Since its transition to democracy barely a decade ago, Indonesia has begun projecting its newly democratic values across international borders. So far, however, its efforts have been largely rhetorical.
Democratization is never easy, smooth, or linear, but as Indonesia’s experience in building a multiparty and multiethnic democracy shows, it can succeed even under difficult and initially unpromising conditions.
The implicit social bargain that carried many East Asian countries through the Cold War has lost its currency. If the peoples of this region are to secure the blessings of…
