As the Middle East forcedly rewires its economy and security amid conflict, Indonesia faces an urgent wake-up call to overhaul its own structural vulnerabilities before its demographic window slams shut.

The latent bias that leads analysts to place the US at the center of the global economy has caused many to overlook just how game-changing Chinese mercantilism has been.

Indonesia’s ambitious B50 biodiesel mandate promises total energy independence, but a volatile mix of surging food costs, environmental degradation, and fiscal strain could turn this historic experiment into a costly economic gamble.

Indonesia’s vast nickel wealth won’t save its green industrial ambitions if volatile regulations and a severe high-tech skills deficit keep driving global EV giants straight into the arms of Vietnam.

Pos Indonesia, the country's oldest state-owned enterprise (SOE), has come under renewed scrutiny following the resignation of its president director, Daud Joseph, after only three months in office. His departure was followed by allegations of governance irregularities, including suspected manipulation of the company's financial statements, prompting state asset fund Danantara to launch an audit. The episode underscores the persistent weaknesses in SOE governance that have contributed to the sector's underperformance for years.

The country's recurring landfill disasters demand that we stop fighting fire with fire downstream and finally extinguish the waste crisis at its household source.

In just a few decades, China accomplished an industrialization process that took many developed countries centuries to achieve.

Renewed US-Iran hostilities and Israel's protracted military campaigns reflect rising risks of a wider Middle East conflict, threatening to trigger severe energy and food crises worldwide.  

True independence requires more than a flag and a border; it demands the fiscal sovereignty to finance the nation's future through public trust and institutional capacity.

One should heed Jean-Paul Sartre’s observation that a text attacked by both sides is probably on the right track.

While the Jatiwaringin landfill fire has exposed the volatile reality of Indonesia’s mismanaged waste, a much larger environmental time bomb is ticking in Bantar Gebang at the gates of Greater Jakarta.

When institutional rivalries push heavily armed soldiers to negotiate the return of seized evidence, Indonesia faces a critical choice: uphold the civilian rule of law or allow justice to be dictated by the barrel of a gun.

President Prabowo Subianto's free nutritious meal program was conceived as a transformative social policy to improve child nutrition, strengthen human capital and demonstrate the state's ability to deliver tangible benefits to millions of Indonesians. It is also the policy most closely associated with his presidency. More than any other initiative, its success or failure will shape public perceptions of his administration.

The Prabowo administration’s aggressive corporate crackdowns risk looking less like impartial justice and more like selective enforcement: a dangerous signal that could spook the very investors the country needs to sustain growth.

Every empire has its strengths and weaknesses. Perhaps the most important asset is understanding those of your adversaries.

Since Pakistan and India remain embroiled in kinetic confrontations below a nuclear overhang, there is an urgent need to come up with ways to defuse tension during crises.

As Indonesia prepares to introduce front-of-package food labels, a new study reveals that the proposed system may dangerously downplay the health risks of nearly half the country's unhealthiest snacks and beverages.

As Indonesia honored its fallen soldiers alongside those of Timor-Leste last week, the occasion served as a reminder of the parallel journeys the two bordering neighbors have trod, not least in their leaders' approaches to maintain national defense and public security within the corridors of democracy.

The main constraint is not the lack of capital available to fund the projects; it is the regulation.

Starting Aug. 1, four of the country's largest marketplaces - Tokopedia, Shopee, Lazada and Blibli - will begin withholding income tax directly from qualifying merchants' sales, replacing the long-standing self-assessment system. By turning digital platforms into tax collectors, the government hopes to improve compliance. The challenge is whether it can formalize the digital economy without discouraging the small businesses that drive its growth.

President Prabowo Subianto's response to call for "introspection" from the military, police and prosecutors is not enough.

As institutional rivalries and overlapping intelligence mandates intensify, President Prabowo faces a critical test: preventing the fragmentation of the Indonesian state itself.

By branding LGBTQ culture as a national security threat, Indonesia's new defense regulation triggers a dangerous constitutional contradiction that undermines the very human rights the state is sworn to protect.

To truly revitalize rural Indonesia, the government's ambitious 249-trillion-rupiah village cooperative program must move away from top-down bureaucracy and return to its democratic, community-owned roots.

Beyond the headlines of environmental conflict, Papua’s ancient pig feasts offer modern climate policymakers a profound lesson in generational forest stewardship.

If Malaysia continues to focus on domestic platforms and generalized talent cultivation without forging deep, structural links with Taiwan's market leaders, its economic spillovers will remain limited.

Beyond the standard headlines of trade and defense, the genuine warmth between Modi and Prabowo signals a profound shift from transactional diplomacy to a resilient, co-developed future for India and Indonesia.