PRACTICE OF IDENTITY POLITICS IN INDONESIAN DEMOCRACY: CASE STUDY OF GUBERNATORIAL ELECTION IN WEST NUSA TENGGARA, INDONESIA

Abstract Criticism against identity politics, both in public discourse and political theory, has intensified over the past decade with the rise of right wings populism and the polarization of politics. Identity politics is a contested term. Nevertheless, there are systematic overlaps between current criticisms of identity politics that mainly repeat arguments that have been similarly articulated since the 1990s. This study aims to analyze the practice of identity politics in Indonesian democracy, especially in the context of the 2024 NTB gubernatorial election. This study uses a qualitative method with a case study approach. The results of this study found that identity politics tends to operate softly so that it can provide affiliation of choices and preferences to voters in the 2024 NTB gubernatorial election. The role of habitus in influencing voters is quite significant, especially since the actors involved in the arena have sufficient modalities to influence voters. Overall, the practice of identity politics in regional elections is very important in order to promote a more inclusive and representative local democracy. To understand identity politics as a democratizing oscillation between power and reason, the radical democratic account has to be refined through standpoint theory. The proceed in the systematically reconstruct the equivalences of both theoretical traditions, filling a gap in the existing research literature that is ignorant of these equivalences.