A quiet revolution? Village head elections and the democratization of rural Indonesia

Berenschot, Ward and Capri, Wigke and Dhian, Devy (2021) A quiet revolution? Village head elections and the democratization of rural Indonesia. Critical Asian Studies, 53 (1). 126 – 146. ISSN 14672715

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Abstract

While democratization is regularly associated with elite renewal, established elites often succeed in maintaining their dominance after the fall of the authoritarian regime that fostered them. This constitutes a relatively understudied challenge facing democratization processes: when and how do democratic reforms succeed in fostering the emergence of new elites? This paper addresses this question through a study of village head elections in three rural districts around Yogyakarta, Indonesia. Comparing older studies of village head elections with ten in-depth studies of recent village head elections as well as assessments of the backgrounds of eighty village heads (kepala desa), this paper shows that a remarkable change has taken place. Whereas up to ten years ago many villages were still ruled by leaders from established families with a quasi-hereditary grip on power, in recent years such leaders are rapidly being replaced by village heads with more modest family backgrounds and a different style of leadership. This important change has resulted from a combination of democratic reforms, the diversification of rural economies, and the particularly competitive character of village head elections. Elite renewal is possible when open and information-dense elections coincide with a process of economic diversification undercutting the economic dominance of established elites. © 2021 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.

Item Type: Article
Additional Information: Cited by: 11; All Open Access, Green Open Access, Hybrid Gold Open Access
Uncontrolled Keywords: Indonesia; Yogyakarta; democratization; election; leadership; political reform; rural area; rural economy; rural politics; village
Subjects: J Political Science > JS Local government Municipal government
Divisions: Faculty of Political and Social Sciences > Politics and Government
Depositing User: Yuli Hesti Wahyuningsih
Date Deposited: 18 Mar 2025 02:43
Last Modified: 18 Mar 2025 02:43
URI: https://ir.lib.ugm.ac.id/id/eprint/15805

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