Indonesia Needs to Break the Habit of Living Dangerously

Indonesia’s first president, Sukarno, famously titled his 1964 independence day address Tahun vivere pericoloso — the year of living dangerously. The phrase, later immortalized in a book and film, captured a period of deep political and economic turmoil.

More than six decades on, Southeast Asia’s largest economy is again confronting a perilous moment. To be sure, Indonesia is at little risk of the Cold War coup that toppled Sukarno, and led to 32 years of dictatorship by a hitherto obscure general, Suharto. But growth is sluggish, global trade is fragmenting, and new geopolitical tensions — not least an increasingly unpredictable US-China relationship — are complicating policy choices. The top-down governing style of President Prabowo Subianto — a military man who was once Suharto’s son-in-law — risks compounding this uncertainty and deterring overseas investment.