Electoral campaigning in Indonesia: the professionalization and commercialization after 1998

Abstract

According to 'Western' models, there are three different stages of electioneering. In Indonesia, elements of these different stages are now combined. The result is not a comprehensive 'Americanization', but a professionalization, along with a hybridization of indigenous and foreign methods. At the beginning, the elections of 1955 were marked by a localized campaign and the absence of TV, pollsters and consultants. The long suppression of electoral politics (from 1957 until 1998) has decelerated the transition toward new forms of electioneering. Technological change, institutional reforms (especially the introduction of direct presidential and direct local elections), the general dealignment of political parties, and the extraordinary rise of pollsters and consultants have effected a professionalization and commercialization of campaigning since the fall of Suharto. Political parties are now tending to become more market-oriented.