Challenging Nuclear: Antinuclear Movements in Postauthoritarian Indonesia

In mid-2006, the Indonesian government announced a plan to build nuclear power plants geared towards meeting soaring demands for energy in the country. After prolonged procrastination, the government is determined that time is ripe for Indonesia to go nuclear. While discussions on adopting nuclear power are steadily gaining currency among high officials and political elites, it is simultaneously being contested by an antinuclear alliance consisting of multiple groups that form an organized resistance. The organized resistance is primarily driven by suspicions that the current government does not possess the capacity to handle high-risk technology. Using combined approaches of STS and social movement studies, the paper discusses the contestation of nuclear risk discourses and how lack of trust in the government has led to the ascendancy of antinuclear movements. In situating the paper within postauthoritarian Indonesia, this paper observes how shifts towards democratic change has allowed a network of civil society groups to organize resistance against nuclear power both at the national and local levels. The paper also highlights the way in which civic epistemology guides antinuclear groups to produce popular risk assessments that confront scientific calculations of nuclear risk. Lastly, it presents a vignette of how civil society groups mobilize local resources to explore alternative energy systems that ultimately undermine the government's nuclear ambitions.