It's always seemed wild to me that Indonesia doesn't come up more in general in the west. It seems like the only time I hear about it in the news is when there's a natural disaster.
Indonesia is poor, far away, not particularly significant geopolitically, and there's no large Indonesian diaspora in the West outside of the Netherlands. A large portion of Indonesian-Americans are actually ethnically Chinese.
It's a huge country in terms of both population and land, and with abundant natural resources including oil. It's the largest Muslim nation in the world, and also has significant numbers of religious minorities. It's adjacent to many other eastern and southeastern Asian markets. There's definitely interest to be had there.
Largest Muslim-majority nation. However, they are on a frightening trajectory towards becoming a Muslim nation. Their democracy is on increasingly thinning ice.
Islamisation of Indonesian politics has happened and faded away before, in the early 2000s. The current wave is worrisome, but there is no reason to believe it will rise indefinitely.
It is democracy and free speech that is enabling Islamic politics in Indonesia. The alternative is a strongman who imposes secularism. Indonesia already tried that, it is not so good for minorities.
Indonesia doesn't have free speech. Look what happened to Ahok. The FPI, who wants to institute sharia law, managed to get him jailed for two years on a BS blasphemy charge. Where is the "atheism" option for the KTP?
I'm afraid the concept of separation of Church and state in the Indonesian constitution and principles is not nearly strong enough. It's trying to have the cake and eat it too. I don't believe the legal constructs and government checks are strong enough to resist what's coming.
Indonesia does seem to have more than its fair share of natural calamities, but anyone who looks at a map cannot help but wonder at how much the country is spread across latitudes and longitudes, while not being extremely large in terms of land area (compared to say, the five largest countries in the world by land area). Such a country having one language as the lingua franca is a big deal, despite the difficulties and inconsistencies pointed out in this article.
