Infrastructures of Impunity: New Order Violence in Indonesia

by Elizabeth F. Drexler

In Infrastructures of Impunity Elizabeth F. Drexler argues that the creation and persistence of impunity for the perpetrators of the Cold War Indonesian genocide (1965–66) is not only a legal status but also a cultural and social process. Impunity for the initial killings and for subsequent acts of political violence has many bureaucratic, military, legal, political, educational, and affective. Although these elements do not always work at once—at times some are dormant while others are ascendant—together they can be described as a unified entity, a dynamic infrastructure, whose existence explains the persistence of impunity. For instance, truth telling, a first step in many responses to state violence, did not undermine the infrastructure but instead bent to it. Creative and artistic responses to revelations about the past, however, have begun to undermine the infrastructure by countering its temporality, affect, and social stigmatization and demonstrating its contingency and specific actions, policies, and processes that would begin to dismantle it. Drexler contends that an infrastructure of impunity could take hold in an established democracy.

428 pages, Kindle Edition

Published December 15, 2023

Reviews

[Mulki Makmun · Rating 5 out of 5]

I believe this is a sharp and necessary read for understanding Indonesia today.

We agree that impunity was one of the root cause of current evil and never dismantled after Reformasi. It adapted, stayed embedded, and morphing itself more openly, not affecting structurally but culturally around our lives. The return of military influence in civilian spaces and continued attacks on activists, including the newest acid attack on our dear friend in KontraS, show how the impunity infrastructure is there and strengthened through bureaucracy.

This book for me is for confirmation and depth, we have discussed and feel it when working, but we never be able to articulate this sharply. While the case studies mostly in Jakarta, we have seen the similar struggles in 65 mass atrocities and in arm conflict setting: Aceh, Timor-Leste, Papua.

The book also makes clear that this struggle is not only about law or institutions, such as fighting at the court to pursue justice. It is about narrative and fighting over truth. Schools, museums, and public discourse are key sites where truth can be defended or erased. That is where propaganda takes hold if left uncontested.

For those of us working on these issues, this book helps articulate what we are trying to do, to unlearn the impunity.