Indonesia's South China Sea Diplomacy

A Foreign Policy Illiberal Turn

Dados Bibliográficos

ID4845994
AutoresDave Mcrae (The University of Melbourne, autor correspondente)
Ano2019
Páginas1-21
Data de publicação2019-04-24
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessNão
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoJournal of Contemporary Asia (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 0047-2336 • E-ISSN: 1752-7554
EditoraInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/00472336.2019.1601240
OpenAlexW2942049309
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas8
Referências citadas33

Key areas of Indonesian foreign policy have remained largely autonomous of the political struggles associated with democratisation and a subsequent illiberal turn, even as they have changed the way foreign policy is formulated. Indonesia’s South China Sea diplomacy has been one such area of autonomy. Although the issue has gained great public salience, as the most prominent foreign policy challenge for the current Joko Widodo administration, the government has maintained a striking continuity in its approach dating to the authoritarian Suharto era. Such continuity persists because the strategic challenge facing Indonesia has endured: throughout Indonesia’s modern history, the government has sought to assert the nation’s rights to territory and resources against more powerful states. The government’s current policy settings have also preserved a status quo that serves a range of Indonesian interests sufficiently well to prevent the emergence of a coherent coalition of interests to push for a new approach, in what is a technical policy area dominated by foreign ministry experts. As such, although the Joko Widodo administration has exhibited greater overt nationalism in its handling of the issue, Indonesia’s broader illiberal turn has not been transformative of the government’s diplomacy

Authoritarianism · China · Democracy · Democratization · Diplomacy · Foreign policy · Nationalism · Political economy · Political science · Politics · Sociology · Status quo · Asian Studies and History · Island Studies and Pacific Affairs · Law · Maritime Security and History