"Indonesia, an Unlikely Democracy"

First aired on March 15, 2019.

In this Brookings Cafeteria Podcast, Jonathan Stromseth of Brookings interviews Tom Pepinsky of Cornell about Indonesia and its political system. The podcast covers quite a bit of general information and history about Indonesia, so serves as a nice rough introduction to some of the major political points about the vast archipelago.

Pepinsky begins by detailing the inherent complexity of the nation: 17,000 islands within an area about the size of the Sahara. The islands are ethnically, religiously, and linguistically very diverse, without a majority ethnicity but with a majority religion (Islam, at about 88% of the population).

The discussion then turns to how this background affects democracy in Indonesia, and why it's considered an "unlikely" democracy - namely, that its particular mixture of religious, ethnic, and historical characteristics make it unlikely that democracy would have taken hold. Nevertheless, Indonesia became a democracy, so the podcast runs through the particular mixture of events that led to this state of affairs. Pepinksy then highlights recent political changes such as the election of Joko Widodo (a.k.a Jokowi), and what his ascent has meant for governance in Indonesia, as well as the rising role of Islam in political affairs and how a changing emphasis on religion changes the political calculus of leaders in the country.

Stromseth and Pepinsky take a break in the middle, which Brooking's Molly Reynolds fills with an update from the United States Congressional situation (probably a bit outdated whenever you're listening to this), and then wrap up with the relationship between Indonesia and the United States.