Legislating civil–military relations in post- Reformasi Indonesia

The 2024–2025 revision of the Indonesian National Armed Forces Law (TNI Law) reflects a significant shift in Indonesia’s post-Reformasi civil–military relations. This article analyses the legislative process behind the revision, showing that it functioned less as a technical legal exercise and more as a political bargaining platform between the executive, the parliament, and the military. The accelerated and opaque deliberation process was driven primarily by executive incentives and the military’s organisational interests. The parliament played a largely reactive role, enabling the formalisation of practices already occurring informally, including the expansion of Military Operations Other Than War (MOOTW) and the placement of active-duty officers in civilian institutions. Using Indonesian Politik Hukum, policy-oriented jurisprudence, and Seidman’s problem-solving approach, the study demonstrates that the TNI Law revision arose from the interplay of institutional incentives, political bargaining, and inherited organizational structures, rather than from a thoughtful reassessment of civil–military boundaries.