From Jokowi to Prabowo: Perspectives from the ANU Indonesia Update

Indonesia is in the countdown to the October presidential transition from Joko Widodo (Jokowi) to Prabowo Subianto, who won a decisive victory in the April presidential election. Hugely ambitious and popular, Jokowi leaves a complex legacy, including strained democratic institutions, the politicisation of the police and military, and an at times transactional foreign policy that benefited China’s standing. 

This Lowy Institute panel event draws on perspectives presented at the 2024 Australian National University Indonesia Update conference to explore the legacy of Jokowi’s presidency and the direction that Prabowo may now seek to steer Indonesia.

The panel, moderated by Susannah Patton, Director of the Southeast Asia Program at the Lowy Institute, features:  

Eve Warburton, Research Fellow at the Department of Political and Social Change in the Coral Bell School of Asia Pacific Affairs, and Director of ANU's Indonesia Institute at the College of Asia and the Pacific. Her first book manuscript, Resource Nationalism in Indonesia: Booms, Big Business and the State, was published by Cornell University Press in late 2023.

Sidney Jones, Senior Adviser to the Institute for Policy Analysis of Conflict in Jakarta, a non-governmental research organisation she founded in 2013. She served as Director from 2013 to 2021, when she returned to New York. From 2002 to 2013, Jones worked with the International Crisis Group in Jakarta.

Marcus Mietzner, Associate Professor at the Department of Political and Social Change in the Coral Bell School of Asia Pacific Affairs at ANU. He has published extensively on Indonesian politics, and is currently writing a book on the Jokowi presidency, based on a series of interviews with the outgoing president and other key actors.

Rizal Sukma, Senior Fellow at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), Indonesia. Previously, he was Indonesia’s Ambassador to the United Kingdom, Ireland and the International Maritime Organization, London. He was Executive Director of CSIS from 2009 until 2015. 

Refreshments will be served.