This year Indonesia was a featured country at the London Book Fair, which followed a similar showcasing of its literature at the Frankfurt Book Fair in 2015. Is this a reflection of an expanding and globalising literary scene in Indonesia? Are more diverse voices being heard inside and outside the country, and what are the challenges for making sure that the stories are not lost in translation? To talk about these topics and more our guest this week is the young writer and poet Norman Erikson Pa...
Jun 12, 2019•30 min
The past few years have seen repeated questioning of the independent workings of police, the prosecutors and the courts in Indonesia, ranging from accusations that prosecutions have been used to limit opposition or coerce support for the government, to suspicions that the outcome of high profile cases such as the blasphemy prosecution against then Jakarta governor Basuki Tjahaja Purnama had as much to do with societal pressure and political considerations, as it did with the letter of the law. A...
May 30, 2019•30 min
With a huge local market and growing production power, the Indonesian film industry has enormous potential. In recent times, Indonesian films, directors, actors, and other industry professionals are becoming more well-known around the world, not in small part due to a more integrated regional and global distribution network and web-based streaming services such as Netflix. Could films be utilised as a soft-power tool to increase Indonesia’s influence in regional and global cultural scenes? Furth...
May 16, 2019•36 min
An important part of recent Islamic activism in Indonesia has been the rise of conservative women’s groups such as the Family Love Alliance (Aliansi Cinta Keluarga Indonesia, AILA). Moreover, several conservative female activists joined the 2019 legislative elections as candidates. Campaigning against what they perceive as threats against traditional morality and religious values, these women position themselves as anti-feminists, thereby challenging conventional notions of women’s political act...
May 01, 2019•26 min
In today's episode, the final in the Election 2019 series, we gather the Talking Indonesia team to look back over the presidential and legislative polls and the key developments. What were the key factors in Jokowi's apparent victory? What can we anticipate after Prabowo's claims of victory, despite all reputable quick counts showing him to have lost the election by a clear margin? What were the legislative outcomes? Were there irregularities? Would we expect Indonesia to continue to hold the pr...
Apr 18, 2019•36 min
With less than one week until Indonesia’s simultaneous presidential and legislative elections on the 17th of April, candidates are going all out in a final push to get votes. Running concurrently with the arguably more exciting presidential election, the legislative elections have largely faded into the background and under-analysed. However, there are many important questions about this round of legislative elections that need to be addressed. For one, what does the socio-political landscape lo...
Apr 12, 2019•38 min
Recent months have seen a series of claims by political figures in Indonesia that the 2019 polls may be marked by significant irregularities. Senior political party figures and social media influencers have claimed that the electoral roll has been manipulated or could be hacked, cast doubt over the likely reliability of the vote count, and claimed that the civil service and security forces are being mobilised in support of particular candidates. These claims have come in particular from figures ...
Apr 04, 2019•33 min
To celebrate the 100th episode of Talking Indonesia, co-hosts Dave McRae, Jemma Purdey, Charlotte Setijadi and Dirk Tomsa come together to revisit some of the major themes of the first 99 episodes. As Indonesia is deep in election mode, they discuss what impact these themes – Islamism, corruption, fake news, economic development, foreign policy, gender – are likely to have on the 17 April elections. Image: Joko Widodo @Instagram
Mar 27, 2019•41 min
As Indonesia’s 2019 elections are drawing closer, public opinion surveys about the electability of Jokowi and his challenger Prabowo Subianto are released with increasing frequency. Though there are some differences between the results, virtually all pollsters agree that Jokowi is currently on track to win a second term. Why has Jokowi been able to maintain his lead in the polls so easily? What obstacles has the Prabowo campaign faced so far? And why are there no renegade pollsters who are tryin...
Mar 20, 2019•30 min
With the 2019 elections now just weeks away, the economy has become a key issue in the campaign. In comparative terms, Indonesia's current GDP growth of over 5 per cent is healthy. However, this is below the 7 per cent President Joko Widodo pledged to deliver during the 2014 campaign. The president's opponents also claim that the government's huge expenditure on major infrastructure projects and social welfare programs has failed to deliver benefits for all Indonesians. What is the current state...
Mar 13, 2019•35 min
Indonesia’s five-yearly elections are now just over a month away, and Talking Indonesia is switching to a weekly format until after polling day on April 17, to cover the key themes, important groups and pivotal developments that will shape the outcome. The first of our pre-election episodes focuses on labour and politics in Indonesia. Unlike many other countries, no labour party or party of the left represents Indonesia’s working class in parliament, increasing the challenge for Indonesia’s labo...
Mar 07, 2019•30 min
While it is true that Indonesian maids abroad often face terrible conditions, they have more agency than the public often give them credit for, and many also have creative pursuits like fiction writing. Recently, a new genre of literature has developed, one in which – often in short stories – these women reimagine their experiences as domestic workers in foreign lands. What do these literary works reveal about their lives abroad and the challenges they face? To discuss the agency and creativity ...
Feb 28, 2019•35 min
In contrast to various neighbouring countries and various Western democracies, the collection and use of citizen’s data remains largely unregulated in Indonesia. Civil society groups are pushing for a Private Data Protection Law to be passed, but this will not be in place prior to April’s legislative and presidential elections, in which political candidates and parties are expected to use big data to more effectively target their campaigns. In this week's Talking Indonesia podcast, Dr Dave McRae...
Feb 21, 2019•30 min
Some of the most pressing environmental problems in Indonesia today are plastic pollution and the consequences of large-scale land reclamation projects. In recent years, protests against these problems have increased in size and impact, especially on Bali, where the ubiquity of plastic garbage and a controversial reclamation project in Benoa Bay have galvanised a large and diverse protest movement. What are the strategies and goals of the movement? Who is involved? And what role do music and vis...
Feb 13, 2019•26 min
With Indonesia's general elections less than three months away political campaigning and the push to win over voters is reaching high gear. Our guest this week is Ward Berenschot, co-author with Edward Aspinall, of a timely new book that takes a close look at the informal politics of elections and patronage democracy. Democracy for sale: Elections, Clientelism, and the State in Indonesia (Cornell University Press) delves behind the scenes of local election campaigns, their ubiquitous success tea...
Jan 30, 2019•34 min
Rice is Indonesia’s most important staple food, with consumption estimated at more than 100 kilograms per person per year, in a country of 270 million people. Although rice consumption is in long term decline, a common saying in Indonesia nevertheless holds, “if you haven’t eaten rice, you haven’t eaten”. How to provide such an immense quantity of rice to the population – whether through imports or domestic production – is a perennially thorny question in Indonesia, and one tightly bound with th...
Jan 17, 2019•33 min
In early December, at least 16 civilians and 1 soldier were killed, with 5 others missing, in attacks on workers constructing the Trans-Papua Highway in Nduga district in the Papuan highlands. The armed wing of the pro-independence Free Papua Movement has claimed responsibility, as part of the protracted conflict between the Indonesian government and sections of Papuan society. Indonesian police and military have launched joint operations in response, reportedly also causing several fatalities. ...
Dec 19, 2018•32 min
When Indonesians go to the polls in April 2019, they will see an unprecedented number of female candidates competing for seats in the House of Representatives. Around 40 percent of candidates will be women, but if results from previous elections are anything to go by, the chances for many of these women to actually win a seat are rather slim. While female representation in political institutions has gradually improved over the years, Indonesian women still face a range of socio-economic, socio-c...
Dec 05, 2018•29 min
Disparities in development between different regions in Indonesia can be stark. Urban centres on Java like Jakarta and Yogyakarta have human development index scores in the high 70s and low 80s, whereas eastern Indonesian provinces like Papua, West Papua and East Nusa Tenggara score in the high 50s to low 60s. President Jokowi has repeatedly touched upon such disparities in his political rhetoric, pledging to move away from a Java-focussed development model to a so-called Indonesia-centric appro...
Nov 28, 2018•36 min
Bandung-based Pemuda Hijrah has amassed a huge following among young Muslims but has largely escaped the attention of the mainstream media. Led by charismatic young preachers such as Hanan Attaki, Pemuda Hijrah is followed by millions of young Muslims on social media. It presents a cool, hip image that combines youthful energy with revivalist Islamic teachings. What does Pemuda Hijrah and other groups like it tell us about the type of Islam that appeals to young Indonesian Muslims? To find out m...
Nov 21, 2018•33 min
Young politicians Indonesia is undoubtedly a young nation. The median age of the population is just 28 years. In the 2019 elections, 45% of eligible voters will be between 17 and 36 years of age. More than ever, Indonesia’s youth play a key role in the country’s politics. In Talking Indonesia this week, Dr Jemma Purdey talks to Rian Ernest, a senior member of the Indonesia's new 'youth' party, Indonesia Solidarity Party (Partai Solidaritas Indonesia, PSI). Ernest (31 years) is a first time candi...
Nov 07, 2018•27 min
2018 has been a year marked by large-scale natural disasters in Indonesia. A series of earthquakes from July-August in Lombok lefts hundreds dead, and displaced hundreds of thousands more. Another massive earthquake on 28 September then devastated Central Sulawesi's capital city - Palu - and nearby Donggala district. The quake triggered both a tsunami and destructive soil liquefaction, killing thousands of people. These events are consistent with a broader pattern of disaster vulnerability in In...
Oct 24, 2018•37 min
It is more than two years since Indonesia passed the landmark Law 8 of 2016 of People with Disability, but implementation has been slow and prejudices and discrimination against people with disability remain widespread. In the education sector, for example, access and opportunities for learning are still limited. Some Islamic universities, however, have taken important steps toward improving accessibility for students with disability and enhancing awareness among staff. What prompted these unive...
Oct 10, 2018•28 min
Religious intolerance is on the rise in Indonesia, and the state has reacted strongly from a security point of view, with initiatives such as a law passed last year that allows the government to disband any civil society group deemed to disrupt national unity. Many civil society groups support the law, declaring it as necessary to combat radicalism, terrorism, and intolerance. However, is this hard-line stance really the best approach to tackle the issue of rising religious intolerance in Indone...
Sep 27, 2018•34 min
In January 2016 the Minister for Technology, Research and Higher Education Minister Muhammad Nasir stated that universities must uphold standards of ‘values and morals’ and should not support organisations that promote LGBT activities. What followed was a social and political furore that has since seen a surge of intolerance and attacks on LGBT. While persecution of sexual minorities is not new, homosexuality is not illegal and in large part within Indonesian society have been accorded tolerance...
Sep 12, 2018•28 min
In early August, Joko Widodo and Prabowo Subianto registered as the only candidates for Indonesia's April 2019 presidential election, repeating their head-to-head showdown from 2014. Much though, has changed in Indonesia's political landscape over the past five years. Both men have new running mates for one thing. Nor is Jokowi an unknown new entrant to national politics any longer - he will enter 2019 with a five year track record to defend focused on infrastructure and social spending. The mas...
Aug 29, 2018•45 min
The issue of Chinese investment is a controversial topic in Indonesia. Viewed with suspicion and even animosity, Chinese investments are often associated with the ideological threat of communism, as well as a reminder of negative stereotypes of the ethnic Chinese business elites in the country. As such, Chinese investments are considered to be a political liability, especially during and around election times. Yet Chinese investments in Indonesia is on an upward trend. China became Indonesia's s...
Aug 16, 2018•28 min
Local elections held in June 2018 brought victories for a number of candidates who in the last few years have made a name for themselves as innovative and reform-oriented. But can this new breed of local executive leaders really change entrenched patterns of doing politics in Indonesia? How do they navigate established patronage channels? And how do they see their place within the broader political environment in Indonesia today? In this week’s Talking Indonesia podcast, Dr Dirk Tomsa discusses ...
Aug 01, 2018•29 min
In October 2017, the Indonesian legislature passed a new law strengthening protection for the millions of Indonesians working overseas - more than half of whom are women and many in vulnerable sectors. According to the World Bank, migrant workers comprise 7 per cent of Indonesia's work force (only China and the Philippines have larger proportions of migrant workers) and, in 2016, remittances from these workers accounted for 1 percent of Indonesia's gross domestic product. The sector is controlle...
Jul 18, 2018•31 min
On 27 June 2018, Indonesia held elections for mayors and governors in 154 districts and 17 provinces - referred to as pilkada - the third and final such round of regional elections in this five year electoral cycle. This year's round of elections was particularly significant, though, for several reasons. It included gubernatorial elections in five big provinces that between them account for more than half of Indonesia's population: West Java, Central Java, East Java, North Sumatra and South Sula...
Jul 05, 2018•35 min
