Hedging Against China: Indonesia’s Strategy Towards Arising Power

DOI

10.2991/978-2-38476-392-4_2How to use a DOI?

Keywords

Hedging; Strategic Partnerships; Belt and Road Initiative (BRI)

Abstract

The rising strategic cooperation between Indonesia and China, notably during the Jokowi administration, have garnered significant scholarly interest, along with widespread analysis and critics, due to its broader political, economic and security implications. The purpose of this study is to analyze Indonesia’s strategic responses to the increasing interactions with China by employing descriptive research to explain Indonesia’s bilateral relations with China, focusing on tensions over territorial disputes, economic inequality, and Indonesia’s hedging strategy against China’s rising influence proposed by Cheng-Chwee Kuik comprising two main categories: Return-Maximizing Options (Economic-Pragmatism, Binding Engagement, and Limited-Bandwagoning) and Risk-Contingency Options (Dominance-Denial and Indirect Balancing). The results of this analysis indicate that Indonesia has successfully adopted a hedging strategy to improve domestic infrastructure and secure a favourable position by participating in China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), all the while maintaining a cautious approach towards China. The study concludes that while the BRI presents both challenges and prospects, Indonesia must adopt a clearer stance on China to protect national interests and advance ASEAN’s regional priorities. Kuik’s hedging model is therefore still valuable for comprehending and analyzing the significance and implications of the evolving Sino-Indonesian partnerships.

Copyright

© 2025 The Author(s)

Open Access

Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

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TY  - CONF
AU  - Rusdi Bastian Ilham
PY  - 2025
DA  - 2025/05/01
TI  - Hedging Against China: Indonesia’s Strategy Towards Arising Power
BT  - Proceedings of the 6th International Conference on Education and Social Sciences (ICESS 2024)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 5
EP  - 19
SN  - 2352-5398
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/978-2-38476-392-4_2
DO  - 10.2991/978-2-38476-392-4_2
ID  - Ilham2025
ER  -