Public Opinion Polling and Post-truth Politics in Indonesia

Public opinion polling plays a prominent role in Indonesian politics, but as the country grapples with democratic backsliding and post-truth politics, pollsters have faced serious challenges in their endeavour to enhance responsiveness, representation and accountability. This article analyses how the Indonesian polling industry has responded to these challenges since the 2014 presidential elections. It argues that Indonesia's most reputable pollsters have made important contributions to upholding the integrity of Indonesia's electoral regime due to increased transparency and new initiatives to improve media coverage of polling. At the same time, however, democratic responsiveness seems to have declined rather than improved despite an ever-growing number of public opinion surveys, while fragmentation and politicization within the polling industry have exacerbated some of the pathologies of contemporary Indonesian politics, including the explosion of electoral campaign costs and deepening polarization.