This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis in Critical Asian Studies Review in March 2015, available online: http://criticalasianstudies.org/issues/vol47/no1/contesting-tobacco-control-policy-in- indonesia.html Contesting Tobacco Control Policy in Indonesia by Andrew Rosser University of Adelaide
[email protected] Submitted to Critical Asian Studies October 2014 Draft Only. Not for citation. Abstract Over the past decade and a half, the Indonesian government has progressed fitfully and inconsistently towards a stricter tobacco control policy regime albeit without much impact on the country’s worsening tobacco epidemic. The author explains this pattern of reform in terms of the unequal but changing relationship of power between tobacco companies and tobacco farmers, on the one hand, and tobacco control advocates based in NGOs, health professional organizations, universities and international organizations, on the other. The first of these coalitions has had greater structural leverage, better political connections, stronger organizational capacity, greater ability to mobilize popular forces, and more capacity to cultivate a positive public image. But the second coalition has been able to exercise some influence over policy because of changes wrought by democratization. Looking to the future, the author suggests that further progress in Indonesia’s tobacco control policies will be contingent upon an ongoing process of struggle; however, there are signs that the tide is turning in favor of the second coalition. Acknowledgements I wish to thank the Australian Research Council for funding this article through grant number FT110100078 and three anonymous reviewers for their comments on an earlier draft.