MULTI-DIMENSIONAL THREAT PERCEPTION: UNDERSTANDING STATE RESPONSES TO COMMUNAL VIOLENCE IN POST-SUHARTO INDONESIA

The resignation of Suharto in 1998 was accompanied with locally concentrated communal violence. This study seeks to understand the variation of state responses to communal violence in post-Suharto Indonesia. I argue that threat perception, divided to threat formation and threat evolution, is explanatory in bridging communal violence and state responses.By vertical comparison, I argue that (1) State responses to the outbreak of communal violence depend on threat formation on collective action at societal level; and (2) State responses to the escalation of communal violence depend on threat evolution on collective action at state level. By horizontal comparison, I argue that threat perception of religious violence is stronger than that of ethnic violence.