Jokowi Populist Leadership as Reactionary Caesarism: A Gramscian Political-Economy Approach

The devastation of Indonesia’s democratic political order, culminating in the 2024 presidential election, is inseparable from a decade of populist leadership under President Jokowi. This trajectory has produced a condition of Reactionary Caesarism, understood as a dynamic mutation of social struggle among oligarchic factions in post-authoritarian Indonesia. Across Jokowi’s two terms, democracy has effectively flipped: reform institutions have been hollowed out, and democratic reformist activists have been domesticated into the government camp. This dismantling of democratic conditions has proceeded through a populist strategy that combines repressive and hegemonic maneuvers, mobilizing organized support at key political moments through the instrumentalization of state power, bureaucratic machinery, and legal apparatuses. In this configuration, “New Caesarism” in Indonesia appears less as a deviation than as a mechanism for sustaining the social reproduction of oligarchic state capitalism.