Experts for a Brave New City: The Politics of Expertise in the Production of Indonesia's New Capital City

印度尼西亚政府最近宣布将首都从雅加达迁往东加里曼丹省的一个大型农村地区。雅加达的社会生态问题，如洪水和交通拥堵，强调了这一决定，并为总统佐科威提供了一个机会，实现他建设“连接”全国的关键基础设施的承诺。然而，它遭到了批评；原住民和环保团体对这一决定的快速进程以及该项目所带来的大规模城市化表示担忧。作为权威人士，他们的知识被引入来指导发展进程，专家们已经被招募到新首都（NCC）的工作中。然而，“非精英”专家，如活动家，以及拥有某些“非常规”知识的社区和土著领导人，一直被边缘化。这项研究的目的是探索专家——以及围绕什么是专家的争论——是如何影响印尼新首都的建设的。由于规划师、建筑师和顾问被邀请参与项目的各个方面，“非精英”专家，如当地社区人士、活动家和拥有“非常规”知识的土著领导人，一直被边缘化。这个项目将调查谁是“专家”，他们如何相互协商，以及正在产生什么样的城市想象。在对剥夺公民权和环境破坏的担忧中，NCC项目为佐科威的“新发展主义”及其涉及的专业知识提供了一个及时的案例研究。以基础设施发展为重点，其特点是“正统与自由经济战略”的混合搭配。这需要一定的专业知识，使佐科维能够承担这种发展主义的品牌。然而，它忽略了许多人权和环境正义问题。因此，佐科威政策的意识形态支柱依赖于实体经济发展将带来的经济增长。安东尼奥·葛兰西（Antonio Gramsci）关于知识分子和霸权的著作，对于揭示在全球范围内流动的专家如何在更局部的范围内参与政治项目具有指导意义。对他来说，知识分子帮助他们所代表的群体理解世界，从而改变世界。他认为，知识分子在建立和维持合法性/霸权方面发挥着重要作用，但他们围绕自己的阶级利益组织起来，形成跨阶级联盟或“历史集团”。在城市发展中，专家网络承担了这一角色，但“非精英”专家如何适应这一角色？政策流动性文献提供了非精英参与者如何通过“与彼此和国家的平淡接触”来穿越城市政治的相关词汇。在分析NCC项目时，采用葛兰西的观点可以获得很多收获，特别是在佐科维以基础设施为中心的“新发展主义”下的霸权化过程。这个项目将采取“扩展案例方法”，让研究人员在“变化的政策网络”中以多向的方式“遵循政策”。此外，“摩擦”在理解跨国政策流动的混乱和多样化过程中是一个有用的启发。这意味着对来自不同规模和阶级起源的专家的调查，他们的共同点是他们与NCC相关的工作，并探索他们的劳动如何在不同规模上塑造和反过来被不同过程塑造。这一流行病表明了该国存在的多重不公正现象，关注社会某些阶层（如非精英知识分子）的解放性研究可能有助于更广泛的反霸权项目。在这个研究项目中运用葛兰西的理论对于理解这些新的动态是至关重要的。

The Government of Indonesia recently announced the relocation of the capital city from Jakarta to a massive rural site in the province of East Kalimantan. The socioecological problems in Jakarta such as floods and traffic jams underscore this decision and presented president Jokowi an opportunity to deliver on his promises of building critical infrastructure 'connecting' the country. However, it has been met with criticism; indigenous and environmental advocacy groups have expressed concerns with regard to the swift process of the decision and the massive urbanisation the project entails.As figures of authority whose knowledge are brought in to guide development processes, experts are already being recruited to work on the new capital city (NCC). However, 'non-elite' experts such as activists, and community and indigenous leaders who possess certain 'unconventional' knowledges are consistently being side-lined. The objective of this research is to explore how experts-and contestation surrounding what constitutes expertise-are shaping the production of Indonesia's new capital city. As planners, architects, and consultants are being invited to the project to work on its various aspects, 'non-elite' experts such as local community figures, activists, and indigenous leaders who possess 'unconventional' knowledges are consistently being side-lined. This project will investigate who counts as 'experts', how they negotiate with one another, and what kind of imaginaries of the city are being produced.Amidst concerns over disenfranchisement and environmental destruction, the NCC project provides a timely case study of Jokowi's 'new developmentalism' and the expertise that that involves. Focusing on infrastructure development, it is characterised by a mix-and-match of "orthodox and liberal economic strategy". This necessitates certain expertise that will allow Jokowi to undertake this brand of developmentalism. It has, however, left many issues of human rights and environmental justice unattended. The ideological backbone of Jokowi's policies, then, relies on the economic growth physical development will bring.Antonio Gramsci's work on intellectuals and hegemony is instructive for unpacking how globally mobile experts become articulated into political projects at more local scales. For him, intellectuals help make sense of the world for the groups they represent in order to change it. He posits that intellectuals are instrumental in establishing and maintaining legitimacy/hegemony, but organise around their own class interests, forming cross-class alliances or 'historic blocs'. Within urban developments, networks of expertise take up this role, but how do 'non-elite' experts fit into this? Policy mobility literature provides relevant vocabulary in how non-elite actors traverse urban politics through "prosaic engagements with one another and the state". Much can be gained from adopting a Gramscian perspective in analysing the NCC project, specifically in relation to processes of hegemonisation under Jokowi's infrastructure-centric 'new developmentalism'.This project will take a 'distended case approach', where researchers 'follow the policy' in multidirectional ways within "mutating policy networks". Additionally, 'friction' is a useful heuristic in understanding the messy and diverse processes of transnational policy mobility. What this means is an investigation of experts from various scales as well as class origins whose common denominator is their work in relation to the NCC and an exploration of how their labour shapes and are in turn shaped by different processes at different scales.The pandemic has pronounced the multiple injustices present in the country and emancipatory research that attends to certain segments of society such as non-elite intellectuals may contribute to broader counterhegemonic projects. The utilisation of Gramsci in this research project is crucial in understanding these new dynamics.