What Drives Regional Proliferation in Indonesia? Assessing the Role of Institutions

t Regional proliferation (pemekaran) is still a major issue of
debate in the Indonesian public policy forums. In this article, we
investigate the factors that contribute to pemekaran and analyze
whether the quality of institutions can explain the number of regional
proliferation events in Indonesia. Based on observations for the period
2007 to 2014, we find that the levels of both administrative approvals
and social capital have a positive and significant effect on the number
of regional-proliferation events. We also find that fiscal transfers and
income do not constitute motives for regions in Indonesia to
proliferate. In addition, there is a significant and positive association
between ethnic fractionalization and the occurrence of regional
proliferation in Indonesia. Meanwhile, the qualitative findings in
West Java and Banten show that territorial coalitions do matter and
that there are political, economic, and bureaucratic rent-seeking
motives behind pemekaran.