Indonesia's role in the international arena has strengthened and expanded in the last fifteen years, as sustained economic growth and a stable democracy have propelled its rise to the ranks of a more assertive regional power. While there is consensus on Indonesia's potential to further consolidate its status in the region and beyond, Indonesia's increasing activism is not fully understood, especially with regard to its role in regional integration in Southeast Asia and its relations with key global players such as China and the United States.
The edited book under review, featuring chapters by 19 experts mainly based in Australian and Singaporean academia, aims to address these open questions with an analysis of the ‘domestic and international issues and consequences associated with Indonesia's ascent’ (p. 3). After an introduction in which some conceptual and theoretical issues are discussed, a brief history of Indonesia's foreign policy from independence to the New Order lays the foundations for subsequent contributions. Chapter 3 opens the analysis of domestic factors in Indonesia's rise by looking at patterns of economic development, with a particular emphasis on macroeconomic and fiscal outcomes. Chapter 4 offers an informative account of the role of Islam in Indonesian political discourse, arguing that it has provided an important source of political stability in democratic Indonesia, and Chapter 5 speculates on possible internal security challenges after the abatement of the ethnic and secessionist violence that characterised the first years of democracy. Finally, Chapter 6 reviews various issues related to democratic consolidation in Indonesia, identifying the weakness of political parties as a key challenge for political stability.
After these four chapters on domestic developments in post-authoritarian Indonesia, the focus of the book shifts to the international stage. Chapters 7 and 8 introduce Indonesia's international security and foreign policies, outlining the key trends unfolding in these two fields over the last decade. Chapter 9 studies Indonesia's engagement with selected international institutions, and the following chapters focus on bilateral relations with Australia (Chapters 10 and 11) and Malaysia, Singapore and Vietnam (Chapter 12). Chapter 13 studies the role of Indonesia in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), especially as it concerns Indonesia's leadership role in a number of areas of regional cooperation. Chapter 14 expands the focus on regionalism with an analysis of the prospects of Indonesia's continued commitment to the ASEAN project. Finally, Chapter 15 addresses an issue of particular importance to the current administration, namely Indonesia's aspirations to become a maritime power, and the concluding chapter discusses possible future developments in the rise of Indonesia as a key regional actor.
Indonesia's ascent offers a useful compendium of the key challenges that Indonesia is facing in its quest for domestic development and international recognition, as several of its chapters offer cogent analysis rooted in long-standing debates in comparative politics and international relations. The quality of the individual contributions, however, varies substantially, and some of them will disappoint the reader with their lack of analytical depth. Furthermore, the organisation of the book presents some weaknesses. For example, the volume dedicates two chapters to Indonesia–Australia relations, but none to relations with the United States or China, the two world powers most involved in Southeast Asia; and the role of Japan and South Korea in the region is barely acknowledged throughout the book. More broadly, the contributions suffer from a deplorable lack of attention to key policy issues that are shaping the landscape of domestic politics in Indonesia and international politics in Southeast Asia. For instance, Chapter 3 only briefly mentions the dramatic expansion of social security and poverty alleviation programmes, a key feature of Indonesia's efforts to tackle the economic inequalities discussed in that chapter; Chapter 5 analyses internal security threats without reference to the linkages between domestic radical Islam and the Islamic State in the Middle East; Chapter 9 delves into the marginal and anachronistic Non-Aligned Movement, but does not discuss Indonesia's stance on the Trans-Pacific Partnership or the newly established Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank; Chapter 15 overlooks territorial disputes in the South China Sea, arguably a key development for Indonesia's ambitions to grow as an internationally established maritime power; and so forth.
The editors of this timely collection have succeeded in a laudable effort of bringing together a diverse range of experts, many of them Indonesians, to provide an account of the domestic and international dimensions of Indonesia's rise as a regional power. To be sure, academic specialists will not find much theoretical sophistication or empirical novelty in the contributions included in the volume. Nevertheless, despite its deficiencies, Indonesia's ascent represents a valuable resource for a more generalised readership. Practitioners in various fields interested in gaining a more thorough understanding of the increasingly prominent role of Indonesia in the international arena, and of its implications for Southeast Asia and beyond, will find in this volume a reliable and stimulating guide.
