Talking Indonesia

The Papal Visit In early September, Pope Francis visited Indonesia as part of a tour of the region. It was the third papal visit to the country after tours by Pope Paul VI in 1970 and Pope John Paul II in 1989. This trip included Indonesia, Timor Leste, Papua New Guinea and Singapore. The theme of this visit to the world’s largest Muslim nation was ‘Faith, Fraternity and Compassion’ and appeared to build on an earlier visit to the United Arab Emirates in 2019. On that trip the Pope and the Grand Imam of Al-Azhar co-signed a statement known as the Abu Dhabi document, in which they declared a shared commitment to promote reconciliation, fraternity and with the aim of universal peace. The three-day visit to Jakarta was declared a success by the Vatican and Indonesian observers alike, with the Pope highlighting and praising Indonesia’s commitment to interfaith harmony. So, what was the aim of this papal tour for the Vatican and the Catholic Church in Indonesia? What were the Pope’s key messages and how was he

Corruption in Indonesia is widely acknowledged as a complex issue, with some even suggesting it as something that is deeply entrenched in Indonesian culture. However, this perspective overlooks the generally accepted notion among historians of colonialism that corruption in Indonesia and other post-colonial nations is, at least partially, rooted in colonialism and the abuses of power and wealth during the colonial era. In this episode of Talking Indonesia, we examine the sugar scandal of 1926—a case involving wealthy industrialists and a powerful political party in the Dutch East Indies. We explore how a political donation, which was almost certainly considered a case of political corruption even by the standards of that era, somehow became accepted. Among various contributing factors, the fear of communism played a significant role in this acceptance. Our guest, Uji Nugroho Winardi, is a historian involved in the Colonial Normativity research project. This initiative aims to systematically investigate and

Some of the most challenging issues post-colonial societies face involve managing the physical remnants of their colonial histories. In Indonesia, centuries of colonialism left many buildings and spaces with strong colonial identities. While some of these spaces are now abandoned and forgotten, others are being remembered and revitalised. In this episode, Tito Ambyo speaks with Remco Vermeulen, a PhD candidate at Erasmus University Rotterdam and coordinator of international cooperation in collection management at the Cultural Heritage Agency of the Netherlands. Remco's professional experience informed his presentation at the EuroSEAS conference in Amsterdam this year on the revitalisation of Dutch colonial urban spaces in Indonesia. His ongoing PhD research examines how young Indonesians interact with and perceive these revitalised spaces. Remco shares fascinating insights from his research survey and visits to Dutch colonial buildings in various Indonesian cities. His findings reveal an intriguing disconne

Starting a Start Up Starting a small business is a challenge in any context, but what about if you're a foreigner looking to establish a restaurant in Indonesia? What's it like to move to Indonesia, knowing little to nothing about the country, and then go on to start a successful online food business? What is it about the business context in Indonesia that facilitates or blocks small businesses, especially those wishing to leverage Jakartans' large-scale online connectivity? In this podcast, Elisabeth Kramer talks to entrepreneur Sujeet Ramgir, who came to Indonesia from India and went on to start a highly successful Indian food 'cloud kitchen' catering to the Jakarta market. At the end of 2019, just months before the COVID-19 pandemic entered the chat, Sujeet launched his co-owned business, Accha. Little did he know how the pandemic and the mushrooming of online food apps would shape the trajectory of the business. In this podcast, Sujeet shares his motivations for starting the business, his experiences,

Digital Populism Just as we were recording this podcast, the hashtag #daruratdemokrasi (democratic emergency) went viral across Indonesian social media. The alert was prompted by the latest example of Indonesia’s parliament (DPR) attempting to override or block a ruling by the Constitutional Court related to the eligibility of candidates to run in regional elections. The online campaign quickly turned into calls for real action to take place on Thursday 22 August, in the form of protests at the national parliament in Jakarta and other cities across the country. This would be parliament’s final sitting day before it headed into recess ahead of the November elections, and therefore the last chance for any amendments to be passed. The response on the streets by some thousands of protesters, including celebrities, filmmakers, actors and academics, was significant enough to force the DPR to pause its intervention. This effectively put an end to what was seen by the protesters as an attempt to both prevent a key r

One of the signature campaign promises of the Prabowo Subianto presidency is free lunches and milk for Indonesian school kids. This plan is linked to a much wider set of reforms to the way Indonesia’s produces and organises its agriculture sector, including the modernization of agriculture and converting land to plantations. The details are still pretty scant but this is not a thought bubble, food sovereignty is an issue that Prabowo has spent much of his political career touting. Prabowo served as head of the Indonesian Farmers Association and chairs the advisory board for the Primary Rural Cooperative or (Inkud). As Minister of Defence, Prabowo also led Jokowi’s food estate program, using private sector and military resources to open up massive new cassava plantations in Kalimantan. Those plantations failed. But nonetheless the incoming president is undeterred. Prabowo has called Indonesian farmers true patriots who will lead the country to food sovereignty. Food security is going to be the signature po

The Indonesian music scene is currently experiencing a vibrant period of experimentation, where musicians are blending vernacular Indonesian music traditions with elements from diverse global influences and historical periods. This fusion has led to the emergence of groundbreaking acts like Senyawa, who have successfully captured international attention. While the creative landscape pushes forward, however, there's a simultaneous return to older technology in music distribution, particularly the resurgence of vinyl recording. This vinyl revival, mirroring a global trend, has taken root in Indonesia. Taufiq Rahman, editor-in-chief of Jakarta Post as well as the founder of Elevation Records, is at the forefront of this. He and his business partners have now established the country's sole vinyl pressing factory, marking a significant milestone in Indonesia's contemporary music industry. What is the role of vinyl recordings in Indonesian music history? And what are the factors driving its current renaissance?

Antje Missbach - Refugees growing up in limbo Indonesia is currently home to over 13,000 refugees and asylum seekers, a majority of them young people who are stuck in limbo waiting for their futures to be determined. For most, it takes years, sometimes more than a decade, for resettlement to become an option. In the meantime, for those who arrive in Indonesia as children and teenagers this means that much of their youth and formative years - when they look to form relationships, explore their sexuality and establish their identities - are also ones in which they have very limited opportunities for education, work and recreation. This means growing up amid endless boredom and with few pathways into society. The recent arrivals of boatloads of Rohingya refugees on Aceh’s shores is a stark reminder that the asylum seeker issue is not going away. New solutions are needed to enable the thousands currently in Indonesia, to establish a somewhat normal life. With onward pathways to Australia and beyond cut off and

Teaching Indonesian as a second language comes with challenges. In Australia, there is a wide gulf between the government's rhetoric about the importance of learning Indonesian and the realities faced by teachers on the ground. In the absence of centralised resources, Indonesian teachers often have to work creatively to devise their own materials and deliver quality instruction. Today's guests on Talking Indonesia, Dr Howie Manns and Dr Jessica Kruk, both discovered Indonesian at a young age and have gone on to research and teach the language. In this episode, they chat about teaching colloquial and formal Indonesian and other challenges faced by Indonesian teachers in Australia. Howie and Jess believe in the power of open educational practices and collaboration among educators. To help out their fellow teachers, they are developing a new podcast called "Bloody Bagus” that will provide materials for standard and informal Indonesian, connect students with contemporary Indonesian culture and enrich their lea

Bivitri Susanti - Dirty Vote The frenzied final weeks of campaigning leading up to the presidential election on 14 February 2024 were packed with promises, symbols, celebrity and cash. When the dance literally stopped a few days before the polls opened, in the traditional cooling off period, a documentary film, Dirty Vote, dropped on YouTube. The work of activist filmmaker, Dandhy Laksono, the film has a lecture-style format featuring three constitutional law experts as its cast. At just under 2 hours long, the film draws on extensive research conducted by the experts and their colleagues, to shed light on the depth of election fraud, money politics and the systemic deterioration and abuse of Indonesia’s democratic institutions, including the electoral system, anti-corruption agency and the judiciary. Dirty Vote attracted over 6 million views in the first day of release and has since amassed around 30 million views. What were the filmmaker’s aims for this film and what kind of impact were they hoping it

In November 2023, a unique event occured. Eight gamelan groups - Gamelan DanAnda, Kacapi Suling Melbourne, Mahindra Bali Gamelan, Melbourne Community Gamelan, Mugi Rahayu, Putra Panji Asmara, Talo Balak, Selonding Sapta Nugraha - came together to perform at a small church in Northcote, a suburb in North Melbourne. The gathering was dedicated to the memory of Pak Poedijono, a master Javanese dhalang (puppeteer), musician, dancer and gamelan teacher. He taught in Australia for over 45 years and sadly passed away on the 30th of January 2021. In this episode of Talking Indonesia, Tito Ambyo chats with the people who organised this gathering: John Cheong-Holdaway, an Australian gamelan musician; Eka Poedijono, daughter of the late Pak Poedijono; and Jocelyn Tribe, a biracial artist who connected with her Indonesian ancestry later in life. We spoke about many things, including the difference between gamelan and other types of music, the role of gamelan beyond musical performance, and what it's like to be a pa

The talk on the street is all about electric cars and scooters as Indonesia strives to become a regional centre for manufacturing electric vehicles. At the heart of that goal is constructing a national supply chain of locally built battery hubs to drive the transition to electric. But as my current guest reminds us, harnessing electricity has always been at the centre of Indonesia’s dreams of development. Indeed, the very establishment of PLN, Indonesia’s ubiquitous state electricity company, was part of a wider nation building project to create a prosperous and socially just Indonesia. To talk about the role of electricity in the forging of Indonesia, Dr Anto Mohsin chats with Jacqui Baker. Anto is an assistant professor in the Liberal Arts at North-Western University in Qatar. In 2024, the Talking Indonesia podcast is co-hosted by Dr Jacqui Baker from Murdoch University, Dr Elisabeth Kramer from the University of New South Wales, Dr Jemma Purdey from Monash University and Tito Ambyo from RMIT.

There are many things that drive migration to other countries, and one of them is romantic relationships and marriages. But Asian women who are developing relationships with men from Western countries, like Australia, be it through snail mails, online sites or other means, often have to face the stereotype of the ‘subservient woman’.  This stereotype has a history that still haunts us. In the case of Australia, the history goes way back to the First Fleet, but it also has a lot to do with the way multiculturalism is framed in this country.     In a new book, the anthropologist Emeritus Professor Kathryn Robinson looks at intercultural marriages between Asian women and Australian men. The book, titled ‘Marriage Migration, Intercultural Families and Global Intimacies’, mostly looks at the lives of Filipina women who married Australian men, but the book is also about multiculturalism in Australia and the history of the damaging stereotype of the ‘subservient oriental women’ that many Indonesian women, in Austr

Indonesia has one of the highest smoking rates in the world - approximately two thirds of adults are classified as smokers. This is in spite of anti-smoking discourses and tobacco control policies becoming more and more prominent across the globe, at least in many middle and high-income countries. In this episode of Talking Indonesia Elisabeth Kramer chats with Dr Marina Welker about her new book and deep dive on how multinational tobacco corporations impact the lives of ordinary Indonesians. What kinds of labour - paid, under-paid and unpaid - keep the the kretek industry fabulously profitable in Indonesia? Marina Welker is an Associate Professor of Anthropology at Cornell University whose research examines capitalism in Indonesia through the lens of multinational corporations involved in mining and tobacco. Her second book, “Kretek Capitalism: Making, Marketing, and Consuming Clove Cigarettes in Indonesia,” was recently published by the University of California Press and is available for free download as

Indonesians have a saying that you’re not properly satisfied until you’ve eaten rice (belum kenyang kalau belum makan nasi). But in recent weeks the price of rice has hit record highs, meaning that this daily serving of rice is becoming out of reach for some. In 2023 an EL Niño weather pattern across Indonesia made it the hottest year on record, leading to drought conditions and impacting rice production, with delayed harvests and low yields. Since late last year rice prices have continued to climb and with Idul Fitri approaching, prices for basic foods - including rice - are spiking to historic levels. Media reports show people queuing for hours at markets and President Joko Widodo has committed to providing 10 kilograms of rice a month to low-to-middle income households. The government claims that national rice stores are sufficient, but close observers note that cartels and collusion within the industry are also playing a part. At the same time - and an issue highlighted in the recent election campaign -

How do religious minorities fare under the constitution and blasphemy laws in Indonesia? The Indonesia Constitution seems to guarantee religious freedom so long as you believe in an almighty god. However, there are many real-life cases where it seems this is not enough. Add to this blasphemy laws, which have existed since the 1960s, and we can see that Indonesia has legal tools that can be easily weaponsised against individuals who express views that fall foul of the religious majority around them. In this podcast, Elisabeth Kramer talks to Dr Al Khanif about the state of religious rights and freedom of expression, and how jural traditions, the interpretations of laws based on historical and social norms, have made it even more difficult to assert these rights. Dr Khanif is the head of the Center for Human Rights, Multiculturalism and Migration at the University of Jember. In 2024, the Talking Indonesia podcast is co-hosted by Dr Elisabeth Kramer from the University of New South Wales, Dr Jemma Purdey from

In the early 20th century in Sumatra, a movement of young women writers were finding new ways to express their identities, build communities and achieve their dreams. Soenting Melajoe was the first newspaper for women published in West Sumatra during the colonial era in the Dutch East Indies. The newspaper was a part of a larger constellation of people working together to help women find education and employment through writing and crafts like weaving. Tito Ambyo’s guest is Bronwyn Beech Jones, a PhD candidate at the University of Melbourne, and a recipient of the Hansen Scholarship in History. Her completed PhD, called Textual Worlds: Rethinking self, community, and activism in colonial-era Sumatran women’s newspaper archives, looks at how women and girls from Sumatra articulated their experiences and conceived of themselves, their communities and aspirations in Malay language periodicals published between 1912 and 1929. In 2023, the Talking Indonesia podcast is co-hosted by Tito Ambyo from RMIT,  Dr Elisa

Energy transition In the recent national elections, the candidates paid surprisingly little attention to one of the greatest challenges Indonesia and the world at large is currently facing – that of climate change. At the same time, for more and more Indonesians, climate change induced natural disasters like droughts, storms and floods are increasingly impacting their lives. Indonesia has committed to the Paris Agreement to limit global warning to 1.5 degrees Celsius and signed up to achieve zero carbon emissions by 2060, including peaking emissions from the energy sector by 2030. Reaching these targets will have a lot to do with how it transitions from a reliance on fossil fuels to renewable energy sources. For a nation on a steep growth trajectory that includes downstreaming and elevated productivity, and with large coal reserves at its disposal, this is a massive challenge. What are Indonesia’s stated commitments and ambitions towards an energy transition away from fossil fuels? Does it have a plan to g

Prabowo has exceeded expectations to claim victory in 2024 Indonesian presidential election. What do our Talking Indonesia's co-hosts think about the result? Who are the winners and losers? What were the most interesting aspects of the campaign behind Prabowo’s success? And how did a pack of cigarettes save our co-host, Tito Ambyo, from possible jail time in the Suharto era? In this episode of Talking Indonesia, the co-hosts Jemma Purdey, Lis Kramer, Jacqui Baker and Tito Ambyo get together to chat about the election result, their analysis plus their hopes and fears for the future of Indonesian democracy.  In 2023, the Talking Indonesia podcast is co-hosted by Dr Elisabeth Kramer from the University of New South Wales, Dr Jemma Purdey from Monash University, Tito Ambyo from RMIT and Dr Jacqui Baker from Murdoch University. Photo by Adi Wibowo/Antara.

Conglomerates are the main players in the Indonesian economy, controlling core industries like agribusiness, banking and property and telecommunications. They are often built over multiple generations of a single, often ethnic Chinese, family. Indonesia’s biggest conglomerates - Sinar Mas Group, Royal Golden Eagle, Lippo group and Salim group - and their their owners are household names. Their businesses have an immeasurable impact on the daily lives of Indonesians: from the soap they use to wash the dishes, to the phone credit they use, and even to the hospitals they attend. Over the past two decades, Indonesia’s biggest conglomerates have emerged not just as domestic oligarchs but increasingly as regional players. This has come about through a series of acquisitions and joint ventures, but also through expansion enabled by the ASEAN regional economic architecture. To help us understand how Indonesian big business has transformed Indonesia and is now reshaping our region, Jacqui Baker chats with Faris Al