Welfare Regime Change in Developing Countries: Evidence from Indonesia

Abstract This article discusses welfare regime change using two theoretical frameworks, i.e. welfare regimes in developing countries and institutional change. Using these theories as a loop to look at the Indonesian case, it suggests that the Indonesian welfare regime has experienced ‘flourishing’ development and changes. The regime has changed three times, stimulated by economic growth, global market pressures and social policy ‘universalization’. The last two changes have been loaded with thorny layering, to which the government introduced numerous government‐formal social programmes on top of community‐based informal welfare arrangements. This causes complicated consequences, including the problem of informal and formal welfare institutions harming each other. The discussion of the Indonesian case leads to a better understanding of the characteristics and changes of welfare regimes in developing countries, for which there is currently a research gap.