What Drives Governance Reversal and How Does it Reshape State–Society Relations in Indonesia
Abstract
This study investigates governance reversal as a failure-driven institutional reconfig- uration, through which decentralized, networked, or collaborative arrangements are re-centralized under state authority. This study combines a systematic literature re- view with a document-based qualitative analysis of three Indonesian policy domains: halal certification reform, the Makan Bergizi Gratis (MBG) program, and military involvement in food governance through territorial development battalions. This article formalizes a failure-reversal framework by mapping the sequence of failure, political interpretation, and institutional reconfiguration onto four analytical dimen- sions: institutional change, authority shift, policy justification, and governance mode. The framework also identifies two possible outcome pathways: corrective capacity, where state reassertion improves coordination and implementation, and pathological centralization, where reassertion intensifies executive dominance, symbolic institu- tionalism, and accountability deficits. The Indonesian cases are treated as purposively selected, maximum-variation illustrative cases rather than as a basis for an uncon- ditional empirical generalization. Therefore, governance reversal is proposed as an analytically transferable but scope-conditioned concept for studying how governance failures reshape state-society relations.
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References
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Pettus, K. (2020). Whiteness, scapegoating, and scarcity: Medicalizing” the US opioid crisis”. Journal of Illicit Economies and Development (JIED), 2(1), 29-37.
Pistor, K. (2009). Sovereign wealth funds, banks, and governments in the global crisis: Towards a new governance of global finance?. European Business Organization Law Review (EBOR), 10(3), 333- 352.
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Shava, E., Muringa, T. P., & Oladejo, O. M. (2025). “Spare the Rod and Spoil the Child”: Navigating consequence management in local government transformation in South Africa. Frontiers in Political Science, 7, 1579256.
Sun, P., Mellahi, K., & Liu, G. S. (2011). Corporate governance failure and contingent political resources in transition economies: A longitudinal case study. Asia Pacific Journal of Management, 28(4), 853-879.
Svensson, S. (2021). Perspective on sub-national governance of crossborder regions: democratic governance in anti-democratic times. Frontiers in Political Science, 3, 710923.
Vince, J. (2015). Integrated policy approaches and policy failure: The case of Australia’s Oceans Policy. Policy Sciences, 48(2), 159-180.
Warburton, E., & Aspinall, E. (2019). Explaining Indonesia’s democratic regression. Contemporary Southeast Asia, 41(2), 255-285.
Wenham, C., & Davies, S. E. (2023). What is the ideal World Health Organization (WHO)?. Health Economics, Policy and Law, 18(3), 329-340.
Williams, O. D. (2020). COVID-19 and private health: Market and governance failure. Development, 63(2), 181-190.
Yar, M. (2011). From ‘‘governance of security’to ‘governance failure’: Refining the criminological agenda. Internet journal of criminology, 1-19.
Yu, J., & He, Z. (2011). The tension between governance and state building. Journal of Chinese Political Science, 16(1), 1-17.
Zhou, V. S., & Schubert, G. (2025). Minimum Compliance in Local Policy Implementation in Contemporary China: The Case of Municipal Solid Waste Management. The China Quarterly, 1-19.
Zhu, H., Manion, M., & Rothschild, V. (2025). Crisis and Correction: Do Government Rectification Efforts Restore Citizen Trust After Governance Failure. Political Behavior, 47(4), 1595-1620.
Bassoli, M., & Campomori, F. (2024). Re thinking policy and (multi level) governance failure: What went wrong and why in the reception of Ukrainian refugees in Italy?. Governance, 37(4), 1391-1411.
Bermeo, N. (2016). On democratic backsliding. Journal of Democracy, 27(1), 5-19.
Bertacchini, E., & Gould, P. (2021). Collective action dilemmas at cultural heritage sites: An application of the IAD-NAAS framework. International Journal of the Commons, 15(1), 276-290. https:// doi.org/10.5334/ijc.1089
Best, J. (2014). Governing failure: Provisional expertise and the transformation of global development finance. Cambridge University Press.
Bremmer, I. (2010). Article commentary: The end of the free market: Who wins the war between states and corporations?. European View, 9(2), 249-252.
Brown, I. A., & Thai, M. T. T. (2024). The proliferation of neoliberal ideology: A study of international anti-corruption discourse through the lens of institutional entrepreneurship theory. Journal of Infrastructure, Policy and Development, 8(8), 4295.
Bünte, M., & Ufen, A. (Eds.). (2009). Democratization in Post-Suharto Indonesia (p. 102). London: Routledge.
Campos, I., Fuchs, D., Repo, P., Jager, W., Klöckner, C., Wang, S., ... & Živčič, L. (2024). What role can democracy labs play in co-creating democratic innovations for sustainability?. Socio-Ecological Practice Research, 6(4), 367-380.
Clare, S., & Creed, I. F. (2014). Tracking wetland loss to improve evidence-based wetland policy learning and decision-making. Wetlands ecology and management, 22(3), 235-245.
De Simone, S. (2018). Playing the ‘fragile state’card: the SPLM and state extraversion in South Sudan. The Journal of Modern African Studies, 56(3), 395-420.
Dim, E. E., & Asomah, J. Y. (2025). Political transition, structural inequality, and the persistence of bribery in Ghana (1999-2022). Journal of Developing Societies, 41(4), 493-521. https://doi. org/10.1177/0169796X251351798
Downes, J. F., & Lai, K. (2025). EU-China relations in a post-COVID-19 world order: the context of the BRI project. Frontiers in Political Science, 7, 1644327.
Dussauge-Laguna, M. I. (2022). The promises and perils of populism for democratic policymaking: The case of Mexico. Policy sciences, 55(4), 777- 803.
Efrat, A., & Newman, A. L. (2018). Divulging data: Domestic determinants of international information sharing. The Review of International Organizations, 13(3), 395-419.
Englebert, P., & Mungongo, E. K. (2016). Misguided and misdiagnosed: The failure of decentralization reforms in the DR of Congo. African Studies Review, 59(1), 5-32.
Esfahani, A. S., & Masoudnia, H. (2025). Turkey under Erdoğan: Investigating the relationship between populism and governance quality since 2013. Politics and Governance, 13.
Fermeglia, M. (2023). When decentralization strikes back: The example of climate governance in Belgium. Revista d’estudis autonòmics i federals, (37), 93-126.
Giessen, L., Burns, S., Sahide, M. A. K., & Wibowo, A. (2016). From governance to government: The strengthened role of state bureaucracies in forest and agricultural certification. Policy and society, 35(1), 71-89.
Government of the Republic of Indonesia. (2014). Law No. 33 of 2014 on Halal Product Assurance.
Government of the Republic of Indonesia. (2024a). Presidential Regulation No. 83 of 2024 on the National Nutrition Agency.
Government of the Republic of Indonesia. (2024b). Presidential Regulation No. 153 of 2024 on the Halal Product Assurance Organizing Agency.
Guardian. (2025, August 28). In Prabowo’s Indonesia, the military is quietly creeping back into civilian life.
Hadiz, V. (2010). Localizing power in post- authoritarian Indonesia: A Southeast Asian perspective. Stanford University Press.
Hajnal, G., & Jeziorska, I. (2021). Collaborative governance regimes in illiberal democracies: A comparative case of drug harm reduction policy in Central-Eastern Europe. Transylvanian Review of Administrative Sciences, 17(62), 60-80.
Halmai, G. (2023). Rule of law backsliding and memory politics in Hungary. European Constitutional Law Review, 19(4), 602-622.
Hamm, J. A., Carrera, J. S., Van Fossen, J. A., Key K. D., Woolford S. J., Bailey S. B., ... & Calhoun, K. D. (2023). Conceptualizing trust and distrust as alternative stable states: Lessons from the Flint water crisis. Ecology and society: a journal of integrative science for resilience and sustainability, 28(3), 14.
Howlett, M., & Ramesh, M. (2014). The two orders of governance failure: Design mismatches and policy capacity issues in modern governance. Policy and Society, 33(4), 317-327.
Huda, A. M., Nurwahid, A. F., Firmannandya, A., Tsuroyya, & Ismail, A. (2025). Who’s to blame for the Rohingya refugee crisis? Analyzing ‘scapegoating’ narratives in YouTube news channel commentaries from Indonesia and Malaysia. Multidisciplinary Science Journal, 8(2), 2026016. https://doi.org/10.31893/multiscience.2026016
Jessop, B. (1999). The dynamics of partnerships and governance failures. The new politics of local governance in Britain, 11-32.
Jessop, B. (2008). Promoting good governance, disguising governance failure: Reflections on policy paradigms and policy narratives in the field of governance. Public Governance, 1(2), 5-25.
Jones, M. (2023). Spaces of collibration: Governance and metagovernance of failure. Sociologica, 17(3), 51-74.
Khaitan, T. (2020). Killing a Constitution with a Thousand Cuts: Executive Aggrandizement and Party-State Fusion in India. Law & Ethics of Human Rights, 14(1), 49-95.
Knudsen, J. S. (2011). Company delistings from the UN Global Compact: Limited business demand or domestic governance failure?. Journal of Business Ethics, 103(3), 331-349.
Levitsky, S., & Ziblatt, D. (2018). How democracies die. Penguin Books.
Liu, D., Mustafa, S. E. B., & Sarmiti, N. Z. B. (2025). From zero-COVID to global alignment: Transnational pressures and China’s pandemic communication transformation. Globalization and Health, 21(1), 1-13.
Lührmann, A., & Lindberg, S. I. (2019). A third wave of autocratization is here: What is new about it?. Democratization, 26(7), 1095-1113.
Mietzner, M. (2021). Sources of resistance to democratic decline: Indonesian civil society and its trials. Democratization, 28(1), 161-178.
Muluk, M. R. K., Sajida & Durrety, S. F. (2025). Trends, Issues, and Future Directions of Decentralization in Unitary State Research: Bibliometric Analyses from 1975-2024 to. KnE Social Sciences, 10(4), 262-285.
Muluk, M. R. K., Sajida, S., Nisa, G. D., & Durrety, S. F. (2023). Comprehending the Notion of Publicness: Unexplored Dimensions and Future Research Initiatives. BISNIS & BIROKRASI: Jurnal Ilmu Administrasi Dan Organisasi, 30(3), 125-135.
Nicoli, F. (2016). From governance to government? An analysis of the Commission’s bid to politicize EMU rules. SSRN Electronic Journal. https://doi. org/10.2139/ssrn.2731760
Park, S. (2021). Politics or bureaucratic failures? Understanding the dynamics of policy failures in democratic governance. Journal of Policy Studies, 36(3), 25-36. https://doi.org/10.52372/ kjps36303
Paruchuri, S., Hoempler, E. A., Cowen, A. P., Cannella, A. A. Jr., & Nahm, P. I. (2024). Governance failure and governance under failure: Reviewing the role of directors in organizational misconduct. Journal of Management, 50(6), 2237-2265.
Peters, B. G., & Pierre, J. (2000). Citizens versus the new public manager: The problem of mutual empowerment. Administration & Society, 32(1), 9-28.
Pettus, K. (2020). Whiteness, scapegoating, and scarcity: Medicalizing” the US opioid crisis”. Journal of Illicit Economies and Development (JIED), 2(1), 29-37.
Pistor, K. (2009). Sovereign wealth funds, banks, and governments in the global crisis: Towards a new governance of global finance?. European Business Organization Law Review (EBOR), 10(3), 333- 352.
Rhodes, R. A. W. (1996). The new governance: governing without a government. Political studies, 44(4), 652-667.
Richardson, J. R. (2009). Steering without navigation equipment: the lamentable state of Australian health policy reform. Australia and New Zealand Health Policy, 6(1), HP090627.
Rodrik, D. (2021). The right scope of global governance and democracy enhancement. RED, 2(1), 36-45.
Seidemann, I., Weißmüller, K. S., & Geiger, D. (2025). The Downward Spiral of Legitimacy Erosion: Lessons on Network Governance Failure During the German “Refugee Crisis’ Public Administration Review.
Shava, E., Muringa, T. P., & Oladejo, O. M. (2025). “Spare the Rod and Spoil the Child”: Navigating consequence management in local government transformation in South Africa. Frontiers in Political Science, 7, 1579256.
Sun, P., Mellahi, K., & Liu, G. S. (2011). Corporate governance failure and contingent political resources in transition economies: A longitudinal case study. Asia Pacific Journal of Management, 28(4), 853-879.
Svensson, S. (2021). Perspective on sub-national governance of crossborder regions: democratic governance in anti-democratic times. Frontiers in Political Science, 3, 710923.
Vince, J. (2015). Integrated policy approaches and policy failure: The case of Australia’s Oceans Policy. Policy Sciences, 48(2), 159-180.
Warburton, E., & Aspinall, E. (2019). Explaining Indonesia’s democratic regression. Contemporary Southeast Asia, 41(2), 255-285.
Wenham, C., & Davies, S. E. (2023). What is the ideal World Health Organization (WHO)?. Health Economics, Policy and Law, 18(3), 329-340.
Williams, O. D. (2020). COVID-19 and private health: Market and governance failure. Development, 63(2), 181-190.
Yar, M. (2011). From ‘‘governance of security’to ‘governance failure’: Refining the criminological agenda. Internet journal of criminology, 1-19.
Yu, J., & He, Z. (2011). The tension between governance and state building. Journal of Chinese Political Science, 16(1), 1-17.
Zhou, V. S., & Schubert, G. (2025). Minimum Compliance in Local Policy Implementation in Contemporary China: The Case of Municipal Solid Waste Management. The China Quarterly, 1-19.
Zhu, H., Manion, M., & Rothschild, V. (2025). Crisis and Correction: Do Government Rectification Efforts Restore Citizen Trust After Governance Failure. Political Behavior, 47(4), 1595-1620.
Published
2026-09-25
How to Cite
KHAIRUL MULUK, Mujibur Rahman; SAJIDA, Sajida.
What Drives Governance Reversal and How Does it Reshape State–Society Relations in Indonesia.
, [S.l.], v. 10, n. 3, p. 258-274, sep. 2026.
Available at: <https://journal.iapa.or.id/pgr/article/view/1395>. Date accessed: 30 sep. 2026.
doi: https://doi.org/10.30589/pgr.v10i3.1395.
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Articles
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