Indonesia and Singapore: Structure, Politics and Interests

This article examines patterns of cooperation and conflict between Indonesia and Singapore with a view to understanding why the relationship appears prone to recurrent uneasiness. It argues that we have few reasons to believe that either structural or historical factors necessarily place Singapore in a position of strategic vulnerability with regards to Indonesia. Rather, the relationship is driven by the political and material interests of actors on both sides. Contests for domestic political advantage can occasionally spill over into the bilateral arena, but they do not do so in any predetermined way. To the degree that there is a structural conflict of interests behind the relatively mundane disputes between the two countries, it is rooted patterns of economic complementarity and interaction that have operated since the colonial era. Mutual sensitivity to perceived affronts may also be a paradoxical by-product of the non-interference norm as it has been interpreted by the Association of Southeast Asian Nations.