Indonesia
By Okamoto Masaaki (associate professor at Kyoto University, Japan) can be reached at okamoto@cseas.kyoto-u.ac.jp.
A new breed of politics?
The fall of Suharto and the resulting social and political upheaval made many Indonesians feel insecure, feeding the proliferation of various kinds of violent groups offering their own particular brands of ‘security’. While some such groups are ethnic-based, others cite religion as a pretext when pursuing their political and economic interests. These groups have successfully gained formal political power at the local level in places like Jakarta, Madura, Lombok and Bali. Continuing insecurity and the persistence of rampant corruption, collusion and nepotism (KKN), combined with the atmosphere of political openness, has also prompted a yearning for social justice among the Indonesian people. Through its particular brand of grass roots activism and Islamic morality the PKS has been perhaps the most successful of the post-New Order political parties to tap into this desire for a politics free of the habits of the past.
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