The Role of Constitution Building Processes in Democratization - The Constitution-Building Process in Post-Soeharto Indonesia

This case study report was written by Edward Schneier in 2005, published by International IDEA.

With the rapid and unanticipated fall of Suharto in 1998, Indonesia drifted into the uncharted waters of monumental change. Left with a body of authoritarian rule papered over by the quasi-democratic framework of the 1945 constitution, the forces of reformasi— the loose coalition of groups that tumbled the Suharto government— were without leadership, direction, or unifying ideology. Through a series of constitutional amendments, statutes, and evolving procedures, the government is slouching its way toward constitutional democracy; but has yet to provide the kind of transcendent moment called for in the Elster model. “The gap between the founding father’s stress on freedom from colonialism and the emphasis of today’s generation on democratization and decentralization,” as one of the keynote speakers at IDEA’s 2002 conference on reform put it, “has not been addressed.”iii Instead of providing a rare moment of reform, the governing elite has chosen a more incremental process that remains incomplete.