Department of Political and Social Change Seminar Series

Scholars of Indonesian politics have, in the last decade or more, focused increasing attention on a perceived decline in the quality of democracy in Indonesia, particularly in the context of global trends. Analysis has focused on the institutions of executive government and the judiciary. But how do we locate the parliament (DPR) in these developments?

In this article I have two main aims: firstly to understand the role that the DPR has played in the corrosion of democratic norms, both as a participant and an institutional “victim”; and secondly to examine the historical legacies in Indonesian governance and political praxis which are at least as important as the recent manoeuvring of individual political actors. Since 1998 the legislative power of the DPR has been weakened through collusion between the president and parliamentary leaders.

I argue that the rollback of democratic gains from the brief period of reformasi, while not inevitable, can be seen as a reversion to many of the norms of autocratic governance that have predominated in most of Indonesia’s post-independence history. Firstly, the circumvention of parliament by swamping its ranks with government supporters in supermajorities and “rainbow cabinets” has been “normal” practice since the Sukarno and Suharto eras. Secondly, the transfer of legislative power in the constitutional reforms of 1999-2002 was not the break with the original 1945 constitution that it appeared to be. Thirdly, the weakening of the DPR has been facilitated by its own internal procedures, most notably collusive decision-making based on avoidance of open and transparent votes through the purportedly traditional practice of musyawarah-mufakat.

Speaker
Stephen Sherlock is a Visiting Fellow in the Department of Political and Social Change at the Australian National University (ANU) and a former Director of the Centre for Democratic Institutions (CDI) at ANU. His interests are Indonesian politics and history, especially legislatures, elections and public sector institutions. He is currently writing a book on the history of Indonesia’s parliaments.

Chair
Associate Professor Marcus Meitzner, Department of Political and Social Change, ANU Coral Bell School of Asia Pacific Affairs.

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