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At the two year mark of Indonesian President Joko \u2018Jokowi\u2019 Widodo\u2019s time in office, commentators have been quick to criticise the inward turn<\/a> Indonesia\u2019s foreign policy has taken under his administration. This for a President elected on a platform of \u2018expanding Indonesia\u2019s regional engagement in the Indo\u2013Pacific<\/a>\u2019 (PDF). As President, Jokowi has shown himself to be overwhelmingly focused on a domestic archipelagic development agenda, part of his stated vision of developing Indonesia into a global maritime fulcrum (GMF). However, the gulf between rhetoric and action isn\u2019t just a quirk of Jokowi\u2019s leadership but rather a symptom of Jakarta\u2019s long-standing \u2018minimalist\u2019 conception of the Indo-Pacific.<\/p>\n The first Indonesian policymaker to consider the strategic benefits of an Indo-Pacific outlook was Marty Natalegwa, Foreign Minister under the \u2018internationalist\u2019 President SBY. Natalegwa penned a response to the new regional construct in 2013, then being promoted by some Indo\u2013Pacific Rim democracies (the United States, Japan, India and Australia). His proposal was for an \u2018Indo\u2013Pacific-wide treaty of friendship and cooperation,\u2019 based on the East Asia Summit\u2019s Bali Principles. Rather than undertaking a considerable revamp of Indonesian foreign policy, the Foreign Minister simply sought to apply his existing doctrine, that of a regional \u2018dynamic equilibrium\u2019\u2014\u2018where not one country is preponderant<\/a>\u2019\u2014to the expanded region. Marty called for an Indo\u2013Pacific<\/a> (PDF):<\/p>\n \u2018\u2026marked by an absence of preponderant power not through the rigidity, rivalry and tensions common to the pursuit of a balance of power model. Instead, through the promotion of a sense of common responsibility in the endeavor to maintain the region\u2019s peace and stability.\u2019<\/p><\/blockquote>\n For Natalegawa, Indonesia\u2019s interest in the Indo\u2013Pacific was limited to the extent that an expanded region supports its preferred model of an Asia\u2013Pacific order. In that vein, adding a rising India\u2014long seen by Jakarta as a benign power\u2014supports both goals of forging a dynamic equilibrium of inclusive regionalism and a diversity of powers.<\/p>\n On the face of it, the Jokowi administration with its core GMF vision appears to be embracing a holistic conception of the Indo\u2013Pacific. Rizal Sukma, one of the GMF\u2019s key architects, argued that the vision<\/a>:<\/p>\n \u2018\u2026emphasises Indonesia\u2019s geographic, geostrategic and geoeconomic realities upon which its future will depend, and simultaneously influences the dynamics in the Indian and Pacific Oceans.\u2019<\/p><\/blockquote>\n The GMF envisions Indonesia as a fulcrum<\/em>: the \u2018point of support where the burden of the two oceans actually rest<\/a>\u2019. It\u2019s objective is for Indonesia to access the full benefits of its geostrategic position.<\/p>\n Two years in, however, there\u2019s little evidence that Indonesia is acting beyond its traditional Asia\u2013Pacific scope. The Indian Ocean Rim Association (IORA), which Indonesia took chairmanship of in October 2015, appears to be the mechanism for a new grand strategy centred on the Indo\u2013Pacific. Indeed, at the time of Indonesia becoming chair there was hope that its proposed IORA Concord might be the first step toward enhanced regionalism in the Indian Ocean<\/a>.<\/p>\n However after a year of Indonesia\u2019s chairmanship, concrete developments are hard to find. The IORA Concord being drafted for next year\u2019s inaugural IORA Leaders\u2019 Summit is likely to offer little more than \u2018bland diplomatic statements that have little restraining force over signatories\u2019 behaviours<\/a>,\u2019 according to Ristian Atriandi Supriyanto. Jakarta\u2019s interests appear limited to a diplomatic victory for leading on the Concord. There\u2019s no serious suggestion that Indonesia under Jokowi will try to take effective and active leadership over the diverse grouping, as it hasn\u2019t with the more geopolitically pertinent ASEAN.<\/p>\n None of this is surprising, given that the Indian Ocean holds little strategic interest for Indonesia. A stronger position in the Indian Ocean would do nothing to support Jakarta in addressing the strategic challenges it faces. China has contested by force Indonesia\u2019s sovereignty over the Exclusive Economic Zone, and even territorial waters, surrounding its northernmost territory, the Natuna Islands on three separate occasions this year<\/a>. Beijing has also successfully fractured ASEAN unity\u2014long the cornerstone of Indonesia\u2019s foreign policy\u2014under the leadership of Cambodia in 2012 and more recently Laos<\/a>. Economically, Indonesia has limited interests to its west; its major trading partners remain overwhelmingly Asia\u2013Pacific.<\/p>\n The relationship between Indian Ocean security and stability and Chinese assertiveness remains tenuous. For Indonesia, India is the only state outside the Asia\u2013Pacific that has the potential to change the strategic balance in East Asia. As such, Indonesia has long welcomed greater Indian engagement in the Asia\u2013Pacific; Jakarta was a key supporter of expanding the East Asia Summit to include India, Australia and New Zealand in 2005.<\/p>\n There\u2019s little reason to think that under Jokowi, Indonesia\u2019s Indian Ocean interests have developed beyond that perceived by Natalegawa and that the Indo\u2013Pacific is perceived to be anything more than the Asia\u2013Pacific + India.<\/p>\n