The unfulfilled promise of democracy: lesbian and gay activism in Indonesia

This chapter examines the transformation of activism for lesbian and gay rights from an understated, but relatively secure, position in the heterosexist context of the New Order to a much more visible, but also vulnerable, movement. Lesbian and gay activists believed that democracy would improve their capacity to move beyond demands for inclusion and equal treatment to demands for acceptance, which initially proved to be the case. But democracy also created space for homophobic forces intent on eradicating public expressions of homosexual or queer identity. One reaction to this hostility—which reached the highest levels of government in 2016—was to retreat to the “safer” forms of activism characteristic of the New Order. As this chapter demonstrates, however, activists have also responded by using digital media platforms to establish formal and informal networks and by reaching out to international organizations and to other Indonesian social movements with intersecting concerns.