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This article examines the role of non-governmental organisation in supporting the implementation of global voluntary certification. This article investigates how World Wildlife Fund (WWF) helps implement the Aquaculture Stewardship Council (ASC) ecolabel standard in Indonesia. As the world’s second-largest aquaculture fish-producing country, many Indonesian seafood products are rejected in the international market due to quality problems. This makes Indonesia an ideal country for implementing sustainable aquaculture practices. Using transition theory as a framework, we find that WWF has played a key role in three areas: (1) harmonisation of national regulations with ASC principles, (2) establishment of a campaign program to advocate for the public on sustainable seafood consumption behaviour, and (3) creating a special agency to assist to fishery industry players in obtaining ASC certificates. Our finding sheds lights on the importance of strong collaboration between business actors, states, and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) to implement global voluntary standards.

This article examines the variety of roles enacted by Asia-Pacific middle powers in response to the rise of China. This article identifies two factors determining such variety, especially in the security realm: alignment pattern and geopolitical constraints. We argue that the differences in level of alignment with the United States and the risk of geopolitical tension with China affect the role conception taken by the middle powers. We assert that the combination of a high-level of alignment and high geopolitical risk tends to cause them to take a bridging role, a low-level of alignment and low geopolitical risk drive them to take the role of regional leader, a high-level of alignment and low geopolitical risk allow them to become faithful allies, and a low-level of alignment and high geopolitical risk enable them to take an active independent role. We illustrate this framework through the comparative analysis of Indonesia, South Korea, Australia and Vietnam.

This article examines limitations present in India–Indonesia bilateral trade relations. Since January 2019, India has imposed higher import tariffs on Indonesian refined, bleached, deodorised palm oil (RBDPO) than those imposed on Indonesia's main competitor Malaysia. This tariff policy weakened Indonesia's exports, given that India is Indonesia's third-largest export destination for palm oil. To overcome these tariff disparities, the Indonesian government responded with a trade-off strategy, offering to lower its import tariffs on India's raw sugar in exchange for a reduction in India's import tariffs on Indonesia's RBDPO. However, this strategy has thus far failed to generate a satisfying outcome for Indonesia. This article examines the obstacles in enacting such a strategy from the Indonesian perspective. By mobilising the concept of reluctance in international politics, this article argues that India's reluctance hinders Indonesia's trade-off strategy. This reluctance is evidenced by India's hesitation and recalcitrance, resulting in delays, and reversal of policy as well as ignoring Indonesian requests regarding the trade-off strategy. This could indicate that India does not prioritise Indonesia in its Indo-Pacific vision, particularly in enhancing cooperation with Southeast Asian nations, particularly Indonesia.

In recent years, scholars have devoted increased attention to the notion of roles in foreign policy analysis and international relations. However, role theory literature has so far less frequently explored re-conceptualising role conflict. To further understand the concept of role conflict, this article aims to unpacks the notion of international audiences. To do so, this article advances the application of role conflict by arguing the importance of notion of vertical role conflict that considers the different levels of international audiences, specifically regionally and globally. Building upon the symbolic interactionist conceptualisation of social interaction as a stage, regional and global levels can be seen as arenas for role-playing but with different expectations to fulfil. The article proposes two types of vertical role conflict, stemming from the difference between the regional and global levels. These theoretical claims will be elucidated through the study of Indonesia’s regional and global engagement in two areas: human rights and trade.

A growing literature has investigated the relations between accountability and resource boom in developing economies. However, few studies focus on the emergence of political accountability in resource-rich regions at the local level. This article investigates accountability at the sub-national level in Indonesia’s resource-rich areas. While natural resource abundance in developing countries is associated with predatory states, this article aims to show how some sub-national governments have encouraged the responsible management of resources. This article primarily examines the political incentives that influence local elites’ promotion of accountability. Using the Bojonegoro Regency in East Java as a case study, we show that functioning local democracy and the existence of collective actions by local civil societies coupled with promotion from within parties drive politicians to promote accountability.

In 2010, Indonesia officially filled a complaint to the World Trade Organization (WTO) over a dispute regarding the US import ban on clove cigarettes. Despite the fierce exchange of arguments in th...

This article examines Indonesia’s conflicting roles in global trade governance, particularly in the Doha Development Round. This article argues that multilateral trade governance is utilised by Ind...

Post-authoritarian Indonesia has emerged as a state advocating human rights values in the Asia-Pacific region. However, its policies in promoting these values at the global level remain limited. Th...

This article examines how the decentralisation and fragmentation of the Indonesian state and resultant central–local dynamics affect cross-border regionalism in Indonesia’s periphery. It ar...

This article analyzes how foreign policymakers legitimize their enactment of role conceptions to play a more active role at the global level toward a potentially reluctant domestic audience. In order to reduce the likelihood of domestic role contestation while at the same time subscribe toward ego and alter expectations, it is necessary for policymakers to legitimize role conceptions and their enactments toward domestic audiences. This article develops the notion of role legitimation to capture this process and puts forward two mechanisms through which role legitimation is performed. The first mechanism is the revival of roles from a specific period in time that is deeply entrenched as an inalienable historical feature of the state. The second one is the reproduction of the international expectations into the domestic political discourse. To illustrate the argument, this article utilizes the case of Indonesia's foreign policy during Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono's Presidency (2004–2014), particularly its engagement at G20, its objective to make the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) a global player, and its agenda to promote democracy and moderate Islam at the global level.

This paper examines how role theory can enhance the middle power literature in understanding the role preferences of middle powers. Rather than treating it as merely a function of material capability or good international citizenship, this paper resituates middle power as a concept of international status that states aim to pursue through the enactment of role conceptions. Thus, it reinstates a conceptual distinction between ‘Middle Power Status’ and ‘Middle Power Roles’. The paper suggests that the notion of role conceptions can analytically connect the status-seeking behaviour of middle powers with their foreign policy agenda. In so doing, it provides a more nuanced explanation of middle power behaviour, which might differ between one middle power and another. Using Indonesia and South Korea as case studies of middle power, this paper contends that foreign policymakers have strategically conceptualised and enacted several main roles that aim to capture historical experience, as well as ego and alter expectations in order to pursue middle power status. These role conceptions determine the foreign policy agenda of states in articulating their middle power status.

The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) aims to integrate the banking industry in the region. To achieve this, ASEAN members have agreed to create the ASEAN Banking Integration Framework (ABIF) to support such integration. Despite being endorsed in 2014, the framework remains vague and lacks clear policy coordination arrangements as well as standardisation instruments that enable ASEAN member states to integrate their banking sectors. This article examines why the member states agreed to such regulatory arrangements. Building upon the regulatory regionalism approach, we argue that the regulatory arrangement is underpinned by a socio-political struggle among dominant social forces in ASEAN. The article further argues that the political endeavour to internationalise domestic capital through the banking integration project remains problematic, given that local banking players seem to largely focus on protecting and penetrating domestic markets rather than regional expansion. This has hindered the progress of regional banking integration in ASEAN. To substantiate this argument, we use Indonesia’s engagement in the process as a case study. This article contributes to the study of political economies of banking integration outside of the European experiment by emphasising the importance of state–society relations in shaping the outcome of regional integration.

This paper examines the dynamics of the development of Euro-Islam as a discourse which offers a modern interpretation of Islam that fits with European context. It investigates how Europe-wide Muslim umbrella organisations promote Euro-Islam discourse while at the same time gain position to represent European Muslims at the European level by mobilising the discourse. Drawing from constructivist literature, this paper argues that Tariq Ramadan’s version of Euro-Islam has been in the stage of socialisation characterised by (1) the existence of network of organisational platforms such as Federation of Islamic Organisation in Europe (FIOE) and Forum of European Muslim Youth and Student Organisations (FEMYSO), (2) the support from supranational actors such as European Parliament and European Commission, and (3) the efforts to codify the discourse through the creation of the Muslims of Europe Charter. However, given the lack of organisational infrastructure to diffuse the discourse due to the diverse nature of Muslim communities in Europe, further internalisation of the discourse has been hindered. Additionally, the connection between Euro-Islam’s organisational platforms with Islamist movement has made the discourse on Euro-Islam being perceived as a camouflage for Islamist agenda. Thus, at this stage, Euro-Islam has become “empty signifier” that are open to continual contestation which serves Muslim umbrella organisations with speaker position to lobby at the European level.

This paper examines how institutional dynamics among regulatory institutions affect the governance of the recruitment of Indonesian low-skilled migrant workers. Two institutional reforms have been made to create better governance for Indonesian migrant workers in the post-authoritarian era. One was the establishment of the National Agency for the Placement and Protection of Indonesian Migrant Workers (BNP2TKI) while the other was the granting of greater responsibility to sub-national governments to supervise migrant worker recruitment. In spite of these institutional reforms, little progress has been made in the protection of Indonesian migrant workers. The paper reveals that the restrictive regulatory framework for the recruitment of migrant workers, which curbs private recruitment agencies, does not create better migrant worker governance. This regulatory framework does not take into consideration the horizontal relationship between the old and new institutions, and the vertical relationship between the central and sub-national governments. Horizontally, the institutional design of the proposed new regulatory framework has created institutional rivalry between the newly established regulatory actor and the old one. Vertically, the reluctance of central government to decentralise authority to sub-national governments has curtailed the ability of sub-national governments to perform a supervisory role in the recruitment process. These two inter-related factors have hindered the efforts to create a better recruitment process for Indonesian migrant workers.

The most important characteristic of poverty in Indonesia is the prevalence of poverty in the agricultural sector. What is the main root of poverty in the agricultural sector in Indonesia? By analyzing the historical account of agrarian reform, the paper examined the evolution of policy toward peasant and agricultural sector in Indonesia from 1960s. It argued that the lack of peasants’ accessibility of land ownership, government reluctance to revitalize agricultural sector, as well as the failed land reform agenda have contributed toward massive poverty in Indonesian agricultural sector. The paper provided further analysis of current Indonesian policy toward agricultural sector.

The continuity of stable peace in East Asia, especially Southeast Asia, since the end of the Cold War raises one major question: why is there no apparent balancing behaviour against China, the emerging great power in East Asia? In response to this question, exceptionalists argue that there will be no balancing behaviour against China from Southeast Asian states, while soft balancing theorists argue that the balancing behaviour has already occurred in the form of institutional balancing. This article refutes those arguments and maintains that balancing behaviour is not yet apparent in Southeast Asian balancing, yet it exists in an indirect form. In order to make this argument, this article examines the recent military build-up among Southeast Asian states as well as recent assessments of the ineffectiveness of the Southeast Asian regional security framework. The article also further analyses the conditions under which Southeast Asia’s indirect balancing might turn into hard balancing.