Democracy and Local Autonomy Policy in Indonesia: A Particularist Perspective

DOI

10.2991/icse-15.2016.79How to use a DOI?

Keywords

discourse, local autonomy policy, democracy, citizenship.

Abstract

This paper explores the extent to which the discourse of local autonomy policy in Indonesia derived from the concept of democracy is applicable in the case of Daerah Istimewa Yogyakarta (Yogyakarta Special Region). Generally speaking, democracy has been considered a universal concept. However, from a preliminary observation, it was found that a conflict existed in the attempt to applying democracy seen as part of universal values and the desire to preserve the local values of Yogyakarta. Every time when a discourse was put forward to separate the position of the Sultan of Yogyakarta as governor and monarch, the local people tended to reject the election of the governor in Yogyakarta. They wanted the Sultan to be their governor. Using a particulars perspective in the study of governance, this paper argues that democracy can be employed to guide institutional reforms in Indonesia. However, as a concept, it is but a mental construct which is made to draw out meaning from our complex reality. This implies that it should be considered from its usefulness, rather than truthfulness in the case of Yogyakarta. Therefore, the local voice should be carefully considered so that regional autonomy will be less susceptible to failure in its implementation.

Copyright

© 2016, the Authors. Published by Atlantis Press.

Open Access

This is an open access article distributed under the CC BY-NC license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/).

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TY  - CONF
AU  - Rusnaini
PY  - 2016/04
DA  - 2016/04
TI  - Democracy and Local Autonomy Policy in Indonesia: A Particularist Perspective
BT  - Proceedings of the 1st UPI International Conference on Sociology Education (UPI ICSE 2015)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 364
EP  - 368
SN  - 2352-5398
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/icse-15.2016.79
DO  - 10.2991/icse-15.2016.79
ID  - 2016/04
ER  -