During the Suharto era, the official trade union was strictly prohibited from engaging with political parties and all but one of the ‘alternative’ unions publically rejected political unionism, preferring instead to seek recognition as a socio-economic force. In the early years of Indonesia’s return to democracy, too, trade unions sat on the side-lines in elections and depended on mass protests to advance their demands. However, labour leaders’ position on electoral politics shifted dramatically after the 2004 election. Increasingly frustrated with the government’s failure to stem labour rights abuses, the ineffectiveness of the labour law enforcement, and the weakness of the social safety net, many unionists concluded that they must engage in ‘formal politics’ if they are to secure more favourable policies for workers. By the time of the 2009 election, the question was no longer whether unions should try to influence politics, but whether they should do it by lobbying parties from outside the system or by running candidates for office.

In a context where the parties vying for power within Indonesia’s political system have made little attempt to define themselves by a commitment to particular policies, and have faced little pressure from outside to do so, trade unions’ efforts to engage in electoral politics are tremendously significant for Indonesia’s emerging democracy. Drawing on case studies from five union-dense locations in Java and Sumatra, this paper examines trade unions’ engagement in the 2014 electoral cycle and makes an assessment of its significance for Indonesian politics.

Short Bio:

Michele Ford is Australian Research Council (ARC) Future Fellow and Director of the Sydney Southeast Asia Centre at the University of Sydney. Her research interests focus on the Indonesian labour movement, trade union aid, and trade union responses to labour migration in East and Southeast Asia. Michele is the author of Workers and Intellectuals: NGOs, Unions and the Indonesian Labour Movement (NUS/Hawaii/KITLV 2009), editor of Social Activism in Southeast Asia (Routledge 2013) and co-editor of Women and Work in Indonesia (Routledge 2008), Women and Labour Organizing In Asia: Diversity, Autonomy and Activism (Routledge 2008), Men and Masculinities in Southeast Asia (Routledge 2012), Labour Migration and Human Trafficking in Southeast Asia: Critical Perspectives (Routledge 2012), and Beyond Oligarchy: Wealth, Power, and Contemporary Indonesian Politics (Cornell SEAP 2014).

Prof Michele Ford spoke about the importance of trade union's engagement in Indonesian politics by examining the cases of 2014 electoral cycle from five union-dense locations in Java and Sumatra. She argues that this engagement is significant as it opened up pathways of political participation of Indonesia's working class and that both the local and national oligarchs believe in the potential of labor’s mobilizational power.