Federalism in Indonesia

This thesis provides a review for Indonesians about federalism, including the definition and concept, how other countries apply federalism, what the impacts of implementing federalism in Indonesia might be and what the requirements are for Indonesia to make federalism work successfully. Indonesia seems to meet some of the indicators for a successful federal state. It has a population of over 200 million and its territory is spread across more than 2,000 inhabited islands. It has great linguistic and ethnic fragmentation and many religions. The current demands for a federal system are largely the product of a feeling of in justice against the central government, and its abuse of local revenue distribution accompanied by authoritarian actions by members of the Armed Forces and other government officials. This had created an unhealthy undercurrent of resentment against the unitary system. which has been surfacing in different ways for the past several years. In order to deal with this issue, the essence of federalism has been adopted in the new bill No. 221999 or Regional Government known as wide-ranging autonomy. Therefore, the thesis recommends that Indonesia government should first concentrate on the implementation of Law No. 221999 regional autonomy and see how it works.