Indonesian Leftist Movements in Post-Authoritarian Era : Rowing between Democratization and Neo-liberalism

Entering democratization era, Indonesian leftist movements have been facing structural and agency problematic. Structural problematic is posed by the contradictory relationship between political freedom and the operation of neo-liberalism. Agency problematic comes when leftist movements have to redefine their agenda in the new context. To explain those problematic, morphogenetic approach is appropriate since it comprehensively understands interplay between them without necessarily collapsing the explanation one to another. Adopting morphogenetic approach, this research finds that: 1) democracy, neo-liberalism and their relation with organizational dynamics produce different interest that has to be pursued by the movements, 2) even though they produce different interests to be pursued, the materialization of those interests is the subject of movement’s interpretation of the objective conditions which then are refined to construct movement’s strategies, 3) as result, the three movements contribute similar outcome at different levels of society. In turn, it clarifies the understanding of morphogenetic approach to be more addressing the issues of specificity.