Indonesia’s Environmental Diplomacy under Yudhoyono: A Critical–Institutionalist–Constructivist Analysis

Abstract

Indonesia’s environmental diplomacy during Yudhoyono’s administration gained positive international recognition, yet Indonesia’s high-profile diplomatic initiatives took place amid a continued path of environmental decline. Broadly defining environmental diplomacy as a mediating institution between universalism and particularism through the co-constitutive processes of environmental regimes, this article employs a critical–institutionalist–constructivist framework to explain the gap between Indonesia’s commitments to universal norms of environmental preservation and the corresponding local practices. Using both primary and secondary data, the research offers a boundary analysis of diplomacy as the hub between universal norms and local values concerning human–nature relations. Findings suggest that however assertive Indonesia may be in its external diplomatic initiatives, the benefits that it expects to gain from a ‘green reputation’ will only go as far as its efforts to strengthen the foundational local institutions that are required to adapt and localize its global environmental diplomacy strategies.