President Sukarno and the Communists: The Politics of Domestication

Abstract

The Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) is today the largest communist party outside the Sino-Soviet bloc. In a country with a population of some 96 million, it claims today a membership of two million, and the communist mass organizations claim more than 11 million members. At the same time PKI is well represented in parliament and the several high-level councils appointed by Sukarno to render advice to the government. The deputy governors of three of the four provinces in Java are communists, and as of March 9, 1962 the two main Party leaders acquired quasi-cabinet status. Yet the possibility is remote that PKI may achieve power in Indonesia in the foreseeable future. My purpose here is an analysis of the Party's place in Indonesian politics that results in this forecast.