosphere and even makes the atmosphere flare up with his characteristic “crunchy” jokes. The students also remember Mas Conny as a teacher who is always a role model and gives moral messages in every lecture meeting. The impression that Mas Conny left in the eyes of those around him was more or less summarized in these five words: intellectuals, partners, teachers, family, and friends.
The book “Intellectual Third Way” is a book presented by Mas Conny’s colleagues and friends for his 60th birthday. In this book, Mas Conny’s childhood is told as a young market boy who has to live side by side with poverty and hunger. However, the young Mas Conny’s enthusiasm never died down until he struggled with limited financial capacity to gain knowledge in Government Science (now the Department of Politics and Government), Gadjah Mada University. This trip led Mas Conny to become a person who always advised us that the knowledge we learn must have meaning for humanity, nationality and the progress of Indonesia. Mas Conny’s thinking as an intellectual is multidimensional, multisectoral and multidisciplinary, where his thoughts span from the security sector, democracy to diversity. In his footsteps of democratic development in Indonesia, Mas Conny has succeeded in placing the people as the main actors of democracy and finding a balance point between the concept of democracy and the concept of Indonesian diversity. (FI)