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There is much talk today about Indonesia’s rise and aspirations to regional leadership as a middle power. Supporters of this proposition often cite a raft of facts and statistics to validate this claim: Indonesia’s impressive economic growth rates in recent years (averaging 6 percent) relative to other Asian countries, its young population and vibrant democracy, its size and enormous natural resources, etc. These are necessary conditions for regional leadership; yet on their own, they are insufficient. Leadership in international affairs is not just about sitting at the table, nor is it solely about brandishing a country’s potential; it is about what an aspiring power can bring to the table, what sort of following it can muster, and how it can contribute to and promote peace and stability.

This article looks beyond the factsheets and unpacks the notion of Indonesian leadership by assessing key initiatives associated with Indonesia in terms of the intent and objectives behind them, their overall effect (and effectiveness), how they were received by the region, and whether such initiatives are the best means through which Indonesia can play a leadership role towards the ends of regional stability. It considers three recent high-profile initiatives, in particular, that are associated with Indonesia: 1) the ASEAN Security Community concept; 2) the Bali Democracy Forum; and 3) the proposal for an Indo-Pacific Treaty.

Indonesian leadership in historical context

While it is in vogue to talk about Indonesian leadership today, one should realize that this proposition that Indonesia is a regional actor of considerable consequence which can influence its geostrategic neighborhood in significant ways is not new. Indeed, the proposition is as old as independent Indonesia itself, though historians might even trace it further back to the kingdom of Majapahit and the rise of Javanese hegemony in archipelagic Southeast Asia. Soon after independence in 1949, President Sukarno sought to position Indonesia alongside India as a leader of the non-aligned world. In return, Indonesia found itself courted by the major powers of the day—the United States, the People’s Republic of China, the Soviet Union. Yet, as events unfolded, Indonesian adventurism under Sukarno proved to be a source of great instability in the region, particularly in maritime Southeast Asia when his policy of “Konfrontasi” (Confrontation) to “Ganjang Malaysia” (Crush Malaysia) strained relations with Malaysia and Singapore.

The damage of the failed campaign against the formation of Malaysia to Indonesia’s regional reputation in the eyes of its neighboring states, and some major powers from the Western world as well, was slowly but adroitly repaired by Sukarno’s successor, President Suharto, his capable foreign minister, Adam Malik, as well as key figures of the military intelligence who worked to cultivate counterparts in the region and beyond. Suharto moved quickly to shift Indonesia’s foreign policy stance away from the adventurism associated with his predecessor towards greater self-restraint. This he did through a deliberate act of regional leadership “from the rear.” Unlike Sukarno, who harbored intense suspicions of regional organizations, particularly those such as the Association of Southeast Asia (ASA) and the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO), whose membership included West-leaning members, Suharto welcomed the formation of ASEAN. Not only that, he was also prepared to compromise in order to ensure the association’s survival.¹ This created conditions for a thawing of relations with key Southeast Asian neighbors, and anchored almost three decades of peace and stability among ASEAN states.

Indonesia’s credibility and regional status as primus inter pares within ASEAN during the presidential tenure of Suharto was severely crippled by the 1997-1998 Asian financial crisis, which brought an end to Suharto’s thirty-two years in office and Indonesia to the brink of disintegration. With national attention and resources preoccupied with the considerable challenges that came after the fall of Suharto, Indonesian foreign policy drifted even as ASEAN relevance and credibility came under intense scrutiny. Against this backdrop, Indonesia prepared to host the Ninth ASEAN Summit in 2003, which occasioned an attempt on Jakarta’s part to return to a position of leadership in ASEAN, albeit not one in the mold of self-restraint that had characterized Indonesian activism within the region under Suharto.

The ASEAN Security Community, 2003

At the Ninth ASEAN Summit held in Bali, Indonesia in October 2003, Indonesia proposed the concept of an ASEAN Security Community, which was later adopted as one of the three pillars of ASEAN (the other two being the ASEAN Economic Community and the ASEAN Social-Cultural Community). Collectively, the three concepts became part of Bali Concord II, a signal document for the regional organization as it came out of the Asian financial crisis. Indonesia was assigned to lead and coordinate the development of a Plan of Action that would operationalize the ASC. In February 2004, Jakarta formally presented a draft Plan of Action for an ASEAN Security Community, which contained seventy proposals. After several revisions, the ASEAN Security Community Plan of Action was adopted by ASEAN at the Tenth ASEAN Summit in Vientiane, Laos in November 2004. Notably, the ASEAN Security Community blueprint on which ASEAN eventually settled differed considerably from Indonesia’s draft Plan of Action.

The inception of the ASC can be traced to an earlier paper authored by Rizal Sukma, an influential foreign policy think-tanker from the Jakarta-based Centre of Strategic and International Studies, which had as its opening premise the view that “the need to cooperate in political and security area was conspicuously absent in the founding document of the Association.”² Sukma argued that in order for ASEAN to retain its relevance, it needed to “strengthen its capability to prevent and resolve conflicts and disorder.” Sukma’s paper formed the intellectual foundation upon which Indonesia’s draft Plan of Action was built and presented to the association. While the draft Plan of Action did not depart from ASEAN’s cherished norms of non-interference in domestic affairs and consensus-based decision-making, it did raise issues that ASEAN had hitherto tended to elude. They included calls for the signing of an extradition treaty and a non-aggression treaty, formation of a human rights commission, commitment to regular elections, open access to information, and the creation of a social climate of tolerance and transparency. The most controversial element was the proposal to establish a regional peacekeeping force to tackle situations of civil conflict and humanitarian crisis. The contents of the draft Plan of Action were undoubtedly bold and ambitious. They were also ahead of their time, for it was not until the creation of the ASEAN Charter in 2007 that at least some of these proposals were adopted.

Several developments informed Jakarta’s move to seize the opportunity of the Bali Summit to launch a major initiative. Based on a range of statements made by representatives from the Indonesian foreign policy establishment, deeper ASEAN integration and closer cooperation on security matters were necessary in response to a new strategic environment. Two particular concerns in this regard were ASEAN’s impotence during the Asian financial crisis and its recent expansion. Both events threatened the credibility of the association and threatened to undermine its effectiveness, which, in turn, compromised its claim to centrality in regional affairs.

Notwithstanding these pressing concerns, Indonesian proactivism at the 2003 Bali Summit was also prompted by a strong sense that the time had come for Jakarta to break out of its diplomatic dormancy and lay claim to a role in shaping the future of the region by reasserting Indonesian primacy in Southeast Asia. Indeed, Sukma himself tellingly cautioned that if Indonesia failed to push closer cooperation through the ASEAN Security Community, it “would need to wait ten years before its turn comes again.”³ Indonesia’s push for the ASEAN Security Community was further informed by domestic pressures on two other counts. First, the previous year (2002) saw Indonesia lose its case against Malaysia at the International Court of Justice over the ownership of the islands of Sipadan and Ligitan, which provoked a strong nationalist backlash in Indonesia. In response to that episode, the ASEAN Security Community was envisioned to provide a platform for regional states to manage, if not resolve, bilateral differences. Second, the inclusion of references to democracy and human rights as part of what Indonesia wanted to see as the core values of ASEAN via the ASEAN Security Community was also, in part, due to domestic pressure, particularly from increasingly vocal and active civil society and lobby groups.

The Indonesian draft for the security community received a cautious reception within ASEAN when it was presented. While regional states recognized Jakarta’s desire as hosts to table a substantive agenda, the contents of the proposal met with resistance from almost all member states. Founding members such as Singapore, Malaysia, and Thailand responded negatively to suggestions for the establishment of a peacekeeping force, which implied a security and defense function for ASEAN—a path which it had consciously sought to avoid since its formation in 1967. To be sure, the issue was not something new for the founding members. Indonesia had on at least two previous occasions proposed some manner of institutionalized defense cooperation in Southeast Asia: in 1976, it sought unsuccessfully to nudge ASEAN into adopting a formal framework for defense cooperation, and in 1990, former foreign minister Mochtar Kusumaatmadja suggested that Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore consider establishing a defense agreement. In both instances, Jakarta’s proposals met with staunch opposition as latent suspicions of Indonesian intent were reawakened. The founding members were not the only ones who expressed reservations. Newer member states like Vietnam and Myanmar also harbored misgivings towards the Indonesian proposal, particularly in response to how it implicitly advocated intervention in the internal affairs of member states. The final document, which set out the terms of the ASEAN Security Community, differed significantly from the original Indonesian draft. Rather than push for the establishment of new institutions to enhance security and defense cooperation within ASEAN, it was notable for its conservatism, as it essentially reinforced existing ASEAN norms and values.

Bali Democracy Forum, 2008

In 2008, Indonesia organized the inaugural Bali Democracy Forum with a view to showcase its successful transition from authoritarian rule to a full-fledged, functioning democracy within a few years. Thus far, it remains the only inter-governmental forum where discussions revolve around democracy and political development in the region. The chief architects were the former foreign minister, Hassan Wirajuda, and Indonesia’s director of public diplomacy, Umar Hadi. The brainchild of the forum, however, is believed to be President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono. On its website, the Bali Democracy Forum claims that it aims to be “an annual, inclusive and open intergovernmental forum on the development of democracy in the Asia-Pacific region. The forum promotes regional and international cooperation in the field of peace and democracy through dialogue-based sharing of experiences and best practices that adhere to the principle of equality, mutual respect, and understanding, with the participating countries sharing its ownership.” In order to achieve these lofty goals, an Institute for Peace and Democracy was created and tasked to organize workshops and undertake research to support the Bali Democracy Forum and its objectives. Such was the draw of the forum that in 2013, more than twelve heads of government and representatives from more than eighty countries and non-governmental organizations attended.

The creation of the Bali Democracy Forum signaled Indonesia’s intention to make the promotion of democracy a key element of its foreign policy and a niche issue area in which its diplomacy hoped to make a regional, if not global, contribution. Such aspirations were understandable given Indonesia’s own successful transition to democracy. Further informing the creation of the Bali Democracy Forum was the belief that the promotion of “Western-style” democracy would be counterproductive and inappropriate for Asia given the diversity of cultures, histories, and political systems. Regardless of the striking similarities between Indonesian democracy and what we are broadly told constitutes “Western-style” democracy (namely, the emphasis on elections, human rights, and freedom of the press), the view from Jakarta was that through the socialization of undemocratic regimes in the non-threatening venue of the Bali Democracy Forum, they may become more open to the language and process of democratization. Such subtle proselytization aside, the forum served the domestic purpose of enhancing the ruling government’s democratic credentials. This dual purpose is captured in the following report from the Jakarta Post: “Through the (Bali Democracy) Forum, the country can advance its role on the global stage and protect its democracy from exposure to an undemocratic region. It also serves to remind our neighbors about the importance of a working democracy.”⁴

The Bali Democracy Forum undoubtedly provides an important platform where discussions on the democratization processes and peace building can take place in a non-confrontational setting. States, particularly those considered “undemocratic,” would not feel threatened by the forum, as opposed to, say, a more robust and direct European or North American style of democracy promotion. While this, on its own, could probably be lauded as a success, it would be a pretty low benchmark. Moreover, this also means that the Bali Democracy Forum merely reinforces regional preferences for form over substance, which continues to define diplomacy in this part of the world. There would hardly be any need for regional “leadership” in this case. Likewise, success is measured by participation rates—both in terms of absolute numbers as well as the level of participation from various governments, which in the past have included the prime ministers of Australia and Japan, and the Sultan of Brunei. So, the usual platitudes aside, how might one assess the effectiveness, if not success, of the forum in a more substantive fashion?

One immediate way is to consider the initiatives or grand ideas it may have spawned. Here, it could well be that any effect the Bali Democracy Forum might have had is likely to be oblique at best. As Don Emmerson rightly surmised as he mused on the hypothetical example of Myanmar: “The Bali Democracy Forum has emphasized process over performance, diplomatic discourse over actual democratization. To my knowledge, the forum has shown no interest in trying rigorously to evaluate its own effectiveness. Its reluctance is understandable in view of the difficulty of the task. If such an assessment were undertaken, however, one might find that exposure to the speeches and especially the corridor conversations at Bali Democracy Forum gatherings did facilitate, however marginally, the liberalizing steps that Myanmar’s president Thein Sein has taken to date.”⁵ Another way is to assess the extent to which the Bali Democracy forum has strongly advocated and pressured for democratization rather than merely serving as a platform for Indonesia (and other participating states) to present its own experiences. Here, criticism has been levelled by civil society groups that the forum does not go beyond merely talking about democracy to advocacy. Even worse, others have suggested by inviting undemocratic regimes, the forum has allowed them to “appropriate the term ‘democracy’ and then to woefully distort its meaning.”⁶ Judged against the considerably more measured objectives of the Bali Democracy Forum, however, these criticisms miss their mark. Indeed, its organizers made clear from the very outset that the Bali Democracy Forum would be a forum, and not an advocacy group. A more trenchant critique would be the lack of support that the Indonesian government has provided to the Institute of Peace and Democracy in order to enable it to drive the Bali Democracy Forum. Arguably, its incapacity accounts for the forum’s inability to move from a discussion platform to incorporate an action-oriented agenda, as desired by civil society activists and participants. In the final analysis, the forum still does not have the institutional or procedural mechanisms to facilitate democratization in the region; it remains very much a “talk shop.”

The Indo-Pacific Treaty, 2013

On May 16, 2013, Indonesia’s dynamic foreign minister, Marty Natalegawa, proposed the signing of an Indo-Pacific “Treaty of Friendship and Cooperation” during a keynote address at a conference in Washington D.C. In Natalegawa’s words, “I am of the view that we should be ready to work towards an Indo-Pacific wide treaty of friendship and cooperation—a commitment by states in the region to build confidence, to solve disputes by peaceful means, and to promote a concept of security that is all encompassing; underscoring that security is a common good.”⁷ The Indo-Pacific Treaty was envisaged to give form to the foreign minister’s concept of dynamic equilibrium, which he used to describe the environment in the Indo-Pacific, and which refers to the “absence of preponderant power not through the rigidity, rivalry and tensions common to the pursuit of a balance of power model,” but “through the promotion of a sense of common responsibility in the endeavor to maintain the region’s peace and stability.” The treaty would address what he identified as three key areas: 1) a “trust deficit” between some states in the region; 2) the existence of unresolved territorial claims; and 3) a rapid transformation of regional states that affects the relationships between them. In December 2013, Yudhoyono took the discussion a step further, proposing that the treaty take the form of a legally binding framework.

The Indo-Pacific Treaty aims to adopt ASEAN’s chief conflict management instrument, the 1976 Treaty of Amity and Cooperation (TAC), for the wider Indo-Pacific region, on account of its purported success in facilitating the management of distrust and division within Southeast Asia. At the same time, the Indo-Pacific Treaty would, arguably, be more ambitious given that it would also “anticipate conflict in the region, offering a preemptive mechanism for conflict prevention and resolution.” Similarly, Natalegawa’s suggestion, when queried over internal conflicts in the region, that intervention might be a feature of the treaty clearly departs from ASEAN’s non-intervention principle.⁸ Despite Yudhoyono’s calls for a legally binding treaty, Indonesia has yet to provide any blueprint as to how the treaty would be arrived at, or even what form it might take.

Short of rhetoric, the Indo-Pacific Treaty is in many ways hardly new. The idea for a mechanism to anticipate conflict sounds suspiciously like the ASEAN Regional Forum’s (ARF’s) numerous failed attempts to introduce preventive diplomacy into its activities, while the ASEAN TAC, along the lines of which the Indo-Pacific Treaty is supposed to be modeled, already has more than thirty high-contracting parties, far more than what the Indo-Pacific Treaty would cover. Even if the geographical scope of the Indo-Pacific Treaty is wider, the fact that the TAC has had hardly any impact on escalating tensions over competing claims in the South China Sea would invariably cast doubts on the utility of such a treaty.

Identifying the Indo-Pacific as a geopolitical entity is one thing, extending that to an institutional expression is another. Natalegawa’s message of how security is a common good, and that the security of regional states is interlinked, is a timely reminder of their collective interest in stability in the Indo-Pacific. But the leap from that acknowledgement to the establishment of an institution in the form of a treaty is a sizeable one. While tabling the idea is laudable, the question remains whether Indonesia can make it happen. Given that existing institutions and mechanisms—for which there are many—have not been able to ameliorate tensions on regional states, it is difficult to see how an Indo-Pacific Treaty can be a game changer.

Indonesian ambitions in context and retrospect

Several observations can be made following this brief survey of recent initiatives that Indonesia has proposed in order to stake a claim to leadership in regional affairs. First, while these initiatives certainly provide food for thought, with perhaps the exception of the ASEAN Security Community, the Bali Democracy Forum and the Indo-Pacific Treaty are long on ambition but short on substance There is little indication how these ideas might navigate structural obstacles such as the sanctity of ASEAN norms, or ideational obstacles in the form of residual suspicions that some neighboring states still harbor towards Indonesia. Second, while it is true that regional states acknowledge Indonesia as “first among equals,” this has not been at the expense of their own interests, which in certain instances involve perspectives that are fundamentally divergent from Jakarta’s. Cases in point would be Thailand’s insistence that ASEAN take a strong stand against Vietnamese aggression in Kampuchea during the Third Indochina War and Indonesia’s inability to push through Timor Leste’s membership in ASEAN.

Third, Indonesia’s attempt to put forward ambitious, but vague, initiatives goes against the grain of regionalism in East Asia. Southeast Asian states have consistently preferred bilateral means to deal with the most pressing of security challenges. Consider disputes between Thailand and Cambodia over Preah Vihear, Malaysia and Indonesia over Ambalat, Singapore and Malaysia over Pedra Branca, and even the Philippines’ move to take China to the International Tribunal of the Law of the Sea. In all these instances, regional states have clearly chosen the bilateral approach. Moreover, insofar as multilateral approaches have been preferred, they tend to be incentivized by shared concerns. ASEAN’s very formation and survival in its first two decades was driven by reservations over Vietnamese ambitions, while the creation of the East Asia Summit was triggered by ASEAN’s collective fear of being rendered irrelevant in the wake of the rise of China and India. In the case of all three initiatives (including Indonesia’s original draft Plan of Action for the ASEAN Security Community), it has never been clear what the shared concerns are.

Perhaps the greatest challenge of all for Indonesia is whether it can mitigate the rising tension caused by intense strategic rivalry between major powers in East Asia. Regional states are increasingly entertaining doubts that America can sustain its rebalance to Asia in the coming years, particularly in view of midterm elections in the United States later this year, and what would likely be yet another polarizing presidential election soon after. These doubts are further reinforced by the US foreign policy establishment’s current preoccupation with urgent crises in the Middle East and Ukraine. At the same time, China and Japan are ramping up their own regional engagement strategies. President Xi Jinping has proffered a new Maritime Silk Route initiative—ironically, announced during his address to the Indonesian parliament on the occasion of his visit to Indonesia in October 2013—to enhance maritime economic cooperation with South and Southeast Asia. It remains unclear what institutional mechanisms will facilitate this objective, or whether it can surmount the tensions that exist between China and Southeast Asia over competing South China Sea claims. What is clear is that China intends to both broaden and deepen its engagement with the region in the coming years, even as it continues its relentless expansion in the South China Sea. Meanwhile, Japan is also enhancing its diplomatic and strategic clout in the region as it seeks to win support for its own territorial disputes with China. Against this backdrop, grand transformative strategic designs such as Jakarta’s proposed Indo-Pacific Treaty must be able to facilitate a modus vivendi for these adversarial relationships in order to be credible.

A second point warrants mention. All this major power posturing is taking place amidst a proliferation of regional initiatives, the most recent being the ASEAN Defence Ministers Meeting Plus and the East Asia Summit. Against this backdrop, Indonesia will have to compete for attention in order to be heard above the cacophony, and this will command significant investment of effort, resources, and attention on Jakarta’s part.

In the final analysis, careful scrutiny of Indonesia’s track record of regional diplomacy will reveal that its most constructive contributions to regional security have not come in the form of big ideas or grand initiatives, but rather through low-key, discrete efforts, including mediation, dialogue facilitation, and the exercise of its good offices. During the Kampuchean conflict, Indonesia played a quiet but pivotal role as ASEAN’s interlocutor with Vietnam. It assumed a similar role to facilitate dialogue between the Philippine government and the rebel leadership of the Moro National Liberation Front that culminated in the signing of the 1996 peace agreement. More recently in 2011, Jakarta also contributed to efforts to reduce tensions on the Thai-Cambodian border, where both Bangkok and Phnom Penh claimed ownership of the Preah Vihear Temple, although Jakarta’s offer to send observers was eventually declined by Thailand. In 2012, Natalegawa’s personal shuttle diplomacy was instrumental in putting ASEAN back on track after the debacle of the Phnom Penh ministerial meeting when the association failed to release a joint communique for the first time in its history because of disagreements over the South China Sea issue.

Indonesian foreign policy under President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo

Come October, Indonesia will have a new president, Joko “Jokowi” Widodo. Much has been said about Jokowi’s meteoric rise and how his political profile departs from the traditional mold of the Indonesian political elite, who have mostly been either oligarchs or from military backgrounds. What is clear from the debates and discussions during the presidential election campaign is that foreign policy and international diplomacy will not be a priority on the new administration’s agenda, certainly not compared to Yudhoyono’s second term. This is understandable given the incoming president’s own persona. Jokowi’s political experience has for the most part been in municipal administration (he was previously mayor of Solo and governor of Jakarta). Unlike his predecessor who enjoyed the international stage, it is likely that Jokowi will be more comfortable laboring over domestic issues such as infrastructure development and educational reform. Hence, to the extent that Indonesia will continue to harbor aspirations to regional leadership, it will be the diplomatic establishment rather than the presidential palace that will stand at the forefront. Second, because Jokowi presides over a parliamentary minority, he is likely to be preoccupied with domestic political challenges from the opposition, which will require him to mount frequent rear-guard actions against political opponents. Once again, this indicates that domestic issues (and domestic political battles) are likely to exercise Indonesian politics far more than matters of international affairs. Indeed, even before his installation, there are already indications that the opposition, led by Jokowi’s opponent during the presidential election, Prabowo Subianto, is working to undermine his government when, in September 2014, the parliament voted to dispense with elections for local and regional offices, in so doing returning Indonesia to the practices of Suharto’s New Order.

Conclusion

Indonesia’s aspirations to regional leadership are confronted with a host of external as well as internal obstacles. Initiatives such as the Bali Democracy Forum and an Indo-Pacific Treaty, though well-intentioned, still lack the clarity and substance needed to be considered credible blueprints for regional political and diplomatic transformation. It is noteworthy too, that regional responses to Indonesia’s attempts to play a greater role in the management of regional order via such grand strategic designs have been, at best, equivocal. While Jakarta’s proactivism is generally welcome, its Southeast Asian neighbors for the most part prefer that this activism takes place within the edifice, and through the vehicle, of ASEAN. In addition, it is also unclear how major powers, each with its own ideas and strategies of engagement, have received Indonesia’s gestures. It is notable, for instance, the scant response that the proposal for an Indo-Pacific Treaty has received from the capitals of major powers. Ultimately, the biggest obstacles to Indonesia’s foreign policy aspirations may well originate from within its own domestic politics.

As this article has suggested, in its attempt to contribute to regional stability and security, Jakarta has opted for grand gestures and ideas, which it believes are commensurate with the picture that its factsheets portray. Yet, given the constraints outlined above, and if historical precedents in regard to Indonesian foreign policy activism are anything to go by, it appears that low-key, restrained, but resolute action in the exercise of its good offices is Indonesia’s best bet to make a lasting, constructive contribution to regional peace.