Explaining Anti-Chinese Riots in Late 20th Century Indonesia

Samsu Rizal Panggabean and Benjamin Smith

World Development, 2011, vol. 39, issue 2, 231-242

Abstract: Summary In this essay we ask why anti-Chinese riots took place in some Indonesian cities but not in others during the upheaval of May 1998. Employing process-tracing within a sub-national comparison of four cities, we argue that anti-Chinese riots in May 1998 were a frame-shifting strategy employed by security forces to distract public attention from their failure to control anti-government student demonstrations. Anti-Chinese rioting took place only where the local government and the security forces failed to limit the repertoires and spatial reach of protests used by prior student demonstrators.

Keywords: ethnic; riots; anti-Chinese; violence; Indonesia; transition; state-instigated; violence (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2011
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

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