Indonesia, explained.
The conditions that enable buzzer politics in Indonesia are likely to emerge elsewhere (Getty Images)
In Southeast Asia, democracy has gone digital, with online influencers and propaganda teams shaping the narratives.
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How “buzzer politics” is reshaping Indonesia’s democracyHow “buzzer politics” is reshaping Indonesia’s democracy
In the world of social media, the term buzzer refers to accounts, often anonymous and operating in coordinated networks, tasked with shaping public opinion in exchange for payment. Political buzzing has developed into a rapidly expanding industry across Southeast Asia, where individuals and coordinated teams are hired to circulate propaganda, attack opponents, and manufacture the appearance of popular support. Paid influencers add another layer to this system. Indonesian journalists have exposed how celebrities and social media personalities are increasingly recruited to deliver political messages framed as personal views, lending them a credibility that anonymous accounts cannot easily replicate.
This approach became especially visible during the August 2025 protests, which erupted amid economic strain, mass layoffs, and rising costs of food, housing, and education. Public anger intensified when it emerged that each of the 580 members of Indonesia’s House of Representatives (DPR) would receive a new monthly housing allowance of Rp50 million — nearly ten times Jakarta’s minimum wage. The events quickly came to symbolise elite detachment and political indifference, further fuelling public outrage.
Protests that began in Jakarta on 25 August spread rapidly to other cities, driven by students, labour unions, and motorcycle taxi drivers demanding higher wages and the reversal of the allowance. By the end of the month, unrest had spread nationwide, leaving at least six dead, hundreds injured, and more than 1,200 arrests in Jakarta alone.
Rival digital networks cast the unrest in sharply different ways, either as violent chaos endangering national stability or as a popular stand against corruption and creeping authoritarianism. Both interpretations were pushed relentlessly online, leaving many citizens uncertain whether they were seeing genuine public anger or a carefully manufactured sense of agreement.
This ambiguity is not accidental. It is the core function of buzzer politics. Indonesian observers have long warned that buzzers are deployed to fragment discussion, inflame emotion, and polarise society rather than engage with public grievances. During the August protests, several influencers revealed that they had received offers worth tens to hundreds ofmillions of rupiah to promote a government-backed message branded “Ajakan Damai Indonesia”, or “Indonesia’s call for peace” timed for simultaneous release.
The origins of buzzer politics can be traced to the 2012 Jakarta gubernatorial election, when campaign teams deployed anonymous accounts alongside influencer-led messaging.
At the same time, genuine grassroots mobilisation also flourished online. Calls for protest circulated widely under the banner Revolusi Rakyat Indonesia, urging workers, farmers, andstudents to take to the streets. The overlap between genuine mobilisation and professional narrative management made it increasingly difficult to separate public feeling from organised influence.
The origins of buzzer politics can be traced to the 2012 Jakarta gubernatorial election, when campaign teams deployed anonymous accounts alongside influencer-led messaging. These methods expanded during the 2014 presidential election, a contest marked by rising levels of disinformation and negative campaigning. Since then, buzzer networks have become larger and more sophisticated. Campaigns now involve hundreds or thousands of accounts managed by paid operators tasked with pushing hashtags, attacking critics, and diverting attention during crises.
Indonesia’s experience also points to a wider regional shift, suggesting that buzzer-style politics may be increasingly difficult to contain. In the Philippines, public anger over alleged corruption in flood-control projects has spilled onto social media, where largely Gen Z–driven campaigns rely on online exposure and public shaming to demand accountability. While these tactics often emerge from grassroots frustration, they have also created an online environment in which narrative manipulation can easily take root.
Across Indonesia and the Philippines, protests now share a defining characteristic: they are driven by younger generations angered by corruption and elite privilege, and they unfold as much online as they do on the streets. As social media becomes the primary arena for political expression, the conditions that enable buzzer politics in Indonesia are likely to emerge elsewhere — whether through state-backed narrative management or through the commercialisation of online influence itself.
What Indonesia adds to this regional picture is a vocabulary — buzzer politics — for understanding a form of political control that relies less on repression than on manufactured ambiguity. When narratives are multiplied and weaponised, dissent is not silenced but neutralised.
As paid influence becomes widely recognised, suspicion spreads not only towards elites but also towards activists and ordinary citizens. Dissent can be dismissed as staged, while those with resources tighten their grip on public perception. Democracy does not collapse under such conditions; it hollows out.
Indonesia’s protests show that the central challenge of modern democracy is no longer only governing crowds but governing truth in an age of narrative saturation. When outrage can be commissioned, amplified, and redirected at scale, the line between popular will and political performance begins to dissolve. If Indonesia’s experience offers a warning, it is this: the future of protest, and of democracy itself, will depend not only on who speaks, but on whether citizens can still recognise what is real.
About the author
Jeremiah Edbert Grifith Sihite
Jeremiah Edbert Grifith Sihite is an International Relations student at Universitas Pelita Harapan’s Faculty of Social Science and Politics, driven by a passion for global cooperation and diplomacy.
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