Sita Aripurnami
Benita Nastami
Ayu Anastasia
Edriana
In what was dubbed the world’s largest single-day elections, Indonesia made history by conducting both presidential and legislative elections on the same day in February 2024. Over 204.8 million eligible voters were called to cast their votes at more than 823,000 polling stations.
A total of 3,676 women competed in the legislative elections, running for the 580 seats in the House of Representatives (DPR RI). In a pool of 9,917 overall legislative candidates, these women had to navigate a complex environment that, as confirmed by our investigation, remains vulnerable to violence against women in politics (VAWP).
As part of our ASEAN Women’s Political Leadership (WPL) programme, supported by Global Affairs Canada (GAC), WFD partnered with the Women Research Institute (WRI) to better understand the experience of women legislative candidates in the monumental 2024 elections.
Violence against women in politics (VAWP) remains a deeply rooted, systemic problem in Indonesia’s relatively young democracy. In this research, we investigated the dynamics of VAWP leading up to, during, and immediately after the 2024 elections by analysing how VAWP threatens women’s political participation and in turn diminishes the quality of Indonesia’s democracy. The 2023 Global Gender Gap Report ranks Indonesia 92nd of 146 countries with a women’s political empowerment score of 0.0181––far below the global average.
While the proportion of women elected to the House of Representatives (DPR RI) recorded a slight improvement from 120/575 or 20.9% (2019) to 127/580 or 21.9% (2024), the desired 30% threshold remains elusive. However, we argue that this is not necessarily because women are unable to compete, but rather because their ability to compete fairly against their male counterparts is significantly hampered by the various forms of VAWP.
On one hand, women are expected to navigate a political, electoral, and party systems that often dismiss the urgency for gender sensitivity. This leaves women candidates having to navigate not just an electoral process, but also an array of social, cultural, and structural restrictions that put them at a disadvantage. While their resilience has helped women political leaders claiming more and more space within the political institutions, our key findings evidently showcase that a structural reform is imperative in order to create a fairer and more inclusive democratic process in Indonesia going forward.
Key findings
In conducting this research, we interviewed over 250 women legislative candidates affiliated with all political parties that competed in the 2024 elections. Here are some key figures that are important to underline:
- Intensifying violence: 82% of women political candidates reported experiencing more intense violence compared to the previous elections.
- Multifaceted challenges: 52% of women political candidates reported experiencing sexual violence and harassment throughout the elections period, followed by verbal (51%), digital (45%), economic (42%), and structural within political parties (38%).
- Extensive impact: 86% of women political candidates reported very serious (37%) and serious (49%) negative impact of VAWP on their abilities to compete in the elections, to the extent that some have expressed losing the motivation to run in future elections if things do not change.
The 8 key findings we present in the report help identify the following priority areas for key stakeholders to address ahead of the next election cycle.
Violence is an integral part of women’s political experience
51% of women political candidates experienced or witnessed violence against women during the election cycle, with verbal and psychological intimidation being the most common (63.7%), especially on social media (50%).
Collective chilling effect
While there were no records of direct physical violence experienced by women political candidates in the 2024 elections, many reported receiving threats of physical violence, which are often enough to instil collective fear among women candidates even when the perpetrators do not act on their threats, with some limiting their campaign activities out of fear for their safety.
High cost of politics is weaponised to marginalise women
42% of women political candidates identified lack of financial capacity and limited support from political parties put them at a disadvantage before the elections even start.
Delve deeper into this issue by exploring WFD’s cost of politics report for Indonesia
Entrenched patriarchy
Despite a legislated 30% minimum quota for women’s candidacy in place, political parties have not been able to create a safe environment for women to pursue their political aspiration, with many treating the affirmative action policy as administrative barriers.
Normalisation of sexual violence as a political tool
52% of women candidates reported having been subjected to or having knowledge of women candidates being sexually harassed and intimidated in exchange for promises of receiving financial support and/or strategic positions in the party lists.
Political elites and dynasties are complicit
Many women candidates expressed a sense of helplessness navigating a political system that often places more value on kinship, proximity to elites, and lack of transparency in party decision making process.
The digital space is fertile ground for violence against women
The advent of social media and generative artificial intelligence present endless opportunities for creative campaign strategies, but women feel unsafe in the digital space as harassment, intimidation, and manipulated content circulate faster online, highlighting the urgent need for strategies to mitigate the impact of technology-facilitated gender-based violence (TFGBV).
An iceberg phenomenon
With 53% of women candidates reporting scepticisms towards existing mechanisms and 69% choosing not to file any reports of the violence they experienced, the true extent of violence against women in politics is very likely more serious and extreme than we know now, underscoring the need for a more systematic approach in addressing it.
Based on these findings, we formulated concrete recommendations intended for policymakers, advocacy groups, civil society, political parties, election organisers, and election watchdogs to help stop violence against women in politics once and for all. Read our analyses and recommendations in the report, now available in Indonesian and soon in English.
