Constitutional Dialogue in the Indonesia Election Law: Tension between the Indonesian Constitutional Court and the Legislature

Radian Salman, Rosa Ristawati

2018

Abstract

This paper elaborates the Indonesian Constitutional Court’s competences on specific issue of judicial review on the Election Law and dispute settlement of election in Indonesia. It is addressed to examine relationship between the Constitutional Court of the Republic of Indonesia and the Legislative branch on the issue of the Election Law. The Indonesian Constitution (the Amendment) determines two important election issues, first is the type of elections, namely the legislative election and the presidential election. Other issues is the institutional arrangements of election and the principles of electoral administration. The Constitution gives the legislature the power to make election law regulating the election agencies, the election systems, the election processes and dispute settlement of the election results. With regard to the democracy, election Law is the authority of the election agencies. However, the power to make election Law has to be check by the Court. This paper indicates that the Indonesian Constitutional Court is an active-progressive court in dealing with Election Law. Therefore, the Court tends to be very decisive in its decisions. While handing down strong decisions to uphold important constitutional principles could bring great benefits to citizens, the Court is eager to strengthen support for democracy. On the other hand, the role of the Court on special issue of judicial review tends to encroach on the territory of the Legislative. This paper end up with the proposal of a new approach for Indonesian Constitutional Court on the issue of Election Law. It is argued that the Court has to prevent the characters as an “activist”, “decisive” and “reactive”. The Court has to conduct constitutional dialogue with the Legislature specifically on the constitutional meaning in term of election.

Paper Citation

in Harvard Style

Salman R. and Ristawati R. (2018). Constitutional Dialogue in the Indonesia Election Law: Tension between the Indonesian Constitutional Court and the Legislature.In Proceedings of the International Law Conference - Volume 1: i-NLAC, ISBN 978-989-758-482-4, pages 156-162. DOI: 10.5220/0010052701560162

in Bibtex Style

@conference{i-nlac18,
author={Radian Salman and Rosa Ristawati},
title={Constitutional Dialogue in the Indonesia Election Law: Tension between the Indonesian Constitutional Court and the Legislature},
booktitle={Proceedings of the International Law Conference - Volume 1: i-NLAC,},
year={2018},
pages={156-162},
publisher={SciTePress},
organization={INSTICC},
doi={10.5220/0010052701560162},
isbn={978-989-758-482-4},
}

in EndNote Style

TY - CONF

JO - Proceedings of the International Law Conference - Volume 1: i-NLAC,
TI - Constitutional Dialogue in the Indonesia Election Law: Tension between the Indonesian Constitutional Court and the Legislature
SN - 978-989-758-482-4
AU - Salman R.
AU - Ristawati R.
PY - 2018
SP - 156
EP - 162
DO - 10.5220/0010052701560162