Abstract

This chapter examines the four most important changes of the Reform era: the immediate response of artists and the media to Suharto’s resignation; an ongoing struggle within the national bureaucracy over supplementing its long-term goals of creating national citizens and shaping national unity with a more commercial orientation; political decentralization (which includes cultural policy) and the related growth of ethnic and local identity politics and attached cultural traditions; and the changing effects of debates over public morality in Indonesia on culture and the arts. The chapter demonstrates that broadly similar trends are occurring across Indonesia, and the examples from West Java indicate that strikingly different trends can exist in close proximity and sometimes in the same municipality. It concludes by assessing the continued relevance of the authoritarian cultural policy model and identifying four broad uses of culture that are driving cultural policy change across administrations in Indonesia. Keywords:cultural policy; ethnic identity; political decentralization; tourism

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