The outbidding model of intraethnic party competition has dominated the literature on ethnic party competition. The emphasis of this literature on radicalization as an inevitable consequence of intraethnic competition has recently faced fair criticism. Scholars have presented new empirical evidence for intraethnic party competition that runs counter to the predictions of outbidding. Nevertheless, the major assumptions of the outbidding model persist. Scholars generally focus on ethnic outgroups as a source of intraethnic party competition, disregarding other factors that affect competition between ethnic parties within the same ethnic group. My approach to study intraethnic party competition is different. Instead of merely focusing on ethnic politics as the main factor driving intraethnic competition, I investigate other factors that determine intraethnic competition beyond ethnic politics, including social cleavages, and the electoral system. I submit that intraethnic party competition cannot be boiled down simply to ethnic politics. Ethnic parties within the same ethnic group compete over various issues ranging from socioeconomic concerns, to foreign policy and regionalists.

This thesis starts from Anderson¡¦s theory of ¡§Imagined Community¡¨, through the angle of ¡§Nationalism¡¨ and the ¡§Historical State Approach¡¨, to study the development of ethnic politics in Indonesia. In the analysis of historic events, this research hopes to represent the phenomenon of ethnic politics in Indonesia. According to the development of Indonesian Nationalism, this dissertation divides the political history in Indonesia into four stages, ¡§the independent stage¡¨, ¡§the national integration stage¡¨, ¡§the national cooperation stage¡§ and ¡§the democratic transformation stage¡¨, also there are two factors----¡§the state dominate¡¨ and ¡§the ethnic group politic mobilization¡¨ ---- being cross-compared their relations within the four historic stages. This thesis concludes: Indonesia as an ¡§imagined community¡¨, which leads the cleavage in the Indonesian national society. Lack of efficient institution for national integration at the beginning of the national independence, the cooperation politics in the New Order stage, both tended to build the inequality between different ethnic groups, which is the main reason for racial conflict after the democratization, and also the general factor affecting the ethnic politics in Indonesia. Individual factors affecting the ethnic politics in Indonesia include elements of the culture in religion, of the economy in region and the history in international politics, of the racial immigration and economy¡Kwhich form the ethnic consciousness and ethnic identity. Under the effects of the general and individual levels, nowadays the Indonesian ethnic politics presents itself as¡GA. Religion: Muslim parties contestation, the religious demonstration outside the institution, and the regional conflicts in religion. B. Region: secessionism, islanders demanding for regional autonomy or for federalism. C. Race: race violence against Indonesian Chinese, regional racial murders caused by the interior immigration policy. This dissertation concludes with elements of the above three levels, which show the phenomenon of contemporary ethnic politics in Indonesia.