Burhanuddin Muhtadi
Biographic Data
| ID | 322744 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Burhanuddin Muhtadi |
| GIVEN NAMES | Burhanuddin |
| FAMILY NAME | Muhtadi |
| SIGNATURE | MUHTADI B |
| AFFILIATIONS | Syarif Hidayatullah State Islamic University Jakarta |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-6043-6856 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 24 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 211 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 24 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2009 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 7 |
Social Media and Religious Intolerance in Indonesia
Indonesia has simultaneously experienced rapid growth in social media use and persistent concerns about rising religious intolerance, prompting widespread assumptions that digital platforms are fueling intolerance. Yet, the literature offers mixed predictions: social media may heighten hostility through echo-chamber dynamics, reduce prejudice through weak-tie intergroup contact, or generate little attitudinal change on religious tolerance. Drawin…
Complacent Democrats
Indonesia’s population skews young, so political analysts are increasingly concerned with what the “youth vote” looks like, and what generational change will bring to Indonesia’s democracy. On the one hand, analysts have historically focused on the liberal political activism of more educated cohorts of young people, and especially those in urban areas. On the other, and most recently, young Indonesians overwhelmingly voted for Prabowo Subianto in…
Collective Memory, Democratic Ambivalence, and Authoritarian Notions of Democracy
In 2024, Prabowo won by the greatest margin in Indonesian presidential election history, garnering over 96 million votes. How did Prabowo win so decisively, despite his deep ties to the dark authoritarian past and allegations of human rights violations? Utilizing the original national survey data prior to the 2024 presidential election, the author finds that authoritarian beliefs and nostalgia for the authoritarian past do not explain support for…
Politics Over Prejudice? Explaining the Surprising Decline of Anti-Chinese Sentiment in Indonesia During the Covid-19 Pandemic
Indonesian public perceptions of Chinese Indonesians holding different public offices
Partisanship, Religion, and Social Class
This article investigates differences in health precautions taken during the pandemic and the degree to which individuals had faith in the government’s response to Covid-19 in the early stages of the pandemic. Using a sample designed to be nationally representative as well as representative of three lockdown zones, we find that local social-distancing policies, social class, religion, and political partisanship all influenced how Indonesians expe…
Resentment and Polarization in Indonesia
Is political polarization in Indonesia here to stay? For years, scholarly consensus on partisanship in Indonesia viewed weak partisan identity, collusive party behavior, and the predominance of personality as features of a system that would prevent the emergence of deep polarization. In the wake of religious and ethnic mobilizations during three contentious elections, the question of whether polarization has come to Indonesia is increasingly sali…
Political Trust, Democratic Satisfaction, and Partisanship
How does economic hardship during a crisis affect people’s evaluation of the political leadership? In this paper, we investigate how the negative impact of an exogenous event like COVID-19 interacts with other important phenomena which influence leadership approval, such as partisanship, political trust, and satisfaction with democracy. Using a nationally representative survey in Indonesia (N = 1,200), we show that economic hardship does not unif…
Buying Brokers
Studies of electoral clientelism—the contingent exchange of material benefits for electoral support—frequently presume the presence of strong parties. Parties facilitate monitoring and enforcement of vote buying and allow brokers to identify core voters for turnout buying. Where money fuels campaigns but elections center around candidates, not parties, how do candidates pitch electoral handouts? The authors analyze candidates’ distribution of cas…
Why democrats abandon democracy
In several world regions, democracy is in retreat. This retreat is taking place amid growing polarization in many countries, and analysts are increasingly concerned with the role that deepening political divisions play in processes of democratic decline. This article investigates the relationship between partisan polarization and deteriorating public support for democratic institutions. It leverages the case of Indonesia, a major third-wave democ…
Who Gets Exposed to Political Misinformation in a Hybrid Media Environment? The Case of the 2019 Indonesian Election
In the wake of the US 2016 Presidential Election, concerns about misinformation traversing on social media have heightened. Since then, much of the public discourse has been on developing effective strategies to combat the spread of misinformation online. While several studies have focused on the effects of a mixed/hybrid regime of information channels on political participation and campaigns, we know little about how the existence of a hybrid me…
Cleavages and Electoral Support to Islamist Party in Javan Urban Areas
Several studies have noted that electoral support for one of the Islamist parties in Indonesia, the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS), is mostly concentrated in urban areas. While I agree with this observation, I found that these studies did not pay adequate attention to the diversity of socio-political conditions in urban areas that contributed to the varying electoral support for PKS. One of these socio-political conditions is what Lipset and Rokk…
Can Religion Save Corrupt Politicians? Evidence from Indonesia
Does endorsing an Islamist agenda protect a candidate involved in corruption from negative voter evaluations? The corruption literature suggests that voter reactions to corruption are not unbiased and as such Islamist agendas could potentially mitigate the negative effects of a corruption scandal, especially in religious societies. The political Islam literature suggests that endorsing an Islamist agenda would not shield corrupt politicians from …
When does class matter? Unequal representation in Indonesian legislatures
Around the world, legislatures are dominated by politicians who are wealthier and more educated than their constituents. This is particularly so in developing democracies, where clientelist politics and wealth inequalities make it difficult for lower-class citizens to run for office. We contribute to scholarly debates about the substantive consequences of descriptive inequality by analysing a new and important case–Indonesia, the world’s third mo…
The Myth of Pluralism
In much of the scholarly literature, Nahdlatul Ulama (NU), the largest Muslim organization in Indonesia, is recognized as a defender of religious tolerance and pluralism. This is to no small extent the result of how NU has portrayed itself and its actions-including during the 2019 presidential elections, when it professed to have aligned with incumbent president Joko Widodo in order to keep Islamist groups from power. In this article, we analyse …
Elites, masses, and democratic decline in Indonesia
The current worldwide democratic regression has prompted debate about the drivers of democratic decline. One country experiencing decline is Indonesia, where most analysts blame the shift on actions of illiberal elites, casting the public as a democratic bulwark. Yet, as in other fragile democracies, regression in Indonesia has come at the hands of politicians enjoying popular support. To investigate drivers of democratic decline we ask: How demo…
Ideological representation in clientelistic democracies
Inequality and Democratic Support in Indonesia
Indonesia is a country of significant inequalities, but we know little about how Indonesians feel about the gap between rich and poor. Comparative research suggests that negative perceptions of inequality can erode public support for democratic institutions. Using survey data, we explore the relationship between inequality and support for democracy in Indonesia. We find Indonesians are divided in their beliefs about income distribution. But this …
Vote Buying in Indonesia
This open access book investigates the impact of vote buying on the accountability of democratic institutions and policy representation in newly democratic countries focusing on its dynamics in Indonesia’s young democracy, exploring the nature, extent, determinants, targeting and effectiveness
Explaining the 2016 Islamist Mobilisation in Indonesia
There has been an intense scholarly debate about what caused the unprecedented Islamist mass demonstrations in Indonesia in late 2016. Some scholars have argued that increasing intolerance and conservatism among the Muslim population are responsible, while others have disputed such notions, claiming that there is no evidence of widespread support for an Islamist agenda. In this article, we analyse a unique set of polling data to show that a) cons…
Entrepreneurs of Grievance
There has been much scholarly debate on the causes and effects of Islamist mobilizations. As some authors involved in this debate have identified rising Islamist attitudes \namong Muslims as a main cause of Islamist mobilizations, our study advances detailed research of opinion survey data as the best methodology to verify or falsify this assertion. Discussing the case of Indonesia, we use original survey data sets to show that prior to the 2016 …
Jokowi's First Year
When President Joko Widodo (Jokowi) took office in October 2014, he promised to usher in a new style of politics, generating optimism among many Indonesians that his government would enthusiastically promote reform. Yet Jokowi has since placed greater value on realpolitik than on reform, as evidenced by his choice of cabinet members, his response to the controversy surrounding senior police officer Budi Gunawan, and his handling of attempts by th…
The Quest for Hizbut Tahrir in Indonesia
Indonesia
Explaining the 2016 Islamist Mobilisation in Indonesia
There has been an intense scholarly debate about what caused the unprecedented Islamist mass demonstrations in Indonesia in late 2016. Some scholars have argued that increasing intolerance and conservatism among the Muslim population are responsible, while others have disputed such notions, claiming that there is no evidence of widespread support for an Islamist agenda. In this article, we analyse a unique set of polling data to show that a) cons…
Elites, masses, and democratic decline in Indonesia
The current worldwide democratic regression has prompted debate about the drivers of democratic decline. One country experiencing decline is Indonesia, where most analysts blame the shift on actions of illiberal elites, casting the public as a democratic bulwark. Yet, as in other fragile democracies, regression in Indonesia has come at the hands of politicians enjoying popular support. To investigate drivers of democratic decline we ask: How demo…
Why democrats abandon democracy
In several world regions, democracy is in retreat. This retreat is taking place amid growing polarization in many countries, and analysts are increasingly concerned with the role that deepening political divisions play in processes of democratic decline. This article investigates the relationship between partisan polarization and deteriorating public support for democratic institutions. It leverages the case of Indonesia, a major third-wave democ…
Ideological representation in clientelistic democracies
Buying Brokers
Studies of electoral clientelism—the contingent exchange of material benefits for electoral support—frequently presume the presence of strong parties. Parties facilitate monitoring and enforcement of vote buying and allow brokers to identify core voters for turnout buying. Where money fuels campaigns but elections center around candidates, not parties, how do candidates pitch electoral handouts? The authors analyze candidates’ distribution of cas…
Jokowi's First Year
When President Joko Widodo (Jokowi) took office in October 2014, he promised to usher in a new style of politics, generating optimism among many Indonesians that his government would enthusiastically promote reform. Yet Jokowi has since placed greater value on realpolitik than on reform, as evidenced by his choice of cabinet members, his response to the controversy surrounding senior police officer Budi Gunawan, and his handling of attempts by th…
Entrepreneurs of Grievance
There has been much scholarly debate on the causes and effects of Islamist mobilizations. As some authors involved in this debate have identified rising Islamist attitudes \namong Muslims as a main cause of Islamist mobilizations, our study advances detailed research of opinion survey data as the best methodology to verify or falsify this assertion. Discussing the case of Indonesia, we use original survey data sets to show that prior to the 2016 …
The Quest for Hizbut Tahrir in Indonesia
When does class matter? Unequal representation in Indonesian legislatures
Around the world, legislatures are dominated by politicians who are wealthier and more educated than their constituents. This is particularly so in developing democracies, where clientelist politics and wealth inequalities make it difficult for lower-class citizens to run for office. We contribute to scholarly debates about the substantive consequences of descriptive inequality by analysing a new and important case–Indonesia, the world’s third mo…
The Myth of Pluralism
In much of the scholarly literature, Nahdlatul Ulama (NU), the largest Muslim organization in Indonesia, is recognized as a defender of religious tolerance and pluralism. This is to no small extent the result of how NU has portrayed itself and its actions-including during the 2019 presidential elections, when it professed to have aligned with incumbent president Joko Widodo in order to keep Islamist groups from power. In this article, we analyse …
Who Gets Exposed to Political Misinformation in a Hybrid Media Environment? The Case of the 2019 Indonesian Election
In the wake of the US 2016 Presidential Election, concerns about misinformation traversing on social media have heightened. Since then, much of the public discourse has been on developing effective strategies to combat the spread of misinformation online. While several studies have focused on the effects of a mixed/hybrid regime of information channels on political participation and campaigns, we know little about how the existence of a hybrid me…
Inequality and Democratic Support in Indonesia
Indonesia is a country of significant inequalities, but we know little about how Indonesians feel about the gap between rich and poor. Comparative research suggests that negative perceptions of inequality can erode public support for democratic institutions. Using survey data, we explore the relationship between inequality and support for democracy in Indonesia. We find Indonesians are divided in their beliefs about income distribution. But this …
Collective Memory, Democratic Ambivalence, and Authoritarian Notions of Democracy
In 2024, Prabowo won by the greatest margin in Indonesian presidential election history, garnering over 96 million votes. How did Prabowo win so decisively, despite his deep ties to the dark authoritarian past and allegations of human rights violations? Utilizing the original national survey data prior to the 2024 presidential election, the author finds that authoritarian beliefs and nostalgia for the authoritarian past do not explain support for…
Resentment and Polarization in Indonesia
Is political polarization in Indonesia here to stay? For years, scholarly consensus on partisanship in Indonesia viewed weak partisan identity, collusive party behavior, and the predominance of personality as features of a system that would prevent the emergence of deep polarization. In the wake of religious and ethnic mobilizations during three contentious elections, the question of whether polarization has come to Indonesia is increasingly sali…
The Quest for Hizbut Tahrir in Indonesia
Jokowi's First Year
When President Joko Widodo (Jokowi) took office in October 2014, he promised to usher in a new style of politics, generating optimism among many Indonesians that his government would enthusiastically promote reform. Yet Jokowi has since placed greater value on realpolitik than on reform, as evidenced by his choice of cabinet members, his response to the controversy surrounding senior police officer Budi Gunawan, and his handling of attempts by th…
Explaining the 2016 Islamist Mobilisation in Indonesia
There has been an intense scholarly debate about what caused the unprecedented Islamist mass demonstrations in Indonesia in late 2016. Some scholars have argued that increasing intolerance and conservatism among the Muslim population are responsible, while others have disputed such notions, claiming that there is no evidence of widespread support for an Islamist agenda. In this article, we analyse a unique set of polling data to show that a) cons…
Entrepreneurs of Grievance
There has been much scholarly debate on the causes and effects of Islamist mobilizations. As some authors involved in this debate have identified rising Islamist attitudes \namong Muslims as a main cause of Islamist mobilizations, our study advances detailed research of opinion survey data as the best methodology to verify or falsify this assertion. Discussing the case of Indonesia, we use original survey data sets to show that prior to the 2016 …
Vote Buying in Indonesia
This open access book investigates the impact of vote buying on the accountability of democratic institutions and policy representation in newly democratic countries focusing on its dynamics in Indonesia’s young democracy, exploring the nature, extent, determinants, targeting and effectiveness
The Myth of Pluralism
In much of the scholarly literature, Nahdlatul Ulama (NU), the largest Muslim organization in Indonesia, is recognized as a defender of religious tolerance and pluralism. This is to no small extent the result of how NU has portrayed itself and its actions-including during the 2019 presidential elections, when it professed to have aligned with incumbent president Joko Widodo in order to keep Islamist groups from power. In this article, we analyse …
Elites, masses, and democratic decline in Indonesia
The current worldwide democratic regression has prompted debate about the drivers of democratic decline. One country experiencing decline is Indonesia, where most analysts blame the shift on actions of illiberal elites, casting the public as a democratic bulwark. Yet, as in other fragile democracies, regression in Indonesia has come at the hands of politicians enjoying popular support. To investigate drivers of democratic decline we ask: How demo…
Ideological representation in clientelistic democracies
Inequality and Democratic Support in Indonesia
Indonesia is a country of significant inequalities, but we know little about how Indonesians feel about the gap between rich and poor. Comparative research suggests that negative perceptions of inequality can erode public support for democratic institutions. Using survey data, we explore the relationship between inequality and support for democracy in Indonesia. We find Indonesians are divided in their beliefs about income distribution. But this …
Cleavages and Electoral Support to Islamist Party in Javan Urban Areas
Several studies have noted that electoral support for one of the Islamist parties in Indonesia, the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS), is mostly concentrated in urban areas. While I agree with this observation, I found that these studies did not pay adequate attention to the diversity of socio-political conditions in urban areas that contributed to the varying electoral support for PKS. One of these socio-political conditions is what Lipset and Rokk…
Can Religion Save Corrupt Politicians? Evidence from Indonesia
Does endorsing an Islamist agenda protect a candidate involved in corruption from negative voter evaluations? The corruption literature suggests that voter reactions to corruption are not unbiased and as such Islamist agendas could potentially mitigate the negative effects of a corruption scandal, especially in religious societies. The political Islam literature suggests that endorsing an Islamist agenda would not shield corrupt politicians from …
When does class matter? Unequal representation in Indonesian legislatures
Around the world, legislatures are dominated by politicians who are wealthier and more educated than their constituents. This is particularly so in developing democracies, where clientelist politics and wealth inequalities make it difficult for lower-class citizens to run for office. We contribute to scholarly debates about the substantive consequences of descriptive inequality by analysing a new and important case–Indonesia, the world’s third mo…
Political Trust, Democratic Satisfaction, and Partisanship
How does economic hardship during a crisis affect people’s evaluation of the political leadership? In this paper, we investigate how the negative impact of an exogenous event like COVID-19 interacts with other important phenomena which influence leadership approval, such as partisanship, political trust, and satisfaction with democracy. Using a nationally representative survey in Indonesia (N = 1,200), we show that economic hardship does not unif…
Buying Brokers
Studies of electoral clientelism—the contingent exchange of material benefits for electoral support—frequently presume the presence of strong parties. Parties facilitate monitoring and enforcement of vote buying and allow brokers to identify core voters for turnout buying. Where money fuels campaigns but elections center around candidates, not parties, how do candidates pitch electoral handouts? The authors analyze candidates’ distribution of cas…
Why democrats abandon democracy
In several world regions, democracy is in retreat. This retreat is taking place amid growing polarization in many countries, and analysts are increasingly concerned with the role that deepening political divisions play in processes of democratic decline. This article investigates the relationship between partisan polarization and deteriorating public support for democratic institutions. It leverages the case of Indonesia, a major third-wave democ…
Who Gets Exposed to Political Misinformation in a Hybrid Media Environment? The Case of the 2019 Indonesian Election
In the wake of the US 2016 Presidential Election, concerns about misinformation traversing on social media have heightened. Since then, much of the public discourse has been on developing effective strategies to combat the spread of misinformation online. While several studies have focused on the effects of a mixed/hybrid regime of information channels on political participation and campaigns, we know little about how the existence of a hybrid me…
Partisanship, Religion, and Social Class
This article investigates differences in health precautions taken during the pandemic and the degree to which individuals had faith in the government’s response to Covid-19 in the early stages of the pandemic. Using a sample designed to be nationally representative as well as representative of three lockdown zones, we find that local social-distancing policies, social class, religion, and political partisanship all influenced how Indonesians expe…
Resentment and Polarization in Indonesia
Is political polarization in Indonesia here to stay? For years, scholarly consensus on partisanship in Indonesia viewed weak partisan identity, collusive party behavior, and the predominance of personality as features of a system that would prevent the emergence of deep polarization. In the wake of religious and ethnic mobilizations during three contentious elections, the question of whether polarization has come to Indonesia is increasingly sali…
Indonesia
Complacent Democrats
Indonesia’s population skews young, so political analysts are increasingly concerned with what the “youth vote” looks like, and what generational change will bring to Indonesia’s democracy. On the one hand, analysts have historically focused on the liberal political activism of more educated cohorts of young people, and especially those in urban areas. On the other, and most recently, young Indonesians overwhelmingly voted for Prabowo Subianto in…
Collective Memory, Democratic Ambivalence, and Authoritarian Notions of Democracy
In 2024, Prabowo won by the greatest margin in Indonesian presidential election history, garnering over 96 million votes. How did Prabowo win so decisively, despite his deep ties to the dark authoritarian past and allegations of human rights violations? Utilizing the original national survey data prior to the 2024 presidential election, the author finds that authoritarian beliefs and nostalgia for the authoritarian past do not explain support for…
Politics Over Prejudice? Explaining the Surprising Decline of Anti-Chinese Sentiment in Indonesia During the Covid-19 Pandemic
Indonesian public perceptions of Chinese Indonesians holding different public offices
Social Media and Religious Intolerance in Indonesia
Indonesia has simultaneously experienced rapid growth in social media use and persistent concerns about rising religious intolerance, prompting widespread assumptions that digital platforms are fueling intolerance. Yet, the literature offers mixed predictions: social media may heighten hostility through echo-chamber dynamics, reduce prejudice through weak-tie intergroup contact, or generate little attitudinal change on religious tolerance. Drawin…
Politics (21 works) · Political science (19 works) · Law (18 works) · Asian Studies and History (17 works) · Sociology (16 works) · Political economy (14 works) · Law (13 works) · Economics (12 works) · Democracy (11 works) · Development economics (8 works)