Democracy and the Rule of Law in Indonesia A Legal Philosophical Analysis

Introduction; 1. Republican Democracy and Rule of Law: A Theoretical Assessment; 2. On the Founding Moment: The Birth and Collapse of the Indonesian Republic; 3. Imagined Constitutions: The Success and Failure of Amending Constitutional Identity; 4: The Post-1998 Democracy: The Restlessness of the Democratic Soul; 5: One Step Forward, Two Steps Back: Indonesia's Difficult Journey to Democracy and Rule of Law; 6: The Sounds of Contradiction: The Rise of the People's President and the Authoritarian Constitutionalism; 7: "The Last Page of the Constitution": Democratic Blockage and the Subversion of the Rule of Law; 8: Dare We Hope That Indonesia Will Become a Democratic Republic?

Biography

Stefanus Hendrianto is a visiting assistant professor at Creighton University School of Law, USA.

"Intellectually daring and morally resonant, this magnificent book combines historical depth, philosophical rigor, and comparative sophistication to trace Indonesia’s constitutional destiny. Hendrianto’s multidisciplinary lens reveals Indonesia as a laboratory of democratic possibility—where republican ideals, democratic aspirations, and legal realities intersect. This is scholarship of the highest order: rigorous, humane, and transformative."

Richard Albert, Hines H. Baker and Thelma Kelley Baker Chair in Law, Professor of Government and Director of Constitutional Studies, The University of Texas, Austin

"Indonesia is one of the world’s largest and most important constitutional democracies. Yet is a democracy at clear risk of backsliding.  What explains this constitutional vulnerability?  In this important new book, Stefanus Hendrianto offers a potential answer – linked to the thinness of Indonesian democracy from its inception.  Indonesian democracy, Hendrianto argues, was always too focused on elections, at the expense of deeper democratic values and forms of participation. Those failures, he suggests, are also now coming home to roost. The argument is novel, serious and important – and deserves broad notice from scholars of Indonesian and global constitutional law and democracy alike."

Rosalind Dixon, Anthony Mason Professor and Scientia Professor of Law, University of New South Wales, Sydney

“Indonesia is an enormous and important country which remains poorly understood outside the ranks of specialists. In this superb volume, one of its keenest observers  helps explain both the apparent success of the country’s negotiated political transition and the continued shortcomings in its democratic performance. As this enormous and important country enters its third decade as a democracy, we could have no better guide in understanding why it continues to surprise, and to disappoint."

Tom Ginsburg, Leo Spitz Distinguished Service Professor of International Law, University of Chicago