Faith, Followers, and Factions: Making Social Media Publics in Indonesia

Abstract: This introductory article lays the groundwork for the special issue on "Social Media and Society in Indonesia." It examines the co-constitutive relationship between social media and Indonesian society, focusing on their mutual shaping within enduring socio-cultural dynamics. The article calls for a nuanced understanding of how technologies are localized and how diverse "social media publics" emerge in the Indonesian context. It begins by tracing the social and material histories of Indonesian social media and subsequently explores three key themes that emerge from the curated collection: the business and labor of cultivating social media publics; social media's political publics; and social media's religious publics. Challenging dominant narratives of social media as a homogenous phenomenon, the article positions Indonesia as a critical lens for analyzing and reimagining global social media discourse.