The 8th SEA-SH Seminar：「Political and Social Dynamics of Coal Railway Project in Kalimantan, Indonesia」

The 8th Southeast Asian Studies for Sustainable Humanosphere Research
Seminar will be held on the 19th March 2013

Date: March 19th, 2013　12:00~14:00
Venue: Tonan-tei (Room No. 201), CSEAS, Inamori Foundation Memorial Building, Kyoto University

Title：Political and Social Dynamics of Coal Railway Project in Kalimantan, Indonesia

Speaker: Akiko Morishita, Ph.D. (Center for Southeast Asian Studies, Kyoto University)

Indonesia’s local politicians in natural resource rich regions are embarking on economic development projects at a rapid pace, using their influence as a leverage to broker deals with foreign investors. Democratization and decentralization has also brought about unremitting struggles over local power and resources among local political elites. Both the central government and international business forces find it hard to ignore the local power holders when venturing into local development projects.

Now in the pipeline, a multi-billion dollar railway project in Kalimantan is a case that shows how the central and local government leaders are promoting infrastructure development for the extractive industries particularly for coal at a time when the global demand for it is rising. In my presentation, I will explore how the local government leaders are dealing with the central government and foreign investors in their attempt to secure financial assistance for the coal railway project, which was once part of the trans-Borneo rail network concept that failed to take off.

Studies on foreign company-host government relations in Indonesia have focused on interactions between foreign firms and the central government (Khong 1980; 1986) given that the country was highly centralized during the New Order period (1967-1998) and local authorities acted as mere agents of the central government. In decentralized Indonesia today, local governments are also taking part in the negotiation processes of foreign investment projects. In my presentation, I will show the reality on the ground and how the local power players operate to secure their position in a project venture by manipulating the local communities and environment concerns regardless of the impact such development projects and mining activities will have on the Kalimantan region.