Changing welfare solidarity: social policy and solidarity ventures during COVID-19 outbreak in Indonesia

ABSTRACT

This study aims to draw the solidarity patterns of welfare providers, i.e. state and non-state responders to COVID-19, and how their acts of solidarity reacted to the crisis and its impacts. These data are based upon secondary literature and semi-structured interviews with relevant stakeholders associated with each particular case. We suggest that interactional patterns of solidarity between institutionalized type and informal solidarity have changed twice during the crisis. First, a shortage of public resources in the early phases of the crisis encouraged informal solidarity to play a significant role, even conditioned, in providing social services to citizens. The relentless spread of COVID-19 has also resulted in the interactional patterns of both solidarities shifting in a more contingent manner, resulting in a collaborative partnership between state and non-state actors. The evolving phenomenon of changing welfare solidarity practices has been largely disregarded in the midst of a rapidly expanding literature that scrutinizes the transformation of social policy in the Global South during the crisis, while also highlighting the emergence of fragmented solidarity within the country.

KEYWORDS:

• COVID-19
• solidarity ventures
• institutionalized solidarity
• informal solidarity
• social policy

Acknowledgments

This research received no specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. Although Telkom is a state-owned company, it is legally distinct from the government. The General Meeting of Shareholders, which includes both government and non-government shareholders, serves as the highest authority within the enterprise, as stipulated by the Indonesia State-Owned Enterprises Act Number 19 of 2003.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Nurhadi Nurhadi

Nurhadi is a senior lecturer in the Department of Social Development and Welfare at Universitas Gadjah Mada (UGM), Indonesia. He received PhD in social policy and social work from the University of York, UK. His areas of expertise include child and family policy, social security/social protection, and social policy for developing countries or global social policy. Nurhadi serves as the editor-in-chief for the Journal of Social Development Studies, which is published by the UGM publisher. He has published articles in the Asia Pacific Journal of Social Work and Social Development, Journal of Social Development Studies, Journal of Applied Journalism & Media Studies, etc.

Tauchid Komara Yuda

Tauchid Komara Yuda is a Lecturer at the Department of Social Development and Welfare, Universitas Gadjah Mada (UGM), Indonesia, and a PhD candidate at the Department of Sociology & Social Policy, Lingnan University, Hong Kong SAR. His areas of research expertise are in policy process areas, including politics and policies of welfare state changes, historical institutionalism, general social policy, and policy diffusion. Yuda has published extensively in these areas, contributing articles to leading international journals and publishing houses, including Political Studies Review, Social Policy & Administration, Social Policy & Society, International Journal of Social Welfare, International Social Work, Journal of International and Comparative Social Policy, Journal of Asian Public Policy, Public Administration & Development, and others, along with a wide range of popular writings on Indonesian social policy.

Kafa Abdallah Kafaa

Kafa Abdallah Kafaa is a lecturer at the Department of Social Development and Welfare, Universitas Gadjah Mada (UGM), Indonesia. His studies focus primarily on social development and policy, particularly on social protection, social insurance, vulnerable groups, welfare regimes, local welfare initiatives, and inclusive development. He recently published co-authored articles in Asian Social Work and Policy Review (2020) and International Social Work (2023), respectively.

Pinurba Parama Pratiyudha

Pinurba Parama Pratiyudha is a lecturer at the Department of Social Development and Welfare, Universitas Gadjah Mada (UGM), Indonesia. His areas of expertise are focused on social development with particular emphasis on urban studies, capability approach, and housing development and policy. He recently published co-authored articles in Asian Social Work and Policy Review (2020) and International Social Work (2023), respectively.