From Downplaying to Giving Illiberal Responses: Jokowi’s Populist Leadership Amidst COVID-19

Abstract

Many countries have proven that they could rise from the COVID-19 pandemic. Yet, each country has different results in overcoming this pandemic due to some factors, specifically their leaders' role in responding to this pandemic. In Indonesia, Jokowi, as the official president has played central role in responding to the pandemic through his leadership. The rise of populist leaders in responding to the COVID-19 pandemic has become the main topic of holistic discussions among political scholars. This research aims to describe and analyse how Jokowi's populist leadership respond to the COVID-19 pandemic. This research uses the two-part populist leaders framework in making decisions amidst the COVID-19 pandemic by Brett Meyer to classify Jokowi's initial responses to the COVID-19 pandemic; and it is further developed through one of the populist types of framing, Cultural Populism. This research concludes that Jokowi's initial responses to the COVID-19 pandemic are a form of downplaying, and most of them are classified as cultural populism. However, worsening cases causes a significant shift in Jokowi's responses, making them harsher by means of the enforcement of illiberal policies. He takes advantage of the crisis in the name of emergency, which results in the decline of democracy and violations of the Human Rights and the Freedom of Speech.