Representing Chinese Indonesians: Pribumi Discourse and Regional Elections in Post-Reform Indonesia

Abstract

Utilising Pitkin’s concept of representation, this article surveys the landscape of Chinese Indonesian political representation since the advent of regional elections in 1999. Analyses of the dataset of individual profiles of Chinese Indonesian executives, as they adopt inclusive-pairing tactics by taking on deputised roles or appeal using charisma, had demonstrated that there was a visible transition from “descriptive” towards more “substantive” forms of political representation in various constituencies – seen as the most important dimension of ideal representation despite the presence of soft ethnic politics. Recent appeals to indigenism (pribumi-ism), especially in the wake of Jakarta governor Ahok’s failed re-election bid in 2017, had the effect of confining representational politics towards the narrow margins of ethnicity above all else. This article looks at the precarity of thedivide between pribumis and Chinese Indonesians (Tionghoa) from the perspective of political representation at the regions and fills in the lacuna of political representativeness in post-reform Indonesia – overlooked so far by critiques of democracy.