International Viewpoint - online socialist magazine

When past and present collide: Indonesia 1965-2025

Adam Novak, Pierre Rousset — 2025-12-22T09:45:53Z

“At the time of the US escalation in Vietnam, Indonesia was the scene of one of the worst bloodbaths in modern history, committed under the auspices of Washington and London. Sixty years later, the archipelago is at the heart of youth revolts against the privileges of the oligarchy and corruption, in defence of a democracy dearly won back since 1998.”

Indonesia hit by climate disaster and authoritarian power

Pierre Rousset — 2025-12-12T06:41:49Z

Cyclone Senyar has caused deadly floods and landslides in several Indonesian provinces. The toll looks set to be very heavy, and the government's (non-)risk prevention policy is once again under scrutiny.
A week after the cyclone passed, it is still impossible to measure the full extent of the devastation in the provinces of Aceh, North Sumatra and West Sumatra. At least 961 people have lost their lives, with nearly 300 still missing, over 156,000 homes have been damaged or destroyed, (…)

- IVP611 - December 2025 / Solidarity after disasters , Indonesia, Climate

Women cannot win decent work and freedom from violence under the anti-democratic regime in Indonesia:

Perempuan Mahardhika — 2025-12-08T17:47:49Z

"On the occasion of the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women, observed globally from 25 November to 10 December, Free Women will conduct simultaneous national actions in four cities under the theme 'Decent Work and Freedom from Violence Will Not Be Achieved Under an Anti-Democratic Regime'. This is an effort to strengthen the global commitment of the women's movement to end torture and violence against women."

- Feminism / Women, Indonesia

“We Are The Working Class”?: Indonesia's Labour Party and the Limits of Reformist Politics

Mark Johnson — 2025-11-02T09:47:01Z

When more than 50 Indonesian labour unions gathered in Jakarta on 5 October 2021 to establish the Partai Buruh (Labour Party), it appeared to mark a historic moment: workers organising their own political vehicle to challenge an oligarchic system that had stripped away their rights. Yet from its inception, the party embodied a contradiction. Led by union bureaucrats with histories of elite collaboration, the Labour Party promised working-class independence whilst its president courted the very politicians who had passed anti-worker legislation. It claimed to represent the marginalised whilst maintaining "deafening silence" on human rights abuses and democratic backsliding.

- IVP610 - November 2025 / Indonesia, Trade unions/workplace organizing

Social revolts and environmental issues in South Asia

Dominique B. — 2025-10-20T20:50:40Z

Since the 2022 popular uprising in Sri Lanka that ousted President Rajapaksa, South Asia has been swept by a wave of revolts that have toppled three governments and threaten most regimes.

- IVP609 - October 2025 / Philippines, Sri Lanka, Indonesia, Kashmir, Nepal

The lesson of Indonesia

Fourth International — 2025-09-30T04:36:36Z

Statement of the United Secretariat of the Fourth International, March 20, 1966

- Features / Fourth International, Indonesia, Historical events and figures

Lessons of the Defeat in Indonesia

Alex de Jong, Ernest Mandel — 2025-09-30T04:36:21Z

Sixty years ago, on October 1, 1965 the Indonesian army set in motion its plans to seize power from president Sukarno and to destroy the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI), one of the main forces supporting the president. In the article below, dated November 1965, Mandel criticized the political approach of the PKI in the preceding period. 

- Features / Indonesia, Historical events and figures

Prabowo: Stop State Violence, Revoke Parliamentarians' Facilities and Allowances, End Repression Against Mass Action, Provide Justice for Victims

Indonesian Women's Alliance (API) — 2025-08-31T08:26:43Z

The death of Affan Kurniawan, an online motorcycle taxi driver who participated in mass action and was run over by security apparatus vehicles, cannot be viewed as an isolated incident. This event is part of the face of systematic state violence; the apparatus is used to silence the people's voices with impunity that continues to be allowed.

- IVP607 - August 2025 / Women, Indonesia, Protest movements

Labour's Polycrisis

Kevin Lin — 2025-08-20T12:11:28Z

A concept that takes on a life of its own often says a lot about the material conditions and structure of feeling of the time. Polycrisis, recently re-popularised by the historian Adam Tooze, was first coined in an earlier era of multiple crises in the 1970s. For Tooze, polycrisis points to “this experience of not a single crisis with a single clearly defined logic…but this coming together at a single moment of things which, on the face of it, don't have anything to do with each other, but seem to pile onto each other”, and he locates the beginning of the current polycrisis in 2008 at the point of the Great Recession.

- Features / Philippines, South Korea, China, Indonesia, Asia, Trade unions/workplace organizing, Hong Kong

Indonesia's Communists Helped Forge Its National Identity

Alex de Jong — 2025-06-07T19:51:45Z

Review of Communication against Capital: Red Enlightenment at the Dawn of Indonesia by Rianne Subijanto (Cornell University Press, 2025).

- Reviews section / Indonesia, Reviews