Parliament Votes to End Direct Elections: Twists and Turns
Politics in Indonesia is about to become a whole lot more interesting. Late last Friday while President SBY was in DC –after addressing the UN Global Climate Change Summit in NY–Indonesia’s […]
Where Are The Technocrats ?
I have been watching the rupiah flirt with 12,000, remembering 1998 time when it dropped from 2400 to 15,000, and the long period in 2010 and 2011 when it was […]
The January Surprise
On January 12, Indonesia’s mineral export ban came into effect with an unexpected kicker: an export tax on copper concentrates. As predicted, a last minute compromise allowed them to be […]
Structural Reform Anxiety
Its amazing and somewhat anxiety producing to watch both the US and Indonesia democracies struggle over structural reforms. An inflection point seems to have simultaneously been reached in each […]
Return of Paternalist Capitalism
A commonly held view of Indonesia’s recent, more protectionist policy decisions (i.e. mineral export bans, beef and horticulture import restrictions, mining divestment rules) is that they are motivated by populist […]
Political Parties and the Next President of Indonesia
Political Parties For many years I have been a member of Columbia University’s Southeast Asia seminar, a fantastic group of scholars, writers, and a few private sector representatives. We […]
Outlook for 2013
Indonesia heads into 2013 with continuing questions for foreign companies within an overall atmosphere of solid 6% -6.5% economic growth. The blemishes –if handled well–will not take away from the […]