Military Politics and Democratization in Indonesia

Jun Honna

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• eBook ISBN:
  9781135139254
• Subtopic: International Relations
• Index: Politics & International Relations

The military have had a key role to play in Indonesia's recent history and may well have a decisive role to play in her future. This book looks at the role of the military in the downfall of Suharto and their ongoing influence on the succeeding governments of B.J. Habibie and Abdurrahman Wahid. The author also examines such key features as human rights, reconciliation, civic-military discourse and ongoing security dilemmas. The book is unique in providing the best overview of the role of the military in the world's fourth most populous nation.

1 Introduction

The problem: the military in regime transition

On the morning of 21 May 1998, President Soeharto announced his resignation after ruling for three decades. His resignation, prompted by a devastating economic crisis, opened the door for political change and gave rise to high expectations about both political liberalization and economic recovery. Many celebrated the pre-millennium ending of Soeharto’s regime as a good omen and a necessary step towards coping with the many challenges Indonesia faced at the end of the century.

The four years subsequent to his resignation demonstrated that the fall of Soeharto had an impact that went well beyond changes in government form and style, and shook the unity of the nation-state. As long-suppressed ethnic, religious and regional conflicts erupted throughout the archipelago, the nation was plunged into chaotic violence. The state seemed to be losing control and demands for autonomy and independence coupled with religious and ethnic strife suggested a nation unravelling. Although the fall of Soeharto launched a new era in Indonesia, there is no consensus on where Indonesia is headed. Indonesia’s post-Soeharto transition has been hesitant and without clear direction. The civilian government seems ill prepared to navigate these uncharted and stormy waters of reform, reconciliation and transformation. Clearly, the legacy of three decades of authoritarian rule have taken a toll on civil society and complicate the process of recovery from the mismanagement, distortions, corruption, institutional atrophy and political oppression that marked Soeharto’s ‘New Order’ era (1966–1998).

One key institutional actor in this transition process is the military. As the backbone of Soeharto’s authoritarian regime, the military has been a primary target of public anger in the post-Soeharto era. The reform movement sought to return the troops to the barracks, to hold leaders accountable for their human rights violations and to eliminate the military’s prominent political role. Yet widespread turmoil under Indonesia’s nascent civilian leadership has worked to sustain the military’s political power. Political instability has conferred considerable influence in political circles on the current military elite because their cooperation is deemed indispensable in trying to maintain the integrity of a fragile and fractious nation-state. In assessing prospects for democratic transition and national consolidation in the new Indonesia, the military factor remains of critical importance.

This book is about Indonesia’s military politics in transition. The main focus is on the development of civil–military relations in the late Soeharto period. As a basis for understanding the course of events in the post-Soeharto era, it is essential to understand the dynamics of civil–military relations during the New Order. Do soldiers accept civilian control of the military? To what extent does the military support political democratization? How does reform within the military influence the nature of its political engagement? Such questions comprise a topic of great interest following the fall of Soeharto, and cannot be investigated fully without assessing the military’s internal developments prior to his resignation. Change in organizational behaviour does not happen overnight and the legacy of the New Order casts a long shadow over contemporary Indonesia. Today’s top officers were trained and came up through the ranks during the New Order and are a product of the patterns, inclinations and assumptions of that era. This book analyses the change and continuity of military politics before and after the fall of Soeharto, and illustrates how current military attitudes reflect changing civil–military relations during the late Soeharto era, particularly since the early 1990s.

The problem of the military in regime transition is a global issue. The collapse of the Soviet Union and end of the Cold War in 1989 ushered in challenges to right-wing authoritarian regimes in developing countries, which had legitimized their rule by insisting on the need for strong government both to defend the nation from the threat of communist subversion and to provide maximum political support – i.e. stability – for economic modernization. Authoritarian polities in Latin America, Asia and Africa faced similar societal challenges to open up the political system, as the principal premises of authoritarianism were significantly undermined. Scholarship on third-world democratization in the last decade has focused on the process through which authoritarian regimes have been undermined by such pressures for change. This literature probes the evolution of civil–military relations in the context of democratization by investigating the response of the military – a part of the authoritarian old guard – to the demands for political liberalization and ‘civilianization’ of government. This book builds on this scholarly endeavour by examining the case of the Indonesian military during the 1990s and the transition to civilian rule since 1998.

The theme: dwifungsi and democratization

The main question and core argument of this book are simple. What has conditioned the pattern of military responses to democratic pressures? Broadly we see two different attitudes assumed by the military when facing social demands for democratization – accommodation and repression. Why in some cases has the military accommodated such demands while in other cases it took repressive measures? How do we explain this positive–negative pendulum in the military response to democratic demands? It could be argued that the very nature of the military constrains tolerance and challenges to authority. This study, however, argues that it is the internal power struggle within the military which has persistently been the primary factor influencing its response to democratic demands. The motivations of generals and incentives to either accommodate or repress democratic demands reflect more strongly cleavages within the military more than any commitment to certain political values. The cause of military factionalization varies over time. But competing factions are always motivated to take different approaches than competitors in order to show their ascendancy. Thus, if a group of officers takes a hardline approach, the competition appeals for a softer response. The result was that the military had a mixed response to the growing democratic demands in society during the 1990s, taking measures both to accommodate and to repress such requests. The mixed response could be seen to reflect strategic confusion of the military as an institution, but it is a rational consequence of the power struggle within the military. The book shows that this dynamic in the development of civil–military relations during the late Soeharto era even now shapes military responses under the two civilian governments that followed (led by B.J. Habibie and Abdurrahman Wahid respectively). We go on to underline the sustained significance of intra-military politics in understanding the prospects of military adaptation to democratic change in the near future.

In analysing the military’s role in democratization, this study focuses on the problem of dwifungsi, a concept that legitimated the military’s involvement in social and political affairs extending well beyond the usual scope of maintaining national security and providing national defence. Dwifungsi, or ‘dual function’, was the central doctrine of the military during Soeharto’s New Order regime. Dwifungsi insists that, apart from its normal defence function, the military has a sociopolitical mission to promote national development and to ensure political stability. This concept animated the military’s systematic and pervasive political intervention and the formation of its political programme, organizational ideology, security policies and patterns of civil–military interaction during the Soeharto era.

Until his resignation in May 1998, Soeharto – who ousted former President Sukarno in the chaotic political situation in the mid-1960s – dominated Indonesian politics for more than thirty years. With backing provided by the military, or ABRI, General Soeharto established his authoritarian political system, named the New Order.¹ As the antithesis of Sukarno, who favoured nationalist adventurism and radical mass mobilization, the new regime led by Soeharto sought legitimacy in economic modernization, requiring, inter alia, political stability. Based on this logic, ABRI formulated the concept of dwifungsi. This doctrine legitimized the involvement of soldiers in non-military fields – the legislature, bureaucracy, regional government, to name but a few – and also encouraged the repression of government critics, political parties, a free press and other vestiges of civil society.

Three decades of relative political stability during the New Order reflected the military’s political influence under the auspices of dwifungsi doctrine. Dwifungsi – a euphemism for military surveillance and control of national life – has, however, been challenged as an emerging middle class and a growing popular political movement have started to demand democratic reforms, including the military’s withdrawal from politics. A segment of the government elite during the 1990s also began to see the need for promoting political deregulation in order to accelerate economic development in the era of globalizing market capitalism. Moreover, since the end of the Cold War, international criticism of the military’s abuse of human rights increased, as allies have been less inclined to look the other way. ABRI has therefore been under strong internal and external pressures to diminish its dwifungsi commitment since the late 1980s.²

How did ABRI respond to these demands during the late New Order era? Why did the military adapt itself positively to democratic demands in some areas but negatively in others? What were the dynamics behind these responses? Discussions in the following chapters will show how intra-military power struggles led to and sustained these different patterns of adaptation and response, and why. This analysis demonstrates how these patterns constitute a significant legacy of the New Order for the Indonesian polity.

The structure of the book

The dwifungsi–democratization problem consists of various dimensions. Chapters are therefore organized in a thematic rather than a chronological manner. I try to identify specific patterns of change within a given dimension in order to clarify the complexity of dwifungsi–democratization problems. This multidimensional perspective is also aimed at illustrating how different military actors take initiatives over different issues in different areas. Who are the main actors in what fields? Elucidating this picture is key to understanding how internal power struggles influence the military response to democratic demands. This book examines the dwifungsi–democratization problem from five different analytical dimensions of civil–military interaction: regime maintenance; doctrinal adaptation; internal security policy; the development of military ideology; and civil–military discourse – both in the twilight of the Soeharto era and after his fall. These themes are addressed independently in the following chapters as an attempt to assess various military responses to pressures for democratization. We will see how different responses coexisted and why.

The focus of Chapter 2 is regime maintenance. We examine the politics of escalating dwifungsi criticism in society. Why did dwifungsi become a central topic of open critical debate in society? How could such political space be expanded under the authoritarian New Order regime? As we will show, societal demands for democratization were not sufficient to open up dwifungsi to public criticism. Several factors within the ruling elite circle significantly contributed to the breaking of the taboo on dwifungsi debate which had been in place during the first twenty years of the New Order. This process not only reflected and facilitated intra-military rivalry, but also effectively eroded ABRI’s credibility, reaching a nadir at the time of Soeharto’s resignation. This chapter clarifies officers’ political motives and incentives in the growing dwifungsi criticism and how this issue was used in inter-factional competition and continues to influence the transition to post-Soeharto military politics. I also regard this chapter – which discusses major political events and the historical development of military factionalism during the late New Order period – as the background chapter to this book.

What was the effect of such cleavage within the military? Important transformations were evident in many fields. The next two chapters focus on the conciliatory actions and postures taken by different groups of elite officers in facing democratic pressures. Chapter 3 details ABRI’s doctrinal change during the New Order, especially after the demand for democratization was intensified in the final decade of Soeharto’s reign. Doctrinal analysis is helpful to examine simultaneously individual officers’ perceptions and responses and the military’s institutional political evolution. We discuss how ABRI institutionalized its political activism by attempting to strengthen the legitimacy of dwifungsi doctrine; how this was adjusted and manipulated in order to maintain the relevance of dwifungsi in changing and hostile circumstances; and finally how some reform-minded officers attempted to revise the doctrine in coping with growing criticism. This final process of accommodation by ABRI’s doctrine-makers to pressures for democratization sheds considerable light on the dynamics of military politics and the series of military reforms adopted since Soeharto’s resignation.

Chapter 4 examines the internal security policy. ABRI’s record of human rights violations is seen to reflect the emphasis on internal security and political stability enshrined in dwifungsi. We see how this controversial issue, a taboo topic during the New Order, gradually became a legitimate public criticism since the late 1980s. The growing concern about human rights was encouraged by changes in the international political system – the end of the Cold War and the subsequent trend towards respect for universal values. How did ABRI respond to this new international political paradigm in the late New Order period? We look at some major cases of military violence and discuss the civil–military struggle over accountability concerning ABRI’s human rights abuses, and the ways in which ABRI has been forced to adapt its organizational procedures to incorporate human rights principles. Here, the erosion of ABRI’s traditional internal security policy is discernible.

In Chapter 5, on the other hand, we focus on ABRI’s ideological evolution, examining in particular the adaptation of hardline military ideology as a way to justify repression of popular democratic movements. For a variety of reasons, ABRI’s permanent control of politics was deemed increasingly irrelevant as the threat of communist subversion disappeared and the regime seemed ill equipped to cope with the new challenges facing Indonesia. In short, the military-dominated polity was widely seen to be part of the problem and a significant handicap in realizing the goal of economic modernization. In the face of growing public hostility, it is revealing to examine ABRI’s reformulation of old vigilance ideology to rationalize military repression of popular democratic movements and attempts to revive civil society – notably led by NGOs and students – which emerged in the late 1980s.

Chapter 6 analyses the development of civil–military discourse during the late New Order era. Our focus is on elite criticism, rather than popular protest, as the popular demand for the elimination of dwifungsi during the Soeharto regime was generally perceived by military officers as, at best, unacceptable and, at worst, as a security threat. However, ‘debate’ on the dwifungsi problem went on between civilian elites and serving officers, and we highlight the function of this political space – which was generally seen as too limited in the eyes of critics – in undermining ABRI’s assertion of the permanence of dwifungsi. We analyse several systematic approaches employed by elite critics to delegitimize dwifungsi and ABRI’s responses to them. Exploring these discursive styles also leads us to assess the characteristics of intra-military communication on dwifungsi problems. In what ways have serving officers discussed the issues within their circles, and how were reformist views presented among them? Analysis of this discursive dimension provides insight into how the problems of New Order civil–military dialogue remain a troubling legacy in post-Soeharto Indonesia.

Throughout these chapters, we try to clarify the complex patterns of military responses to democratic demands under the Soeharto regime. We may find that military adaptation cannot be explained by a simple linear continuum of negative–positive responses to democratic pressures, and also cannot be judged by looking at only one dimension. I argue that military adaptation was not monolithic but instead pervasive, albeit with differences in direction, pace and scope. Military responses were mixed, as certain officers became reform-minded while others took hardline approaches in the face of democratic pressures. As the demand for change increased, initiatives of adaptation in both doctrinal dimension and civil–military dialogues were gradually taken by reform-minded officers who saw the need to review the role of the military in order to ensure its institutional survival in society. However, these efforts ran counter to the realpolitik tactics of Soeharto’s ‘praetorian guard’ of hardliners eager to protect the New Order from reform. President Soeharto attempted to recruit loyalist officers and strengthen control over top military leaders to preserve his political interests against growing demands for the opening up of the regime. It was these top officers who initiated negative adaptation in some arenas. The development of such contradictory responses of the New Order military clearly reflected power struggles within the officer corps – a core argument of the book. It is widely accepted in public that the military merely adapted itself after the fall of Soeharto. Such a simplistic view may lead us to misunderstand the real dynamics of civil–military relations in the late Soeharto government and therefore misjudge developments in post-Soeharto Indonesia.

Following the analysis of late New Order regime, Chapter 7 looks at the fall of Soeharto and the subsequent developments under the Habibie and Abdurrahman Wahid administrations. There are currents of change and eddies of stagnation in the post-Soeharto military and the polity it has bequeathed to Indonesians. Our discussion builds on previous chapters to explain the development of presidential–military politics, intra-m...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Acknowledgements
• List of Abbreviations
• 1. Introduction
• 2. Eroding dwifungsi: Power politics and democratic movement in the late New Order regime
• 3. Reinventing legitimacy: Doctrinal adaptation in a changing society
• 4. The security approach and human rights
• 5. Creating new threats: Ideological dogmatization
• 6. Contesting ‘inner’ thoughts in civil–military discourse
• 7. Post-Soeharto
• 8. Conclusions
• Appendix 1. Military area commands (Kodam), 1985–1998
• Appendix 2. ABRI’s codes of ethics
• Appendix 3. DPR seats and the elections, 1971–1999
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Index