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Australia-Indonesia relationship lacks diplomacy from below
Since Indonesian independence, Australian and Indonesian governments have recognized the strategic and economic importance of their relationship. The relationship has the potential to improve the wealth and security of the entire Indo-Pacific region.
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Indonesia’s President Joko "Jokowi" Widodo (right) and Australia’s Prime Minister Anthony Albanese (left) ride bamboo bicycles at the Presidential Palace in Bogor, West Java on June 6, 2022. (AFP/Laily Rachev)
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ince Indonesian independence, Australian and Indonesian governments have recognized the strategic and economic importance of their relationship. This relationship has the potential to improve the wealth and security of the entire Indo-Pacific region.
Australia is a capacity builder in Indonesia, whether that is through improving institutional resilience or a deepening of democracy. As one of the oldest democracies in the Southern Hemisphere, Australia can share invaluable knowledge with its neighbor to create the type of wealthy egalitarian society that Indonesians crave. For Australia, closer ties with Indonesia can deepen its needed diversity of markets and protect Australia’s need for free and fair trade routes throughout the Indo-Pacific through closer defense ties.
The last 20 years have been incredibly successful in deepening the relationship through solid government-to-government dialogue at the ministerial level. However, dialogue becomes almost nonexistent beyond the elite-level discussions of bureaucracy and academia. This paucity of people-to-people contact has led to instability in the relationship with populists, easily whipping up xenophobia on either side of the Arafura Sea.
Much discussion but little progress has occurred in the last three decades in bringing the two peoples together. Australian analysts have argued that the problem lies in cultural, religious and historical difference, which has led to shallow notions of the other and to uninterested and apathetic engagement. Put simply, our otherness is considered insurmountable.
I do not concur with this view. As an Australian who is in contact with Indonesians from North Sumatra to Papua, I have found we have more in common than high-table analysts would have us believe.
It is true that Australians are inclined to have negative views of Indonesia, but this is based on shallow media coverage and an even shallower understanding of Southeast Asian history.
Due to ignorance, most Australians’ interest in Indonesia begins and ends in Kuta. A worrying majority of Australians live with the erroneous notion that the rest of the country is plagued with Islamic extremists and corruption. A notion that can be easily dispelled by viewing any of the self-published internet videos by westerners who ignore the travel warnings and venture beyond Bali to discover a warm and welcoming nation.
