Experts for a Brave New City: The Politics of Expertise in the Production of Indonesia's New Capital City

The Government of Indonesia recently announced the relocation of the capital city from Jakarta to a massive rural site in the province of East Kalimantan. The socioecological problems in Jakarta such as floods and traffic jams underscore this decision and presented president Jokowi an opportunity to deliver on his promises of building critical infrastructure 'connecting' the country.

However, it has been met with criticism; indigenous and environmental advocacy groups have expressed concerns with regard to the swift process of the decision and the massive urbanisation the project entails.

As figures of authority whose knowledge are brought in to guide development processes, experts are already being recruited to work on the new capital city (NCC). However, 'non-elite' experts such as activists, and community and indigenous leaders who possess certain 'unconventional' knowledges are consistently being side-lined. The objective of this research is to explore how experts-and contestation surrounding what constitutes expertise-are shaping the production of Indonesia's new capital city.

As planners, architects, and consultants are being invited to the project to work on its various aspects, 'non-elite' experts such as local community figures, activists, and indigenous leaders who possess 'unconventional' knowledges are consistently being side-lined. This project will investigate who counts as 'experts', how they negotiate with one another, and what kind of imaginaries of the city are being produced.

Amidst concerns over disenfranchisement and environmental destruction, the NCC project provides a timely case study of Jokowi's 'new developmentalism' and the expertise that that involves. Focusing on infrastructure development, it is characterised by a mix-and-match of "orthodox and liberal economic strategy". This necessitates certain expertise that will allow Jokowi to undertake this brand of developmentalism.

It has, however, left many issues of human rights and environmental justice unattended. The ideological backbone of Jokowi's policies, then, relies on the economic growth physical development will bring.

Antonio Gramsci's work on intellectuals and hegemony is instructive for unpacking how globally mobile experts become articulated into political projects at more local scales. For him, intellectuals help make sense of the world for the groups they represent in order to change it. He posits that intellectuals are instrumental in establishing and maintaining legitimacy/hegemony, but organise around their own class interests, forming cross-class alliances or 'historic blocs'.

Within urban developments, networks of expertise take up this role, but how do 'non-elite' experts fit into this? Policy mobility literature provides relevant vocabulary in how non-elite actors traverse urban politics through "prosaic engagements with one another and the state". Much can be gained from adopting a Gramscian perspective in analysing the NCC project, specifically in relation to processes of hegemonisation under Jokowi's infrastructure-centric 'new developmentalism'.

This project will take a 'distended case approach', where researchers 'follow the policy' in multidirectional ways within "mutating policy networks". Additionally, 'friction' is a useful heuristic in understanding the messy and diverse processes of transnational policy mobility. What this means is an investigation of experts from various scales as well as class origins whose common denominator is their work in relation to the NCC and an exploration of how their labour shapes and are in turn shaped by different processes at different scales.

The pandemic has pronounced the multiple injustices present in the country and emancipatory research that attends to certain segments of society such as non-elite intellectuals may contribute to broader counterhegemonic projects. The utilisation of Gramsci in this research project is crucial in understanding these new dynamics.