... It was they who created the system, and it was they who failed to make it work. The period of parliamentary democracy in Indonesia between 1950 and 1957 was a time of great opportunity and uncertainty. It was in this period that democracy had its best, and until recently, its only chance, to prove itself workable in Indonesia. Yet for democracy to work in the new nation of Indonesia, it had to overcome significant cultural and social difficulties that ran deep within Indonesian society. The very notions and ideas that made up the Indonesian elite's understanding of what democracy was and how it should work, significantly weakened and undermined the whole of the democratic system as set-up by the elites. The limited ideological basis of Indonesian democracy was to play an important role in its eventual demise. The political model that the Indonesians chose for their parliamentary system also fundamentally undermined parliamentary democracy. It led to a string of unstable coalition ...

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