Sandeep Ray contrasts the very different outcomes from elections in two of the world’s largest democracies.
This year, two of the world’s largest democracies, India and Indonesia went to the polls within two months of each other.
The winning candidates could not have been more different.
Indonesia’s president-elect is a young, modest, approachable former mayor, who won a hard-fought contest by promising transparency and civic participation in his government. India voted in 63 year-old veteran politician Narendra Modi – reputed to be a Hindu-nationalist hardliner with a penchant for big business. His perceived handicap, strong allegations of complicity in the mass-murder of Muslims in Gujarat in 2002, surprisingly did not prevent his meteoric rise in popularity.
While many are bitterly disappointed at Prime Minister Modi’s triumph, he won a free and fair election. Perhaps even more perturbing than Modi’s victory, was the inevitability that he would win – every poll before the elections had predicted it. How is it that Indonesia, only 16 years after the fall of the New Order, was ready to usher in a model democratic leader, while India, in its 16th general election since 1951, chose Modi – a man who leaves a lot to be desired in the realm of secular trust in a country historically polarised by religion?
Indonesia and India had both pushed to create democratic republics in the aftermath of independence. But while Nehru’s Five Year Plans sputtered along slowly, by the late 1950s Sukarno was see-sawing precariously between democracy and autarchy. The mid-1960s saw the nation veering sharply away from a democratic destination as the New Order ascended to power.
India did have its share of anti-democratic spells, most notably Indira Gandhi’s declaration in 1975 of a national emergency suspending many basic civic rights. But otherwise the free and secular model had been generally upheld. And yet in 2014 Indonesia seems to have made a swift and remarkable comeback from the long Suharto years, while India has regressed. One might consider a few broad factors to shed light on this puzzle.
First, for a nation that is frequently and correctly identified as having the largest Muslim population in the world, religion did not factor significantly in the Indonesian elections this year. Cornell University political scientist Tom Pepinsky has conducted longitudinal studies indicating that all other factors remaining the same, religion generally does matter in Indonesian politics – but significantly less so than other considerations such as economy, welfare and corruption.
This changed somewhat in the last years of President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono’s government when extremist Islamist groups were emboldened in their crusades against Christians, liberal Muslims, Shias and the Ahmadiyyas.
And collectively, the four big Islamic parties PPP, PKB, PKS and PAN did make a six per cent gain in the legislative elections in 2014.
Electorally, this however, was not a game changer. In fact, when Prabowo chose to make an issue of religion by guaranteeing ‘the purity of religious teachings’ under his rule, it backfired on him and he hurriedly deleted it from his manifesto. Jokowi sensibly and successfully steered away from the issue of religion.
In contrast, religion has been the over-bearing tone in Indian politics this year. With Modi’s recent promises to rid India of ‘its slave mentality of the last 1000-1200 years’ (he interprets the transition to Islamic rulers in the second millennia as un-Indian), his exhortations to ‘send packing’ illegal Bangladeshi Muslims, and revisionist histories in textbooks being supported by the new ministry, the BJP (Bharatiya Janta Party) has made it clear that it operates within an essentialist Hindu scope.
Skeptics have even viewed Modi’s reputation of being anti-Muslim as having been an electoral advantage. Indeed, a ‘Modi wave’ swept across central and western India. It is however, important to point out that 69 per cent of Indian voters did not vote for Modi. As startling as that sounds, it was often the arithmetic of the first-past-the-post system and not an actual majority vote that led the BJP to their landslide victory of 282 out of 545 seats. An instrumental combination of religious fervor taking hold in electorally strategic states (which had a higher number of seats) was key to a BJP win.
Second, while India certainly has no dearth of renowned scientists, artists, and academics, and has made remarkable leaps in technology, it may surprise many that Indonesia is significantly ahead of India in basic adult literacy.
It is estimated to be 93 per cent for Indonesia and still only about 74 per cent for India.
This achievement is actually in large part due to education policies implemented during the long Suharto years. Some benefits of that incremental advancement were reaped only recently as Indonesia went from autocratic to democratic rule. In functional democracies with a robust literate population, candidates have a better shot at convincing voters of the merits of a self-determined future.
Jokowi reached out to his followers by persuading them that he was creating a political movement where their participation would matter. It worked. A significant number of Indonesians with basic literacy, the group that probably had the most to gain from a new awakening in the government, voted for him. In India, after a decade of weak leadership by the Congress Party, many of Modi’s supporters were persuaded not by the lure of democracy and civic participation but by entrusting their future in what was billed as a heavy-handed ‘big brother’ type leadership.
Unsurprisingly, despite its rising popularity elsewhere in the country in 2014, the BJP was unable to make dents in three large southern states with high literacy rates – Andhra Pradesh, Kerela and Tamil Nadu (average literacy 90 per cent) – while it swept Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh and Bihar in the ‘Hindi heartland’ (average literacy 69 per cent).
Finally, the persistence of arcane dynastic rule was a deal-breaker for India’s democratic aspirations. In the aftermath of the Congress Party’s walloping at the voting booths (securing only 42 seats or barely eight per cent of the total), Shashi Tharoor, possibly one of the most educated, self-achieving politicians ‘modern’ India has produced – a former UN Secretary-General contender no less– vehemently insisted in an interview that nominating Nehru progeny was ‘not in contradiction’ with the ideals of a modern political party.
‘But this is modern India! What about meritocracy?’ high-decibel television host Rajdeep Sardesai had yelled in exasperation. Indeed, it has taken an absurd degree of insularity and arrogance, ills common to long-running, quasi-feudalistic styled governance, for the Congress Party (and by extension the coalition UPA) not to admit that Nehru scion Rahul Gandhi was hardly a challenge to Narendra Modi. Yet, an alternate candidate in a populous nation with many capable politicians was never seriously considered.
While Indonesia does have its share of family backed politics, it is somewhat in check. Megawati didn’t ride for free on her father’s legacy and Titiek is Suharto’s only offspring who successfully ran for Legislative Council, winning her seat this year. This defeat of New Order hardliner Prabowo, a man with deep pockets, a billionaire brother, and decades-old family connections (he was a Suharto son-in-law) is case in point.
When a secular, former furniture salesman of modest means wins the popular vote over a wealthy ex-army general, especially in Southeast Asia, it is a watershed moment in that nation’s democratic journey. In India, the persistence of non-meritocratic dynastic ambitions, a faltering economy, resurgence of religious sectarianism, a weakened minority, an under-educated populous, and conducive electoral arithmetic – all of these created conditions favorable for a takeover by someone with Modi’s far right-wing credentials.
Is India in peril with Modi in office?
University of Chicago political scientists Lloyd and Susanne Rudolph have long argued that right-wing forces like the BJP tend to become more centrist when in power. Modi certainly realises that to ensure a second term victory he will need to improve on his rather low 31 per cent voter success and that that support will have to come from outside his current base.
Many are hoping that Modi’s incendiary positions were merely election time chest-thumping and that he will veer towards sensible rule. The stock market is up five per cent since he took office in May, and the US and the UK have lifted their visa bans on him.
Outspoken anti-Modi intellectuals like filmmaker Anand Patwardan, economist Amartya Sen and author Arundhati Roy however, continue to express their grave concern that insidious change will gradually envelop the country. They contend that India will increasingly position itself as a nation eager to give industrialists and big-capital a leg-up in a manner that will keep widening the already harrowing gap between the haves and have-nots, while infiltrating the nation-wide judiciary with a pro-Hindutva bias that puts minorities in peril.
Indonesia will need a lot more than an affable, ‘people’s man’ to steer it to a robust democracy. Despite Jokowi’s strong track record as Governor of Jakarta, and his perhaps idealistic intentions, the calculus of coalitions dictate that the power-sharing terrain will remain rife with concessions. His recent plan of outsourcing his cabinet nominations to public opinion polls was more stunt than practicality and has drawn heavy criticism.
Indonesia is currently besieged with financial problems – elevated fuel subsidies and a steep drop in price for many of its basic exports. Unlike Modi who faces limited opposition, Jowkowi has opponents with strong financial influence and ties to old military-styled cronyism waiting to call out on incompetence.
Jokowi has one key asset at the moment however – tremendous adulation from his supporters, reminiscent of independence-era Sukarno. But unlike the charismatic first President of Indonesia, who steered the country with a wayward personal style of governance he labeled ‘guided democracy’, Jokowi seems to be determined to let democracy guide him.
Sandeep Ray is a filmmaker and a doctoral candidate in history at the National University of Singapore.
Modi and Jokowi could not be more different. India is a Democracy, Indonesia is still an autocracy. The reality is very clear. In India you can have a Hindu Prime Minister, a Muslim President, a Christian Defence Minister and a Sikh Foreign Minister (or a Jain or a Jew). This has never happened in Indonesia where all cabinet-level officials are Muslims, and it is not going to happen anytime soon, in Indonesia. India has more or less accepted the multicultural and multireligious paradigm since partition, and has anti-discrimination laws. India also has an honest and apolitical military and judiciary, Indonesia does not, enveloped by corruption in the courts and in the military.
Yes, India and Indonesia have a common root in Hindu-Buddhism, with the Majapahit and Sriwijaya Empires in the Archipelago, which strongly influenced native Javanese traditions. India and Indonesia have also always had very close bilateral relations, as “non-aligned” nations, that go back to the close ties between Jawaharlal Nehru and Soekarno. There is no doubt about the closeness of India-Indonesia ties, but at the political and social levels, they are quite different, and not just because India is only 15 % Muslim and Indonesia is 90 % Muslim. Indonesia has never instituted affirmative action policies, like India (not to mention Communism is legal in India and not in Indonesia), and therefore the participation of non-Muslims in Indonesian politics is commercial and political, whereas in India, it is much more meritocratic. Having said that, India is a good model of what Indonesia should become, in terms of multicultural and multireligious diversity, as well as establishing an apolitical and ethical judiciary and military. The election of the non-military Jokowi, over the blood-stained Prabowo, is a small step in the correct direction.
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Dear Hang
I am not sure which century or which country you are looking at. In no parliament in Indonesia’s history and certainly not during the past 20 years has there ever been an over-representation of the religious majority (Muslims).
What kind of a country could be called an “autocracy” when during the past 15 years there have been Presidents coming from 4 different parties?
In the lower House of the Indonesian Parliament there are 17% women (only 11% in the Lok Sabha) while in Indonesia’s upper house there are 26% women (12% in the Raj Sabha). All MPs in Indonesia are elected by the voters. here are no appointed MPs.
Throughout its history, many Commanders of the Armed Forces and the various services within the military, Coordinating Ministers and other ministers, Central Bank Governors, Managing Directors of State Owned Enterprises and untold governors and other local leaders have been from religious and ethnic minorities.
There has never been a Cabinet in all of Indonesian history that has been all Muslim.
In the current Cabinet of 34 members, some 7 are from Religious Minorities including 2 Sino-Indonesians.
Kindly update your prejudiced views.
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Mr Evans,
Your comments are funny. You find the rare unimportant exceptions to prove my very point about India. NO, Indonesia is not a working Democracy, yet. India has been for about 65 years. Please don’t waste time with prevarications and obvious dissembling.
India is far more diverse politically than Indonesia. Your rather meagre examples are
useless. Indonesia has not had a Christian, Buddhist, Hindu (purely Hindu), Taoist or Marxist President, and will not, for many years to come. The mere fact that there are several legal Communist Parties in India, and the mere mention of Communism in Indonesia will get strong whispers, at best. Don’t even attempt to compare the open ideological system in India with Indonesia. Go ahead, start a new Communist Party with the logo of Soekarno. Good luck with that.
Your barely-relevant examples compare in no way to India. Call me when one of the major parties in Indonesia is headed by an Italian born convert to Islam, who is fluent in Bahasa Indonesia, and is one of the most prominent politicians in Jakarta and is accepted as a genuine Indonesian. Call me when there is a Parliament in Indonesia, totally devoid of military people. Already Prabowo supporters are trying to make Jokowi sound like he is the hands of the military
(which I don’t believe). They did that during the elections. Indian elections aren’t perfect but, then candidates don’t accuse each other of being proxies for the Indian Army. Indian Parties do not squabble over military connections, period. Call me when Indonesia has a two-star JEWISH General that led one of the most important campaigns in Indonesian history. You will be lucky if the Jewish man isn’t run out of town as a “Zionist Conspirator”, something no Jew in India was ever accused of. I urge you to read about General Jacob and his role in the various Indian military campaigns. Every Indian, including former Muslim Presidents of India, have honoured General Jacob. Please don’t make me out to be a fool and tell me such things happen in Indonesia, when they don’t. Yeah, how many Hindu, Chinese and Catholic Generals in Indonesia now ?
I didn’t hear you. And, yes, Benny Moerdani is no longer with us, that doesn’t count.
You do not know what nation you are talking about, let alone what century we are living in. Unless you have been in Indonesia and India for a total of 40 years, which it is clear, you have not, spare me your attempts at political revisionism of Indonesia into something it is not. Indonesia is an Islamic nation, with minorities. India is a Democracy that is 15 % Muslim, as well as having Parsees, Christians, Jains, Jews, Buddhists and others. And for at least two of these (Parsees and Jews), don’t even dare to tell me that in Indonesia they would be treated more tolerantly, than in India, where they have lived, completely free, for several thousand years, while Shi’ites and Ahamdiyas
are regularly persecuted in Indonesia. Wow, 2 Sino-Indonesia !! I have news Mr Evans, in autocratic Malaysia, Chinese even are allowed to have their own parties, as are Indians. Spare me any more lectures, bone up on Indonesia and India, as you are most bereft of knowledge, of either nation.
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You have a funky understanding of what autocracy means
Cambridge Dictionary defines autocracy as: government by a single person or small group that has unlimited power or authority, or the power or authority of such a person or group
I am not sure about you but that sounds nothing like Indonesia to me.
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India is the great country on earth. I bow before the magnificence of Indian democracy. Despite all your talk about the religious tolerance of India, the fact is your beloved India, has instituted anti-conversion laws in some states. In fact the current PM, instituted such laws in Gujarat. I thought they had religious freedom in India. As for persecution of Shia and Ahmadiyah, how many low caste men have been burned to a crisp in the cow belt for defending their women against rape by higher caste men. Anti-Caste violence in India has with far grater frequency than persecution of religious minorities in Indonesia, but since its accepted, the West does not complain. Why didn’t the Federal Government in India do anything about it?
As for Indonesia being an Islamic nation, for much of its history, when it wasn’t a democracy, Muslim were actually persecuted and their religious freedoms curbed in the name of secularism. Muslims women were allowed to wear head coverings in state institutions whether schools or universities. And even in Islamic schools. Would India ban the Sikhs from wearing the Kirpa or laws concerning protection of cattle (beef) in its Constitution. Why just cattle, why not chicken, pigs or goats etc.
From a blunt legal assessment of the Indonesian vs Indian Constitution, the Indian one is far more riddle with “Hinduism” than the Indonesian one with respect or Islam.
Indonesia is a military dictatorship, you are correct, so it should be held to a lower standard than India, a democracy. India elected an PM who was most likely involved in abetting the slaughter of thousands of Muslims. What a tolerant society, I want to move there right now.
As for your Catholic Hindoo convert who leads the a major party in India, would she have become that PM had she not been the wife of one Indian PM and the daughter law of another. India has been ruled by Gandhi-Nehru for 46 out of 67 years, and total of 56 years for the Congress as a whole total. Indonesia has been ruled by the Sukarno family for 19 out of 65 years. 32 Years by Suharto, 14 years by others. Which one would you a military dictatorship or feudal-democracy where one family has more or less ruled the country for most of its history.
BY the way Chinese Indonesians can form their own parties. So can Catholics, Christians. The problem is you don’t know enough about Indonesian politics to realize that such parties do exist. The problem is they don’t get enough votes.
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You do not have the faintest idea what you are talking about. Where did you get description of Indonesia, cut and paste from Glifford Geertz ?
You cannot defend Indonesian intolerance, so you point out India’s problems. Classic deflection and dissembling. I am sure my Ahmadiya friend in a wheelchair, with second-degree burns all over his body, would love to hear your propaganda, and coming from a non-Indonesian, trying to out-Indonesia the Indonesians, is particularly comical. Chinese parties huh ? Name them, please. And I am sure they also have dragon dances throughout Java and also “dominate the economy” too.
By the way, they burn people and smash heads in, too in Indonesia, not just in India (smashing heads, actually, is rare in India). And make sure you jail a Communist on the way out. Rape is no less rampant in Indonesia than India. Parsees sought refuge in India from Moghul Iran for a reason, How come they didn’t go to “moderate” Indonesia. They would have loved Aceh and Madura. The Protocols of the Elders of Zion and Mein Kampf can be found all over Jakarta, but somehow, they are less frequent in New Delhi. “Kill the Jews” is heard all year round among SOME Indonesians, hardly less frequent than analogous comments in Gujarat about Muslims. Or did India elect a Muslim President as a sign of tokenism and George Fernandes accidentally became Defense Minister, right ?
Portuguese must have bribed Congress Party.
Get a life, and some truth. You have little of either.
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“As for your Catholic Hindoo convert..”
Anyone who spells Hindu as “Hindoo” is either in a British Colonial timewarp, infatuated with EM Forster, or is merely illiterate. As I doubt you are the “Jewels in the Crown”, we have not used the term “Hindoo” for quite some time, Memsahib. It very much weakens any arguments you make in defence of modern Indonesia, when you seem so prone to anachronistic expressions that best belong in old novels of the British Raj. Welcome to the 21st Century. Funny, though.
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@Nakal
The dictatorship was just sarcasm. While you think my remarks are childish and nonacademic, well they are. While this is supposed to be an academic blog, having a film maker write about Indonesian/India electron really shows its not. I have seen some very partisan writing about the Indonesian election (very anti-Prbaowo), and I am supposed to hold it in high regard.
If it really was an academic blog, at least they should have gotten someone more credible to write about the two elections.
Sorry about your friend. but I will go through your points one by one. Nevertheless, I will go through my points one by one.
Parsiee and Mughals, I didn’t know the Mughals were in Iran? Tell me the story. Iran had been invade by Arab Muslims conquerors starting from the 8th century. The Parsis started immigrating to India since then. The Mughals came much later (13the century). As for moderate Indonesia, Indonesia was Hindu-Buddhist at the time. You tell me why they didn’t go to “tolerant” Indonesia? Most parts of Indonesia weren’t Muslim until 15-16th century.
Chinese Indonesian parties, well in the beginning of reformasi period, there were a couple, that have since been disbanded. Here is an book on it.
http://books.google.com/books?id=5CBr78vhjhcC&pg=PA63&lpg=PA63&dq=partai+politik+tionghoa+indonesia+order+reformasi&source=bl&ots=UcJD7b7HQB&sig=GfJGZhVpDH3AY9HJsHG5spP3HtI&hl=en&sa=X&ei=AYbqU79-qIKLAqaBgaAJ&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=partai%20politik%20tionghoa%20indonesia%20order%20reformasi&f=false
“Rape is no less rampant in Indonesia than India.”
Do you have proof? Can you provide me with statistics? The incidence of rape in Indonesia is about 60% lower than in India.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/21672/Crime-Statistics-Rapes
” Or did India elect a Muslim President as a sign of tokenism and George Fernandes accidentally became Defense Minister, right ?”
The Indian President is not directly elected by the population, but elected by a joint session of the Upper and Lower houses and state assemblies. Its a ceremonial position. As for George Fernandez. The funny thing with India is certain ethnic groups dominate the military, what they call the “martial races”. Its a hold over from India’s colonial past, but for some reason Indians still adhere to those stereotypes.
“Portuguese must have bribed Congress Party.
Get a life, and some truth. You have little of either”
Unfortunately, the Swedes beat the Portuguese to it. Maybe Rajiv thought the Swedish women handing over his bribes were prettier than Portuguese women.
Yes and this is coming from a person who lowered himself to debate with a gutter rat, like myself. As for the truth, maybe you need to get a hold of some facts before preaching about the truth.
The low quality of the post brings out racist and stereotypical arguments like Hang Tuah and mine. Indonesia and India are vastly different countries politically, comparing them is futile. The assumption is that Modi bad, Jokowi good. Why do some English speaking literati and champagne socialist in India hate Modi so much. People could be a bit more neutral.
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@Monique
I am a guy, Memsahib is used to refer to women, my Memsahib. Its a combination of Ma’am and Sahib. As for Hindoo I know its anarchistic, I can’t help it, my history teacher was a Scottish woman born and bred in British India (3 Generations).
As for EM Forster and a Passage to India, I take offense that one would refer to his works as anarchistic. EM Forster at one point was the private secretary to an Indian Raj. How many Western scholars who pen these post in this blogs have worked in such a capacity. EM Foster has a far better insight into India than most modern Western writers writing about the country.
As for modern Indonesia, the poster Hang Tuah has been copying and pasting the same stuff 203 times. He was goading the Indonesians to respond. The arguments are similar to the ones they use for Pakistan, its the same. The underlying argument is that Muslims are intolerant and are incapable of democracy.
India and Indonesia are vastly different countries, political, socially etc. Is India more tolerant / democratic than Indonesia? Yes in some ways, no in others. India is diverse, but its like a Mosiac, states are clearly divided largely on linguistic lines. New Delhi, Mumbai and Bangalore are the few big multicultural cities. In Indonesia, whole provinces are multicultural, you have Lampung, South Sumatra, Jakarta, Kalimantan, , Bangka, Bengkulu, Jambi, Riau. The fact that Jokowi could win in Jakarta is an indication of that, if Jakarta resembled Mumbai he wouldn’t even be voted dog catcher. India allows regional parties. Is it a good thing? Depends who you ask.
How would Jakartans like Forum Betawi to run Jakarta. That is Mumbai for you, the Municipal Council of Mumbai has been controlled by Shiv Sena for decades.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shiv_Sena
A party that is xenophobic and commits acts of violence is not something to cheer about.
Yes India from a national perspective may seem more tolerant than Indonesia, but once you drill down to regional and local politics, I am doubt it. The fact that Jokowi, a mayor from Central Java could be voted in as Jakarta Governor is more impressive than him being elected President. Even in the US, the way local politics operates, with entrenched local fiefdoms, residency requirements in some cases non-partisanship. The last Republican Mayor of Chicago left office in 1931.
I expected more from an academic blog, you can’t talk about Jokowi and Modi without talking about regional politics / local elections in their respective countries. Jokowi is a rare political animal even by current Western standards. One Australian commentator said, there are very few national leaders that are entrepreneurs. Modi’s background is more typical of most politicians, he is professional politician like most top politicians in the West. There are politicians in developed democracies who start their political career in their late 30s-50s, but they rarely become President / Prime Minister. You have to go back to Jimmy Carter to have a US President that wasn’t professional politician / community organizer / celebrity or trading on his family pedigree. And before that, Harry Truman. How healthy is a democracy dominated by professional politicians?
For an academic blog, a lot of the post aren’t much different than what you find in the press. Comparing Jokowi and Modi has been done about dozen times in the Indian / Western press in one form or the other in the last year. What would be more interesting is to examine the legislative elections in April and some of the state elections and national parliamentary election. Their backgrounds, how much were campaigns cost.
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As I have pointed out on this website before, Jokowi is also backed by ‘wealthy ex-army general’ Luhut Binsar Panjaitan, plus a stable of Megawati’s favourite TNI officers, such as Hendropriyono, Sutiyoso and Ryamizard Ryacudu. Whether, taken together, their fortunes match that of Prabowo and Hashim or not, I don’t know. But let’s not pretend that Jokowi’s election was financed entirely by kampung donations.
It is odd that the author didn’t mention the man who could be considered Jokowi’s counterpart in India, Arvind Kejriwaal, who was chief minister of New Delhi, thus an exact counterpart to Jokowi, for some time before resigning. His common man’s approach bears comparisons with Jokowi’s, though Jokowi had a stronger base. Kejriwal’s Aam Aadmi (‘Common Man’) party was pretty unsuccessful, and of course he was defeated by Modi in Varanasi. Kejriwal was a critic of some of India’s richest businessmen, such as Ambani and Adani. By contrast, Jokowi is not a critic of Indonesia’s richest businessmen, despite contesting the presidency at a time of rapidly growing inequality in his homeland.
This author apparently believes that Megawati ‘didn’t ride for free on her father’s legacy’. This may be passably accurate if a comparison with Rahul Gandhi, great-grandson of Nehru, is intended, but she has failed so often that she should have been dumped years ago.
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How rich is Luhut Binsar Panjaitan, he is definitely no scion of the Tata group. For all Jokowi association with military generals, how that compare with Modi close association and active participation in chauvinist Hindu organizations. Its the equivalent of having some who was an ex-member of FPI as President. The BJP has members of Sri Rama Sena in their ranks, that is the Gerindra allow the FPI to join its ranks. Even Gerindra won’t allow FPI members to become Gerindra members. Despite what you say about Gerindra, they keep their paramilitary thugs at greater distance than the BJP does.
Arvind Kejriwaal is not PM, and his is not even Chief Minister of Delhi,he quit after 6 weeks. I can criticize rich people, but how does that improve the livelihood of the poor? But if Jokowi was to start criticizing the rich, people would be calling him out for being anti-Chinese.
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The writer does not know enough about Indonesia, and I find it surprising they got a film director to write such a piece. The Indonesian correspondent for The Hindu was written a much more informative article about the differences between the two.elections.
The author didn’t highlight the main differences between India and Indonesia. The big mistake is focusing on the two individuals, its understandable, but wrong. Jokowi does not seem himself as a singular defining leader, but as a vanguard for the subsequent local leaders that will shape and eventually dominate Indonesian politics for the next 20-30 years. Indonesia was able to produce a Jokowi after just 16 years, because of decentralization. Indonesians can directly elect regent chiefs, mayors and governors. This has allowed middle class people like Jokowi and Ahok to become local leaders with a very small campaign chest. In India, in most states, district chiefs and mayors are chosen by the state parliament, not directly elected. You have to have a lot resources to run for Chief Minister of a State in India.
The second aspect is Indonesia is more centralized and uniform than Indonesia than India. Almost everyone speaks Indonesia. The media The media is centered around Jakarta. Third is the settlement pattern of Indonesia. Indonesia has many more multicultural cities and regions than India. Outside of Bangalore, Dehli and Bombay much of India is mono cultural, one ethnic group dominates. In Bombay the city government has been dominated by Shiv Sena. In contrast, Indonesians cities are much more multicultural, to the extant that the original inhabitants aren’t the majority. When Jokowi became Governor, he didn’t even have a Jakarta Identity Card.. Would the Mayor Of Chicago try to run for Mayor of NYC?
The author like many analyst who point out to Jokowi’s face greater opposition than Modi in Parliament, divisions within his own party, forget two things about Indonesia. Modi faces his own problems, mainly that India is explicitly a Federal Republic, while Indonesia on paper is still unitary Meaning the central government in Indonesia has a lot more powers than in India. Secondly, the Indonesian Presidency is a lot more powerful than the US Presidency. SBY was able to accomplish a lot more in his first term than in his second term, despite a smaller coalition.
Another thing is Jokowi from the start has been very clear, unlike Modi, where the money is most likely going to come from for all his spending plans. Removal of the fuel subsidies, and he out going President, SBY is already increasing fuel prices. Modi never really mentioned if he was going to tackle India’s much large subsidies
About the whole education aspect, South India did not vote for Modi, less because of education, but because of they feared Hindi chauvinism and being the more prosperous parts of India, wondered what is so special of Gujarat. The other reason is Southern India is much more religious diverse than Northern India. Secondly, interestingly enough Jokowi won heavily among the less educated and poor, and among minorities. In fact Jokowi didn’t even the majority of Muslim votes in Indonesia.
Many people from English speaking countries look at Indonesia from a right vs left in economic terms. Indonesians don’t think like that. Jokowi was more explicitly more right wing on economic policy than Prabowo, that is why foreign investors endorse him. And Indonesia as a country is much more right wing economically than India is.
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“religion did not factor significantly in the Indonesian elections this year.”
Given that Jokowi faced massive smear campaign depicting him as not Muslim enough (or as a Chinese, a closet Christian), which prompted him and his campaign team to try to highlight his Islamic credential, it wouldn’t be accurate to say that “religion” did not matter in the presidential election. There are many other indicators that suggest religion played a role in the election: such as Prabowo-Hatta’s “coalition of Islamic parties”, attempts to frame Jokowi/PDIP as PKI due to their secular nationalist platform, and the role of pesantren during the campaign period…etc.
I guess the problem has to do with your conflation of religion and political Islam; whilst the former remains an important factor in Indonesian politics in my view, the latter has become somewhat discredited and lost its salience as many analysts have pointed out (on this site as well).
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I am in agreement with your observation. Indeed, this election saw far more activity along religious lines compared to 2009. I was making a comparison with India where the BJP strongly identified with religion and that led to an electoral points surge – more so than here. But yes, religion and political Islam perhaps ought not to be conflated.
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An interesting comparison — and one that I expect will continue to receive critical attention.
Still, some of the analysis seemed shallow. One point that, in particular, bothered me was the implication that Indonesia and India’s different electoral outcomes could be explained by differences in literacy rates. There may be some truth to this, but it is a big claim and thus requires greater evidence than the author provides. Without such evidence, it sounds as though the author is saying that only uneducated voters voted for Modi/Prabowo and only smarter, better educated voters voted for Jokowi. This is an overly-simplified narrative that doesn’t advance this interesting comparison.
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To your point Modi actually swept some of the most educated areas – the cities Bangalore, Delhi and Mumbai. I was looking at trends across the country that would explain the overall high numbers for the BJP. Probowo got many votes from the educated urban elite.The well educated % in both countries is still low. A lot really depends on the votes that come in from the huge number of people with basic literacy. I think it would be worth a specialists time to do a large n study on this.
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Personally I dont agree with most of points raised in the article. The author seems to be left oriented scholar who compared the two leaders very superficially and like other leftists he did not miss to brand Modi as anti Muslim.
The leader who has been into active politics since his youth and the other who has been picked up by a strong political party PDI-P (who was already facing leadership crisis) can not be compared.
Jokowi is certainly a good man having clean record(as projected by media) given his 9 yr of experience as mayors of two cities, however there are so many aspirant leaders in Indonesia both in PDI-P and other coalition groups and have good records but not popularized as him, can be really very challenging in coming future.
The reference about Amartyasen who never criticized the previous govts for their corrupt practices, and Arundhati Roy, who is not a think tank but just one of the novelists in India is not enough.
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