Responsive Governance and Discourses of Cultural Modernisation

In the literature on Indonesia’s development and modernisation as a nation state, a lot has been written about the Post-Suharto reformasi era, about the process from militarism, bureaucratisation and repression to democratisation, decentralisation, media liberalisation, but also its “illiberal turn” (Diprose et al. Reference Diprose, Dave and Hadiz2019), meaning a recent turn towards illiberalism across diverse areas of policy making in Indonesia. As a response to the state’s and markets’ failure to address social issues, illiberal models have emerged in fields such as decentralisation, civil–military relations, economic and foreign policy but also in terms of human rights (Diprose et al. Reference Diprose, Dave and Hadiz2019: 691). Indonesia’s former President Joko Widodo (Jokowi), who had been quite successful with his new developmentalism (Warburton Reference Warburton2016), attracted harsh criticism at the end of his second and final term of office, notably from civil society. The “Omnibus Law for Job Creation” introduced in 2020 is criticised for restricting workers’ rights and dismantling environmental protection, for instance by threatening indigenous peoples’ access to land and dwindling rainforests. There is also criticism of weakening existing environmental laws and legal protections for indigenous groups, heightening concerns about land grabs (cp. Göpel Reference Göpel2024). Apparently, Jokowi’s model pembangunan baru (new developmentalism) followed the reformasi tradition and served as a narrative to justify deregulation in the name of progress and development.

Civil resistance movements such as #ReformasiDikorupsi in Indonesia aim to fight the deterioration of democracy, shrinking civic space, acute corruption, etc., in line with criticism against the Omnibus Law and the new criminal code – yet only moderately successful. During a panel at the 2022 EuroSEAS conference titled “Civil resistance in Southeast Asia”Footnote ¹ that also focused on Indonesia, the discussion circled around (1) the basic principle that for building democratic structures, cultural components must be taken into consideration, and (2) when searching for reasons why civil resistance and non-violent intervention are declining, the hypothesis was that democratic institutions are now working “too well”, and governments have become “too responsive”. In a publication resulting from the panel, the authors identify changes in the environment for activism and political agency: While virtual space has expanded, opening new avenues for voice and solidarity-building, innovations in strategies for suppression have kept pace, and physical space faces new constraints (Bünte and Weiss Reference Bünte and Weiss2023: 298).

In recent literature on digital governance and public participation in policy making in Indonesia, positive case studies and evaluations stand beside rather critical examinations and assessments. While for West Sumatra, digital governance has been linked with better social inclusion and more inclusive development (Arianto Reference Arianto2024), examples from Central Java (Wahyunengseh et al. Reference Wahyunengseh, Hastjarjo, Mulyaningsih and Suharto2020) and beyond Java (Hermana and Silfianti Reference Hermana and Silfianti2011) emphasise risks of digital governance implementation in poverty reduction policies, of social and economic marginalisation. Studies on collaborative and digital governance in various Indonesian cities show that while smart city programs are envisioned to support political participation and good governance, a common issue is that implementation of the programs does not go beyond information dissemination, and local political authorities do not involve other actors in government management and public policy making (Hardi and Gohwong Reference Hardi and Gohwong2020; Mukhlis and Perdana Reference Mukhlis and Perdana2022; Triyanto et al. Reference Triyanto, Warsono and Herawati2022). Allowing political participation and implementing collaborative governance requires, beyond the government’s four official pillars (digital ethics, skills, culture, and security), actual collaboration among governments (central and local government) and with the private sector, media, academics, society, and other communities (Budiati and Jumiati Reference Budiati and Jumiati2021). Instead, political authorities still tend to use a top-down approach in their (urban) management, i.e., in planning, organizing, implementing, and controlling, according to their development agenda.

Besides business- and economy-oriented development schemes, sustainability concepts are receiving more consideration in fields such as rural development, agriculture and food systems, but also cultural development. Pembangunan Desa or village development, in the sense of autonomous development strategies, is presented as a key factor for poverty reduction in rural areas (Agustina and Yahya Reference Agustina and Yahya2022), and local capacity – villagers’ capability to address local livelihood and governance problems – as essential for effective village government (Bebbington et al. Reference Bebbington, Dharmawan, Fahmi and Guggenheim2006). For Pembangunan Pertanian or Agriculture Development, a shift from conventional, growth-oriented agriculture to more sustainable, organic agriculture with a holistic and integrated approach is envisioned (David and Ardiansyah Reference David and Ardiansyah2016). This will be discussed in detail below. More autonomous governance approaches to village and agricultural development would require the government’s receptiveness to local cultural or situated knowledge, which, again, implies the question of responsiveness.

Since Indonesia’s independence, in the context of nation-building and development, local cultures in Indonesia have been defined as outdated, backward, something that needs to be overcome in order to become a modern, developed Indonesian society, and/or selected and preserved as a presentable part of the country’s cultural diversity (Schlehe Reference Schlehe, Hermann, Klenke and Dickhardt2009). This national narrative of a modern, unified national culture that overcomes individual, traditional local cultures has made a remarkable contribution to Indonesia’s nation-building and state unity and has been revived for the promotion of national policies and local projects by Indonesian governments time and again. However, the notion of “local wisdom” has entered debates in Indonesian academia and policymaking, demanding the appreciation of local knowledge sources beyond reducing culture and tradition to folklore, mainly for touristic purposes (Pesurnay Reference Pesurnay2018). This creates “new geographies of imagination” (Knauft Reference Knauft2002) in the sense that local, cultural approaches and knowledge gain recognition and are involved in policy-making processes in various fields, such as environmental conservation (Putri et al. Reference Putri, Noven, Nurcahyati, Irfan, Septiasari, Batoro and Setyawan2022), disaster recovery (Kusumasari and Alam Reference Kusumasari and Alam2012), religious moderation (Kasdi et al. Reference Kasdi, Farida and Mahfud2020), language teaching and education (Suprapto et al. Reference Suprapto, Prahani and Cheng2021), agriculture management (Kurnia et al. 2020), and so forth. This arguably indicates that the central government has become more responsive towards the interests and concerns of the local population. At least, it suggests that Indonesian academia has successfully begun to contribute to more integrative, transdisciplinary research and participative policy making. However, the question here is how the government deals with criticism - towards organic farming policies and regulations - that comes from civil society actors, and whether this criticism influences policy-making or remains superficial in the sense of a “too responsive” government that adapts to criticism in order to avoid civil resistance.

In this paper, the supposed responsiveness of Indonesian government institutions and the ways in which civil society actors seek to participate in or influence policymaking processes will be approached by focusing on discourses of (agri-)cultural modernisation. The focus here lies on the cultural components for building democratic structures and cultural modernisation, as a dynamic interplay between civil society and state actors. In particular, the cultural articulation and communicative conditions for the circulation of and access to media content and related media practices are investigated. This paper thus contributes to reflections on TechnoEnvironments as part of discourses of national, cultural modernisation and on the mediatisation of TechnoEnvironments.

TechnoEnvironments and Mediatisation, Activism and Circularity

TechnoEnvironments in Southeast Asia are approached here as the manifold interfaces of environments and technology; environment is a broad term, used to address natural environments, built environments, technological environments, and the infrastructures and actions that constitute these environments. TechnoEnvironments are meant to describe newly evolving socio-materialities connected to technology in environmental, social, and cultural transformations in Southeast Asia. They are constituted as hybrid spaces with consequences for social and political in- and exclusions, economic advantage and exploitation, and the ecological relations between humans, non-humans, and the world.Footnote ²

In Southeast Asia, imagining TechnoEnvironments has been part of discourses of cultural modernisation that can be traced back at least to the 1970s, for instance, to science-fiction literature in Indonesia and the Malay world (cp. Graf, this issue), but also non-fictional discourses on mechanisation and automation. Technical imaginaries have since also been translated into national strategies to enter the “4th industrial revolution”, such as “Making Indonesia 4.0”. These political visions and strategies are widely embraced as future-oriented development plans, but we also find critical perspectives on imagined effects of modernisation, mechanisation, and mediatisation in a variety of creative and artistic examinations, contributing to public discourses and imaginaries on living conditions in TechnoEnvironments. These, in turn, are widely circulated and communicated via new media technologies, creating ever more mediatised TechnoEnvironments in Southeast Asia.

This profound mediatisation contributes to new geographies of imagination in the sense that it creates a shift in the power relations concerning processes of defining “modern” lifestyles: With progress as an imaginary construct that defines some as progressive by comparison with others who are backward, those who represent local “backward” cultures now gain the opportunity to bring into play their power of imagination. The participatory environment of their digitally networked societies allows people in Southeast Asia to take an active part in cultural production, with especially younger generations using the internet to share content they or their peers produce. Not just young people but citizens in general contribute to public discourses in and about digital media environments, producing knowledge and meaning. Cultural modernisation thus becomes more open in the sense of more diverse imaginaries of multiple modernities; cultural production becomes more open in the sense of more diverse ‘produsers’, although embedded in established power relations and not free from constraints and regulations.

The question here is how cultural production in the interplay of established powerful players such as national governments or (trans-)national organisations and civil societies striving for more participation evolves in mediatised TechnoEnvironments. How do alternative imaginings and public discourses on cultural modernisation influence the strategies and agendas of policy makers and vice versa?

Drawing on sociological and anthropological theory on social movements and resistance (Gillan 2020; Nash Reference Nash1992; Tufekci Reference Tufekci2017), the mutual influence of national, political visions and strategies and public discourse and imaginaries can be seen as circular re-imagining. In accordance with Kevin Gillan (Reference Gillan2018), an understanding of continuity and change in the content and form of social movements over longer time periods is the general objective here. Based on his concept of ‘timescape’ that specifies the macro-level spatio-temporal boundaries in which social movements can be located (Gillan Reference Gillan2018: 516), particular events and the continuity of movements, cultural and material flows, discourses and practices are investigated over an analytically relevant timescale. Following June Nash’s (Reference Nash1992) approach to analyzing complex social movements, a description of people’s responses at different moments in time is combined with interpretations by the media. To understand a social movement, the analysis must cover specific aspects of action and discourse in the various moments of that movement’s unfolding, including the various participants’ interpretations of the events in which they are or were involved (Nash Reference Nash1992: 275). Another important aspect is the government’s response to a more open public sphere and cultural production, to the new information regime that apparently empowers social movements (Tufekci Reference Tufekci2017). While strategies may include legal push-back, stricter control, and blocking or coopting (digital) public space (Tufekci Reference Tufekci2017: 6), governments have also become more receptive to impulses coming from civil society.

With its history of authoritarian developmentalism and relatively weak civil society, Southeast Asia has been examined concerning activists’ politics, motivations, tactics, and strategies, and claims to authenticity (Ford Reference Ford2013). The common characteristic of these engagements is that activists “imagine themselves to be engaged in a struggle against the state, which is simultaneously seen as enemy and potential ally in the struggle for social change (Ford Reference Ford2013: 1). With new, digital media technologies, new forms of Asian activism (Barendregt and Schneider Reference Barendregt and Schneider2020) emerge, characterised by an ambiguity in the relationship between regimes and their citizens, particularly between the state and the middle class (Ford Reference Ford2013: 11). Asian forms of online, digital activism often combine the mechanisms of conventional, established media with the (potential) power and subversion of local, strategic, and social media. Although the Internet’s role as a public sphere that facilitates critical discourse might be threatened by consumerism and state-corporate elites (Lim Reference Lim, Coultry and Curran2003), networked engagement – from micro-activism to hashtag activism in authoritarian settings – makes social movements successful (Lim Reference Lim2018). Looking at media communication of and within social movements, Merlyna Lim (Reference Lim2018: 103) identifies imaginaries, practices of participation, and trajectories as three phases in which these entanglements unfold. While Lim adds that “pathways of social movements are not linear” (Lim Reference Lim2018: 104), the circularity of the phases and mechanisms she presents as a framework is emphasised in this paper, particularly looking at a broader timescape of the social movement that serves as a case study.

The circularity of imaginaries and discourses becomes apparent, especially with media representations and mediatisation contributing to more open information and cultural production. State ideologies and policies, programs, and narratives evoke social movements with alternative visions, narratives, and imaginaries, which in turn encourage policymakers to reconsider and adapt their policy, and so forth. With a focus on digital activism, digital commons (as a subset of the commons), with resources such as data, information, culture, and knowledge that are created and/or maintained online, come to the centre of attention. They present a suitable approach to investigating the organisation of collective action, placing it “beyond market and state” (Bollier and Helfrich 2012, cited by De Rosnay and Stadler Reference De Rosnay and Stalder2020). Identifying practices and politics of un/communing digital resources – above all cultural knowledge – in governance and social activism reveals how powerful media discourses and imaginaries actually are.

Digital commons represent a field of tension in which people can benefit from enhanced participation, on the one hand, while technologies and media content, on the other, are increasingly being exploited, manipulated, and domesticated for political projects and by transnational corporations. The circular processes of reimagining the digital commons in this field of tension points to the danger of policymakers (and other powerful actors) harvesting, domesticating, and alienating alternative cultures and resources for their programs. Cultural traditions and so-called local or indigenous knowledge – I would say embodied knowledge and practice – are the focal point for this process. This knowledge is particularly manifested through farmers’ creativity and cultivated senses (Laksmana Reference Laksmana, Padmanabhan and Beckmann2021); it is embodied in the double sense of relating to embodied experience and practice while also being embodied in a more comprehensive body of cultural knowledge. Part of the national strategies and programs go beyond political and economic realms, and where they touch upon cultural modernisation, they cause resistance and/or strategic cooperation. The result is social movements and imaginaries, alternative visions and versions of modernity, especially in terms of TechnoEnvironments.

In Indonesia’s emerging mediated TechnoEnvironments, farmers’ embodied practices and embodied knowledge are reimagined and given new meaning (Desai 2006; Laksmana Reference Laksmana, Padmanabhan and Beckmann2021; Lin, Bates, and Goodale 2016). This reimagining manifests in circular readjustments of state policies and civil society initiatives; the apparent receptiveness of the Indonesian government, however, bears the risk of disembodying longstanding practical knowledge. In my case study, the mediated discourses and imaginaries of both state actors and activists are investigated, distinguishing between the pre-digital era (Independence until the end of the New Order, 1998) and the digital era (post-Suharto until now).Footnote ³ Besides a relevant timescape for the organic movement in Indonesia, this distinction serves to underline the changes that mediatisation or digitalisation brought about for the social movement and activist-government-relations.

Methodologically, this study focuses on digital space and content, yet builds on ethnographic on-site fieldwork in the context of “IndOrganic”, a collaborative research project on organic farming in Indonesia.Footnote ⁴ My sub-project on organic agriculture and food systems investigated people’s religious, ecological, and agricultural beliefs and practices, including the value systems that underlie them; it involved farmers, activists, and NGOs in the Indonesian organic movement but also educators and civil servants in the agriculture sector. This study expands the analysis of their contestations and negotiations by investigating mediated discourses and imaginaries. Based on a systematic review of online reports and presentations between 2014 and 2024, this paper analyses visions of organic agriculture from both government and social movement actors, and how those imaginaries influence each other. In particular, the online promotion of official organic agriculture programs and regulations (policy documents) are juxtaposed with online reactions and the promotion of alternative ideas by civil society actors. The primary sources that were used for this are the Ministry of Agriculture and their online promotion of official policy, on the one hand, and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) that explicitly, constructively criticise agricultural policies, on the other.

The two NGOs “AOI” and “WALHI” (see below) were identified as influencing policy making through their constructive criticism online and thus serve as cases for civil society engagement. The former was a research partner in the IndOrganic project between 2016 and 2020; as an umbrella organisation for organic farming in Indonesia, it advocates farmers’ sovereignty and has more than 120 members (mainly farmers groups). The latter is an umbrella organisation that advocates for farmers’ and environmental protection; it was chosen due to its long-standing commitment to represent farmers’ concerns and constructively criticise agricultural policy. Both AOI and WALHI have a documented record of voicing farmers’ concerns and criticizing the Ministry of Agriculture’s official agricultural policy, government projects, and regulations. Without disregarding the intersectionality in social movements (Broad Reference Broad2017), a focus on these two NGOs allows for a targeted analysis of mediated discourses and imaginaries coming from civil society, but also of their critique and potential influence on policy-making.

Based on my findings, I argue that the alternative imaginaries of cultural modernisation and modern TechnoEnvironments (re-)produced by civil society actors via new, digital media technologies, are taken up by a very receptive government and policy makers but are not necessarily implemented in the imagined ways of those whose embodied knowledge and practice are being “harvested” for policy making. The process of national, political visions and strategies influencing public discourse and imaginaries, and vice versa, is conceptualised as a circular reimagining of TechnoEnvironments. Referring again to the EuroSEAS 2022 panel on civil resistance in Southeast Asia and the hypotheses that democratic institutions are now working “too well” with governments becoming “too responsive”, I see my case study and argument resonate with these ideas and hopefully provide more detailed insights into the ways in which governments respond to civil imaginings and ways in which cultural modernisation, civil resistance and democratic participation can interplay. Taking Barendregt’s and Schneider’s (Reference Barendregt and Schneider2020) call for a careful and ethnographically informed approach to digital activism seriously, the presented case from Indonesia contributes to a better understanding of today’s forms of digital activism in Southeast Asia [and to its theorizing from a Southeast Asian perspective].

Reimagining Indonesian Agriculture before the Digital Era

In Indonesia, we find a variety of local or regional ecological religious traditions that could be labelled animism, such as Javanese Wiwitan, Dayak Kaharingan (Kalimantan), Adiri (Papua), or the Balinese Tri Hita Karana. These were defined as backward and not in line with modern, progressive agendas of state and religious actors, reflecting the state policy on religion since the Sukarno era. Related long-established agricultural practices changed with the so-called Green Revolution, implemented in Indonesia by Suharto’s New Order regime from the mid-1960s onwards. Yet, the state’s productivist approach and agricultural intensification programs had ecological repercussions for local people and their environments, which led to mixed responses and different positions toward agricultural policies (Schreer and Padmanabhan 2019).

In the 1970s, the Indonesian organic farming movement emerged as a response to the social and environmental impacts of the Green Revolution, and from the 1980s onwards the social movement expanded across the archipelago, with grass-roots organisations promoting sustainable agricultural practices and organic agriculture as an alternative to the industrialised farming methods imposed by the government. Civil society groups and non-governmental organisations envisioned a holistic agricultural system based on organic values and practices, involving technical, ecological, and socio-economic aspects. Although their organisation and communication efforts were limited, this ultimately led to the emergence of new, independent farmers’ movements after the fall of the New Order in 1998. This section describes the TechnoEnvironment of a modernised, intensified agriculture created in the context of the Green Revolution and juxtaposes the official government narratives with re-imaginings of (organic) agriculture before the introduction of digital media and communication technology.

Before the launch of the Green Revolution in 1968, the left-wing administration of President Sukarno created a “mass guidance” (bimbingan massa, Bimas) program to modernise agriculture by improving rural infrastructure, supporting agricultural extension, and providing farmers with high-yielding rice varieties, pesticides, fertilisers, and loans. As a subject-making endeavour, Bimas was intended to transform the mentality of the farmer from “traditional” and “instinctive” to “rational” (Welker Reference Welker2012: 391). Among the various tensions in government-farmers interaction, farmers complained about a lack of adequate instructional support from extension workers, problems in the provision of fertiliser and pesticides in time for planting, and the partial appropriation of inputs and credit repayments by corrupt officials (Hansen Reference Hansen1972: 936). Aside from press reports on peasant dissatisfaction with the program, systematic accounts of these problems and complaints can be found in reports on Bimas by leaders of the Association of Agricultural Cooperatives (Gabungan Koperasi Pertanian, Gakoperta) from West Java (Hansen Reference Hansen1972: 938). However, Bimas promoted its agricultural transformation and the agricultural sector as the major factor contributing to Indonesia’s economic growth and pushed Sukarno’s policy of increasing rice production for national food self-sufficiency. Yet, when the government created the military-based organisation Welfare Operation Command (Komando Operasi Gerakan Makmur, KOGM) that monitored and ensured farmers’ use of fertilisers, improved seeds, etc., this rigid measure fostered resistance from the side of the farmers (Soen Reference Soen1968: 67/152).

The initially unaligned Indonesian Peasant Front (Barisan Tani Indonesia, BTI) was founded in 1945; by 1963 it claimed 7.1 million members or a quarter of all adult farmers and became the largest peasant organisation (White et al. Reference White, Graham and Savitri2022: 70-71). Beyond its national strategy, BTI introduced “Mutual Help Teams” (Regu Saling Bantu) on the local level that supported rural farmers and workers with production inputs and advice on practical problems they faced. This direct communication and support were an important factor in the BTI’s mass appeal (White et al. Reference White, Graham and Savitri2022: 71). Furthermore, the BTI was among the pioneers of critical agrarian studies in Indonesia, with the BTI magazine discussing various problems concerning farmers and rural areas; Mochammad Tauchid for instance, the main editor of the BTI magazine, published articles on agricultural modernisation, in which he described it as not merely a matter of machinery but of educating peasants to organise themselves in modern institutions and to engage in active citizenship (Luthfi Reference Lutfhi2020: 112). In 1964, Sukarno welcomed thousands of peasants at the Presidential Palace for the BTI national conference and assured his support and protection, stating “Do not suffer peasant-phobia, do not suffer BTI-phobia” (White et al. Reference White, Graham and Savitri2022: 72). However, despite Sukarno’s explicit support, the communist-aligned BTI was banned together with the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) after the political turmoil in 1965-66. And despite Sukarno’s administration implementing policies to increase food production and improve distribution, food shortages persisted and worsened by the global famine of the 1960s. This eventually led to the launch of the Revolusi Hijau (Green Revolution) in 1968.

Suharto’s New Order expanded the Green Revolution from the early 1970s onward, through a series of mass guidance and mass intensification (intensifikasi massal, Inmas) programs, making the agricultural sector a focus of their economic development efforts and Bimas the political symbol around which the government sought to recreate its image in a more positive light (Hansen Reference Hansen1972: 937). Under Suharto, no independent organisations were allowed below the district level, preventing farmers and the rural population from formal political engagement. In 1973, all agrarian organisations were re-organised into the “Indonesian Farmers’ Harmony Association” (Himpunan Kerukunan Tani Indonesia, HKTI), which was subordinated to the regime’s ruling party Golkar (White et al. Reference White, Graham and Savitri2022: 72). “For half a century [the HKTI] functioned as a figurehead organisation with no effective role in voicing the concerns and aspirations of Indonesia’s tens of millions of villagers” (White et al. Reference White, Graham and Savitri2022: 72, referring to Bourchier 2015: 175). The main ideology and narrative of the Green Revolution policy was to progress from traditional to modern agriculture, to boost national rice production and achieve rice self-sufficiency. The definition of modern agriculture was envisioned as enabling the Indonesian agricultural sector to overcome the challenges of a complex global food system:

In 1984, Indonesia achieved rice self-sufficiency by producing 25.8 million tons of rice, surpassing the national demand of 25 million tons, for which President Suharto received an FAO award in 1986.Footnote ⁵ In the same year, however, a massive brown plant-hopper infestation devastated rice crops in Java, as a result of indiscriminate spraying of chemical pesticides; the pest of rice crops reoccurred starting from the mid-1970s, and urged Suharto to issue a Presidential Decree (INPRES 3/1986) that banned the most harmful pesticides and initiated a new Integrated Pest Management (IPM) model. The introduction of IPM, implemented through Farmer Field Schools (FFS) in 1986, can be seen as a paradigm shift in agricultural development, from the distribution of technological packages to human development. Although Indonesia ceased its national IPM program after the termination of the World Bank/USAID support in 1999, an IPM farmers’ alliance was established that developed community-based IPM (CIPM), including farmer-to-farmer training, action research, and farmers’ studies, farmers’ organisation and advocacy (Winarto Reference Winarto2004: 248). Yunita Winarto (Reference Winarto2004: 266) argues that CIPM contributed to a new farming culture in which some farmers served as educators in their communities, replacing the old “model farmers” of the Green Revolution era. While the success of IPM is debatable, participatory IPM and FFS facilitated the emergence of new, independent farmers’ movements with a social justice agenda after the fall of the Suharto regime in 1998 (Reuter and MacRae Reference Reuter and MacRae2019: 6).

The New Order’s agricultural policy focused on food security and food (self-)sufficiency as a strategy to ensure socio-economic stability, gain support from the broader population, and project a strong nationalist identity. To convince farmers of its superiority, the broad and extensive program of agricultural intensification employing chemical fertilisers and pesticides was underpinned by official narratives and metaphors such as “medicine for the soil” (obat tanah) or medicine against pests (Winarto 2001). Media coverage of the Revolusi Hijau in Indonesia played an important role in the dissemination of the New Order’s ideology, as part of the portrayals of the success stories of national development programs. The national, state-controlled television TVRI reached millions of Indonesians and portrayed the overall success of the new, modern agricultural policy (Setiawan Reference Setiawan2015: 59). Thus, the New Order regime transformed the agricultural system into a TechnoEnvironment, in which the official discourse on modern agriculture was dominated by narratives and imaginaries of modern agricultural technology replacing outdated traditional methods. In terms of media and communication, the New Order’s TechnoEnvironment incorporated the mass media to disseminate their vision broadly among society.

On the contrary, organic agriculture was seen as a protest movement against the state and its agricultural policy, challenging the political control of farmers and farmer organisations (Tamtomo Reference Tamtomo2021: 5). Organic organisations led by urban middle-class activists only cautiously began to emerge in the early 1990s, in the last decade of the Suharto regime, using the discourse of environmental justice and human rights (White et al. Reference White, Graham and Savitri2022: 73). Yet, from the 1980s onwards, the organic movement expanded slowly across the archipelago, with grass-roots organisations promoting sustainable agricultural practices and organic agriculture as an alternative to the industrialised farming methods imposed by the government. Criticizing the observable degradation of soil and water quality, pest immunity to pesticides, and decreasing harvest yields, farmers and activists set the task of harmonizing the imperatives of efficient food production and preserving natural resources and environments. Civil society groups and non-governmental organisations envisioned a holistic agricultural system based on organic values and practices, involving technical, ecological, and socio-economic aspects. This ideological orientation and return to nature-friendly cosmologies also (re-)created eco-religious trends and a “greening” of Islam and Christianity in Indonesia (Reuter Reference Reuter2015).

Inspired by the growing international environmental movement, national and international NGOs, religious initiatives, and activists independently launched the organic movement in Indonesia. As White et al. (Reference White, Graham and Savitri2022: 73) state, peasant struggles and protests during the New Order were mainly limited to “everyday forms of resistance” and local protests against displacement (for infrastructure projects). While some of these protests were supported by urban intellectuals and received national media attention, such movements against the state faced harsh repression and were crushed by force. In the late 1980s, the Suharto regime introduced a new policy of “openness” (keterbukaan) in public political discourse and eased restrictions on the media; while coercive monitoring of the press was reinforced in the mid-1990s, this laid the foundation for resistance and liberalisation (Aspinall Reference Aspinall2005). The partial relaxation of media restrictions allowed limited coverage of land expropriation and peasant struggles, which contributed to the re-emergence of agrarian movements (White et al. Reference White, Graham and Savitri2022: 73).

In 1980, the Indonesian Forum for the Environment (Wahana Lingkungan Hidup Indonesia, WALHI) was formed in cooperation with the government, as an umbrella organisation that enabled representation of farmers. WALHI received support from the Ministry of Environment, a “safe haven for environmental justice activists” (Peluso et al. Reference Peluso, Afiff and Rachman2008: 384), which was crucial for the representation of farmers, since “environmental debates were the only public media through which farmers’ rights or access to land lost to extractive enterprises could be discussed” (Peluso et al. Reference Peluso, Afiff and Rachman2008: 384). One of the most important pioneers of the organic movement in Indonesia is the Bina Sarana Bakti (BSB) foundation, a centre for organic agriculture development established by Reverend Agatho Elsener in 1983. BSB was the first organic farming training centre to educate and support farmers and organisations all over Indonesia (Jahroh Reference Jahroh2010: 2). In 1990, the Ganjuran Catholic church hosted and issued the “Ganjuran Declaration”, the first declaration on organic agriculture in Indonesia. The World Food Day Secretariat for Farmers and Fishermen (Sekretariat Petani dan Nelayan Hari Pangan Sedunia, SPTN-HPS) was established as a non-profit and non-governmental organisation to implement the Ganjuran Declaration. SPTN-HPS promotes organic farming as concerned for the environment, affordable and socially just, rooted in local cultural practices and values, and acknowledging farmers’ rights to assemble - as a reaction to the strict government regulations on the freedom of farmers in choosing their cultivation methods and of forming farmer groups (Tamtomo Reference Tamtomo2021: 5).

Influential pioneers of organic agriculture in Indonesia, such as BSB and SPTN-HPS from Java, focused on disseminating the values and techniques of organic farming to establish a network of organic producers and practitioners all over the country. Their primary means of communication, however, has long been direct personal contact between educators and farmers. In Central Java, several community radio stations have represented the interests of farmers’ groups since the late 1990s. The Farmer’s Voice Network (Jaringan Radio Suara Petani, JSRP), located in West Java, was founded in 1999 and claimed to have more than 600 community radios as members in their network by 2007. JSRP considers farmers their target audience and works with the Ministry of Agriculture to distribute information on better farming techniques over the radio (Chaerowati and Ibrahim Reference Chaerowati and Ibrahim2023: 266). Outside of Java, in eastern Indonesia (NTT), for instance, up to the 2000s, farmers’ only source of information was agricultural extension workers and, in addition, SPTN-HPS educators. The latter provided farmers in NTT with a balanced information about the benefits and disadvantages of both conventional and organic farming methods. “Their improved agricultural literacy […] encouraged them to convert to organic farming” (Winarsih et al. Reference Winarsih, Putra, Bagir and Northcott2024: 50).

Between 1985 and 1990, BSB implemented the first large-scale IPM program, which helped decrease the use of synthetic pesticides by 90 per cent. From 1989 on, with support from the FAO, farmer trainings were held in field schools, drawing on participatory development models (cp. above). However, the IPM programme was only partially successful since it reached only a fraction of Indonesia’s farmers, who had widely adopted Green Revolution ideas and techniques. Thus, the initiated shift in Indonesian agriculture towards IPM was rather inconsistent, with conventional Green Revolution and IPM models coexisting in state policies. This indicates that the Indonesian state under Suharto did not establish a unified agricultural sector but incorporated different approaches and strategies on organic and conventional agriculture. The agricultural TechnoEnvironment established by the Suharto regime, however, clearly favoured imaginaries of modern, conventional agriculture over holistic, localised IPM and organic approaches. The latter were introduced into the circular reimagining of organic agriculture - and became relevant for policy making - only with the introduction of digital media, as the next section shows.

Mediatised Agricultural TechnoEnvironments in Indonesia

Part of the TechnoEnvironments of “modern agriculture” in Indonesia is the various mediatised imaginaries of so-called modern agriculture – Pertanian Modern. The Indonesian government and, above all, President Jokowi, promoted modern agriculture as a national development project that integrates very well in the “Making Indonesia 4.0” strategy, with “digital farming”, “smart agriculture”, “agriculture 4.0”, and similar concepts. For an agricultural transformation, the Indonesian Ministry of Agriculture has formulated a strategy to develop Agriculture 4.0 as smart agriculture that “will support a sustainable agro-food sector” (MoA 2020). Recently, Jokowi urged regional governments to investigate the potential of smart agriculture, acknowledging regional differences while emphasizing the need for the agricultural sector to adapt to digital technological developments (Ulya and Ramadhan Reference Ulya and Ramadhan2024). In 2019, President Jokowi generally promoted the mechanisation of Indonesian agriculture online, stating: “We must have the courage to shift traditional agricultural patterns to modern agricultural patterns using technology. […] Give our farmers a new mindset” (Pertanian.go.id 2019).Footnote ⁶ While this reflects the terminology used during the Green Revolution, Jokowi also expressed his concerns for farmers’ wellbeing in the process of “socialisation carried out to modernise farmers” (Pertanian.go.id 2019). The ‘middle-men’ responsible for this socialisation are agricultural extension officers, who provide technology and knowledge, and communicate the government’s vision of a digital transformation of the agricultural sector. Recent studies show that extension officers and farmers alike embrace smart farming technology, although not equally unconditional (Subejo et al. Reference Subejo, Untari, Wati and Mewasdinta2019; Sukarno et al. Reference Sukarno, Yasirandi, Utomo, Al Makky, Negara and Rezeki2022).

While many farmers find the official visions of smart agriculture attractive, also to motivate younger farmers, and cooperate with the Indonesian government, others reject the “technological fix” and market-oriented approach. They promote their deep ecological values and knowledge, and their vision of local, small-scale organic agriculture and gardening. The promotion of their alternative visions and approaches of organic agriculture is driven via digital media technologies, such as dedicated websites (e.g. https://aoi.ngo, www.walhi.or.id/ www.komunitasorganikindonesia.org Footnote ⁷), social media platforms (e.g., Facebook, Instagram, X/Twitter), and Instant Messaging Services (mainly WhatsApp). The ways in which Indonesian organic communities build their members’ identities as producers, consumers, and environmentalists, both in physical and digital space, have been outlined (Atmadi Reference Atmadi2013; Wilujeng 2021) using the Jakarta-based network Komunitas Organik Indonesia (KOI). As part of KOI, Lingkar Organik or “Organic Circle” in Yogyakarta (Central Java) and Balai Belajar Bali or “Bali Learning Hall” in Tabanan (Bali) are regional communities that connect local farmers, sellers, and consumers of organic food; they use the Komunitas Selaras Alam or “Harmony with Nature Community” WhatsApp group to connect their members transregionally, and a Jakarta-based radio broadcasting station to disseminate their organic values (Wilujeng 2021). These values amount to an organic, healthy, and eco-friendly lifestyle (Wilujeng 2021: 78), and while KOI facilitates the marketing of organic products, their explicit aim is to balance profits with environmental aspects (Wilujeng 2021: 80). While KOI unsuccessfully tried to cooperate with the Ministry of Agriculture, their focus is rather on ministering to the community than criticizing government bodies and strategies.

Nationally operating NGOs such as WALHI and AOI, on the other hand, give a voice to farmers and actors of organised civil society, and have no qualms about criticizing government strategies and regulations. The circular reimagining of agricultural TechnoEnvironments becomes clear in the interplay of NGOs criticizing government policy and regulations while promoting their values and visions online, and government officials re-adjusting agricultural policies, programs, and regulations accordingly, which is also promoted online. In 2022, celebrating WALHI’s 42^nd anniversary, the NGO published a blog article that reminded us of the organisation’s development since its foundation in 1980 and its struggle against Suharto’s “exploitation of natural resources in the name of development […] and economic growth” (walhi.or.id 2022). The article also emphasises WALHI’s achievements after the fall of the New Order regime, enshrining environmental protection in law and putting organic agriculture policy on a statutory basis; as stated, this was achieved in cooperation with other civil society organisations such as the Indonesian Farmers Union (SPI), the Agrarian Reform Consortium (KPA), and the Indonesian Farmers Alliance (API).Footnote ⁸

The implementation of system applications and supervision of organic products were re-regulated in the MoA regulation number 64/Permentan/OT.40/5/2013, which became effective in May 2014. The regulation was distributed online via several websites and information platforms (e.g., pertanian.go.id, but also provincial government and various university websites). In December 2014, AOI urged the Indonesian government to support the promotion of organic farming, criticizing that the regulations governing organic farming would still depend on [conventional] agricultural policy but should instead be more specific and independent (Khoer Reference Koer2014). In addition, AOI advocated for organic as local and family farming, and cooperated with the city government (Pemerintah Kota, Pemkot) of the city of Bogor to support a shift towards family-based organic farming. The related AOI blog article stated “local crops can adapt to the local environment and do not need special fertiliser. Besides, the resulting products are healthier to consume, the quality of local crops is no less than hybrid plants” (Hazliansyah Reference Hazliansyah2014). Between 2014 and 2017, AOI recorded successes on its blog in establishing local farmers’ markets, organic (vegetables) centres and fairs, and organic adjuvants in various Indonesian provinces, including Sumatra, Java, Bali, and Kalimantan.

As mentioned above, the Ministry of Agriculture set up the “1000 Organic Agriculture Villages Program” in 2014, and aimed to spread organic agriculture across the archipelago. The revised national standard SNI 6729 from 2016 redefines organic farming as “holistic production management system to improve and develop agro-ecosystem health including biodiversity, biological cycles and biological activity of the soil”. […] “Organic farming emphasizes the implementation of management practices which prioritizes the use of inputs from waste cultivation on site, taking into account the adaptability to local circumstances and conditions. […] This can be achieved […] without the use of synthetic ingredients to fulfil special needs in the system”. The revised national standard thus addressed AOI’s critique and formally recognised the conduciveness of local plants, crops, and fertilisers. The 1000 Organic Villages Program was advertised as improving the land and environment (lahan dan lingkungan) as well as the economic and health situation in the respective villages; the former, as stated, was due to preserving water and land from chemical pollution.Footnote ⁹ This advertisement, again, was done online via pertanian.go.id, but also provincial government websites and various online news outlets.

The aforementioned criticism towards the government’s official, large-scale organic programs aimed at the problem that the programs focused on technical measures, outputs, and efficiency, while failing to take proper account of the lifeworld realities and experiences of villagers. Both AOI and WALHI defended the interests of farmers and local communities in the form of combined offline and online protests, rallies, gatherings, and events. Between 2016 and 2018, an AOI consortium organised educational and promotional programs, for instance in villages in Kalimantan, in the context of the US-funded “Millenium Challenge Account Indonesia” (MCA-I) program.Footnote ¹⁰ In 2017 and 2018, AOI re-promoted PAMOR in remembrance of the 2008 national workshop on participatory guarantee systems, and criticised the continuous lack of small-scale organic farmers’ access to (local) markets (Fatimah Reference Fatimah2017). In September 2019, on the occasion of the National Farmers’ Day, WALHI formed a National Agrarian Reform Committee (Komite Nasional Pembaruan Agraria, KNPA) together with the Agrarian Reform Consortium (KPA), the Sundanese Farmers Union (SPP), and other NGOs, and met President Jokowi to discuss their ideas for an agrarian reform. Their primary concern was the interests and needs of small-scale farmers, while their most important point of criticism was that government policy was still made without dialogue. According to WALHI’s blog article, President Jokowi promised to support the agrarian reform and to invite KNPA representatives for further dialogue.Footnote ¹¹

Between 2020 and 2022, WALHI repeatedly published blog articles about links between the COVID-19 pandemic and exploitation in environmental, economic, and social terms. They criticised the state for a lack of alertness (ketidak sigapan) while serving the interests of powerful corporations and elites, and requested to focus on protecting ecosystems and the people (rakyat).Footnote ¹² They explicitly criticised Jokowi for maintaining oligarchic and dynastic business politics and for his emphasis on [foreign] investment; their “environmental review and outlook 2021” (Hidayati Reference Hidayati2021) suggests a shift from “growth-based development” and “big infrastructure projects” to a “new household-based economy” that acknowledges small-scale economic activities such as family farming.Footnote ¹³ A 2022 AOI policy paper (Aji et al. Reference Aji, Wangsit and Ningrum2019) provides a more systematic policy review (including legislation, ministerial regulations, technical guidelines, and the national standard SNI) and recommends more tailored policies (based on interviews, group discussions, and a household survey covering Java, Sumatra, Kalimantan, and Flores). First, the organic farming government projects and regulations are criticised for their high-productivity and global competitiveness paradigm, while neglecting village development (pembangunan desa) and marketing opportunities on the village level. Second, their critique aims at partial implementation of organic farming systems, while working with an ecosystem requires a holistic, integrated application of the organic farming and cultivation system. Both shortcomings would lead to government programs and the official definition of organic being perceived as merely a label without real meaning or effect (Aji et al. Reference Aji, Wangsit and Ningrum2019: 20). In addition, the paper criticises that existing regulations would not strengthen autonomy at the farmer household level but maintain dependence of farmer households on the state and market (Aji et al. Reference Aji, Wangsit and Ningrum2019: 27). Related newspaper articles shared AOI’s view of Indonesia’s still constrained organic agriculture (masih terkendala), urging the government to provide incentives to organic farmers such as better marketing opportunities, official acknowledgment of (tedious) sustainable land maintenance, support in the maintenance of seed variety, better capital allocation, and price incentives.

In 2023, the Indonesian national research and innovation agency (BRIN) reacted to AOI’s critique and publicly announced its views on organic farming and its prospects in Indonesia (BRIN 2023). BRIN stated that organic farming system practices are aimed at the healthcare of both producers and consumers, and at environmental protection. Organic farming was defined as “a combination of the three pillars of future agriculture (pertanian masa depan), namely economic (competitiveness and income), social (employment and health), and environmental (biodiversity and pollution).” Referring to the national standard SNI 6729-2016, certification was presented as crucial for marketing organic produce both at the domestic and export level. The suggested marketing strategy aimed at entering niche markets, “positioning the product as healthy, safe and environmentally friendly food”. Although organic farming institutions were advised to “strengthen farmer organisations” (penguatan organisasi petani), this was defined as “increasing organic farming literacy and partnerships with research and innovation institutions”. The role of the government was defined as “providing seeds for organic farming, increasing literacy in organic farming technology, increasing literacy in organic products to consumers, [and] providing access fees.” (BRIN 2023).

Therefore, the criticism and demands expressed by WALHI and AOI are only partially addressed. The demanded consideration of village development, family farming, and marketing at the village level is discounted by emphasizing certification of organic produce for both export and domestic markets. The demand for strengthening autonomy at the farmer household level is bypassed by the affirmation to strengthen farmer organisations in the sense of educating farmers (through official institutions). The demand for government support in the maintenance of seed variety, which is explicitly understood as farmers’ expertise and capability, is being reinterpreted as a role of the government, i.e. providing seeds for organic farming (without elaborating on which kinds of seeds). BRIN’s official statement thus reflects the government’s approach of selectively addressing and reinterpreting critique from civil society organisations and the organic farming movement, while effectively promoting the official organic farming strategy publicly.

A recent example is the circulation of Jokowi being awarded the FAO Agricola Medal in August 2024, honouring his efforts for transforming Indonesia’s food system and contributing to global food security. Besides broad television coverage, extensive online news coverage (Jakarta Globe, Tempo.co, Antara News, Kompas.com, DetikNews asf.) but also social media content (Facebook, Twitter/ X, Instagram, Youtube) reported positively on Jokowi’s achievements, including his emphasis on sustainability and the acknowledgment of regional diversity, local knowledges and approaches. “The President also expressed appreciation [for] efforts to promote environmental sustainability, which includes establishing a nursery to cultivate seeds and native plants from Papua, aimed at rehabilitating the local forests” (SetKab RI Indonesia 2024). This has been taken up by the organic farming community and linked to a satirical “meme” that exists since 2021 (Figure 1) and is widely circulated up to now, which is mocking Jokowi’s apparent poor understanding of agricultural affairs:

Figure 1.

Meme mocking Jokowi’s apparent poor understanding of agricultural affairs.Footnote ¹⁴

Jokowi asks, “What is this?” and the Minister of Agriculture, Syahrul Yasin Limpo, responds, “This is what farmers grow, they call it rice plant (padi). Once picked, they call it grain (gabah). President Jokowi then asks, “And where is the rice (beras)?” to which the Minister responds, “We import [it]!”.

The imagined dialogue between Jokowi and the Minister of Agriculture points to the irony of Indonesia still importing rice (e.g., from Vietnam, Thailand, and Myanmar) despite increased domestic production and agricultural expansion. On a deeper level, it can be interpreted as a critique of policymakers for not understanding and ignoring farmers’ embodied knowledge in organic agriculture policies. This points to the contrast between embodied knowledge of farmers and NGOs, on the one hand, and the perceived disembodied (technological) progress promoted by policymakers on the other hand. Agricultural TechnoEnvironments – as newly evolving socio-materialities connected to technology in environmental, social and cultural transformations – in Indonesia are thus characterised by a dominant state ideology of modernisation and progress, which is questioned by practitioners and activists who advocate for alternative organic farming and food systems. These agricultural TechnoEnvironments are mediatised in the sense that renegotiations of organic agriculture take place in hybrid (online and offline) spheres, with official online reports and representations constantly being criticised by organic movement actors. The dynamics of this social movement and resistance lead to a circular reimagining of agricultural TechnoEnvironments, with national, political visions and strategies influencing public discourse and imaginaries, and vice versa. The latter can also be seen by the example of this meme mocking Jokowi, since such critical expressions from civil society are taken up by the Indonesian government to adjust policy or, at least, to adjust their narrative framing.