The Institutional Origins of Communal Violence Indonesia's Transition from Authoritarian Rule

Why are transitions from authoritarian rule often marked by spikes in communal violence? Through examining Indonesia's recent transition to democracy, this book develops a novel theoretical explanation for this phenomenon that also accounts for why some communities are vulnerable to violence during such transitions while others are able to maintain order. Yuhki Tajima argues that repressive intervention by security forces in Indonesia during the authoritarian period rendered some communities dependent on the state to maintain intercommunal security, whereas communities with a more tenuous exposure to the state developed their own informal institutions to maintain security. As the coercive grip of the authoritarian regime loosened, communities that were more accustomed to state intervention were more vulnerable to spikes in communal violence until they developed informal institutions that were better adapted for less state intervention. To test the theory, Tajima employs extensive fieldwork in, and rigorous statistical evidence from, Indonesia as well as cross-national data.

1. Introduction; 2. An institutional theory of intercommunal order and violence; 3. Building and constraining the Indonesian state; 4. The problem of local order: a view from the kampung; 5. A microstatistical test of the theory; 6. Small-scale communal conflicts: Lampung Province; 7. Outbreaks of large-scale communal conflicts; 8. The theory in comparative perspective; 9. Conclusion.

Yuhki Tajima is Assistant Professor in the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service and a core faculty member of the Asian Studies Program at Georgetown University. He has written articles for the American Journal of Political Science, the Journal of East Asian Studies, and The World Bank Indonesian Social Development Papers. He has consulted extensively for The World Bank and the United Nations Development Programme and was a researcher at the Federal Reserve Board of Governors. His work has been supported by The World Bank, the Asian Development Bank, Innovations for Poverty Action, the Institute on Global Conflict and Cooperation, and the Pacific Rim Research Program.