Elections are often referred to as the most legitimate mechanism for translating the sovereignty of the people. Through elections, citizens give political mandates to their representatives to make laws, oversee the running of the government, and determine the direction of public policy. However, the 2024 elections left behind an irony that is difficult to deny. More than 17 million valid votes did not result in seats in the House of Representatives. This figure is not just a statistic, but a sign that there are millions of citizens who have formally exercised their right to vote, but substantively have no representation.
One of the main causes is the 4 percent parliamentary threshold. The parliamentary threshold has long been understood as an instrument to simplify the party system and maintain the effectiveness of presidential government. In a multiparty presidential system, the government is indeed vulnerable to legislative deadlock if parliament is too fragmented. However, problems arise when the threshold, which is claimed to be a solution for stability, actually has serious consequences in the form of disproportionate representation and the loss of millions of people’s votes in parliament.
At this point, the threshold can no longer be treated as merely a technical design of the election. It has touched on the core of democracy, namely whether the votes of citizens are treated equally or not.
For years, the debate over the parliamentary threshold in Indonesia has often been stuck on the question of numbers. Is 4 percent too high? Is 3.5 percent more ideal? Is 5 percent more effective? In fact, Indonesia’s experience shows that thresholds never work alone. In fact, an increase in the threshold does not always correlate with a simplification of parties in parliament.
The 2009 elections used a 2.5 percent threshold. As a result, nine parties entered the House of Representatives, but more than 19 million votes, or about 18 percent, were wasted. The 2014 election raised the threshold to 3.5 percent, but the number of parties in the DPR actually increased to 10. Interestingly, wasted votes in 2014 were at their lowest point since the post-reform elections. The 2019 and 2024 elections raised the threshold to 4 percent, and wasted votes rose significantly again.
This fact shows that the relationship between the threshold and party simplification is not as simple as is often imagined. In some cases, the threshold produces more unfair representation than it does simplification that truly impacts the effectiveness of government.
If the main purpose of the threshold is to simplify the party system, then the question that should be asked is, does the 4 percent threshold really result in a more effective parliament, or does it only result in a more exclusive parliament?
The Illusion of Stability
The argument in favor of the threshold almost always points to the need for presidential stability. However, in Indonesian political practice, governmental stability is not built by the threshold design, but rather by the tendency of the political elite to form large, pragmatic coalitions. Almost no post-reform president has ruled with the support of a parliamentary minority. In fact, the opposite tendency has always emerged. Presidents seek to embrace as many parties as possible to join the cabinet, creating large coalitions and minimizing opposition.
This situation causes Indonesia’s presidential system to function in a blurred manner. Constitutionally, we adhere to presidentialism, but in practice, the relationship between the executive and legislative branches more closely resembles a parliamentary system driven by coalition transactions. Furthermore, the mainstream argument that opposition is unknown in presidentialism is true in theory, but it is not appropriate to use it as justification for eliminating the control function of parliament.
In a presidential system, the people elect the president to run the government. At the same time, the people elect the House of Representatives to oversee the exercise of power. This means that opposition in a presidential system should not be understood as simply a party that is not part of the cabinet, but rather as the constitutional function of the House of Representatives as a watchdog of the government. However, when coalitions are too large and parties prefer to compromise for access to power, the opposition function weakens not because the presidential system does not recognize it, but because the political elite deliberately empties that space of control.
This is where the parliamentary threshold becomes problematic. A high threshold does reduce the number of parties that pass, but it also increases the dominance of large parties. Ultimately, the political system becomes increasingly concentrated in the hands of a handful of forces. This phenomenon is not just a matter of simplification, but of power consolidation.
When parliament is dominated by large parties and coalitions tend to sweep up almost all political forces, democracy loses its balancing mechanism. Parliament no longer functions as an arena for competing ideas, but rather as a space for elite compromise. The oversight function weakens because too many parties are in the same position, namely as part of the government.
This situation is dangerous because democracy requires not only stability, but also accountability. Stability without accountability will only result in a comfortable government, but one that is resistant to correction. In the long term, this can accelerate the decline of democracy, which occurs procedurally. Institutions remain in place, elections continue to be held, but the substance of democracy weakens.
Consolidation of Power
Ironically, if the threshold is intended to strengthen presidentialism, the opposite often occurs. A high threshold encourages the concentration of power in parliament and narrows the people’s political choices. At the same time, the practice of large coalitions makes the president increasingly dominant because the House of Representatives loses its capacity as a counterweight.
This combination results in a paradoxical situation. On the one hand, thresholds are promoted as instruments of stability. On the other hand, they create an increasingly oligarchic democracy, as access to parliament becomes more expensive, more limited, and more difficult for alternative political forces to penetrate. In this situation, electoral reform should no longer be understood as a mere technical issue, but as a gamble on the direction of democracy.
Interestingly, experiences in other countries also show that electoral system design is often used as a tool to redraw the political map. Thailand, for example, shows how changes to electoral rules are often not neutral. Electoral reform can be used to strengthen certain forces, suppress political opponents, and subtly limit competition through regulation. Electoral reform in such a context is not merely a technical dialogue, but part of a broader political struggle.
This lesson is relevant for Indonesia, especially as revisions to the Election Law are back on the agenda. The renewed debate over the parliamentary threshold shows that we are at a crucial juncture. Will policymakers evaluate the threshold rationally based on data and its impact on representation, or will this discussion once again become an arena for compromise among elites who are thinking about their own electoral interests?
In public discourse, the argument for removing the parliamentary threshold is gaining strength. Some see the threshold as the main source of wasted votes. Others still view the threshold as an important instrument to prevent fragmentation. But if we are honest with the data, the fragmentation of the Indonesian parliament has never been a real threat. What is more apparent is the tendency toward political cartelization, where existing parties prefer to collaborate rather than compete ideologically.
Therefore, the focus of reform should no longer be trapped in the obsession with reducing the number of parties in the DPR. What is more important is how to ensure that the distribution of seats is not too concentrated and how to ensure that parliament has control over the government. Stability built through cutting representation will only result in false stability. It may reduce the number of parties in parliament, but it does not automatically make the government more effective or democracy healthier.
Direction for Improvement
The Constitutional Court has emphasized that the parliamentary threshold is an open legal policy, but it must still be in line with the principle of people’s sovereignty. The determination of the threshold number should not be done arbitrarily. It must be based on a rational, proportional, and accountable method. Unfortunately, the determination of the threshold has often been driven by political calculations rather than evidence-based evaluations.
If the revision of the Election Law is truly intended to improve democracy, then the parliamentary threshold needs to be seriously reviewed. Lowering the threshold to 1 percent is worth considering. Even the option of completely abolishing it should not be ruled out, as long as it is accompanied by other more substantial reforms.
The main problem with Indonesia’s party system is not the number of parties entering parliament, but rather the weak institutionalization of parties, poor internal democracy, and minimal accountability for political funding. If political parties are not reformed, then no matter how high the threshold is set, it will not result in a higher quality of democracy. What will happen instead is that democracy will become increasingly closed to new alternatives.
At this point, we need to shift our paradigm. The threshold should not be a tool to silence the people’s voice. If the state wants to simplify the party system, then a more appropriate instrument would be to tighten the verification of election participants and strengthen the institutional requirements for parties. Parties must be tested on their organizational readiness before becoming election participants, rather than being allowed to enter easily and then be eliminated at the end through a threshold that punishes voters.
In this way, party simplification is carried out upstream, not downstream. The state filters out parties that are not ready from the start, but still respects the votes of the people who have already voted.
Ultimately, democracy cannot be built by discarding millions of citizens’ votes. Discarded votes are not merely a technical consequence, but a wound to representation. They signify that there are citizens who are politically forced into non-existence.
If the parliamentary threshold continues to be maintained at a high level, elections will increasingly stray from their fundamental principle as a mechanism of representation. They will turn into an exclusive competition that only benefits the established powers. Democracy, however, needs space for alternatives, space for correction, and space for different voices.
Electoral reform must return to a simple but fundamental principle, whereby every vote cast by the people must be counted and valued. Without this, elections will become nothing more than a procedural ritual that has lost its meaning. It is important for us to ask ourselves again, what kind of democracy are we actually nurturing?
M. Iqbal Kholidin
Researcher at the Association for Elections and Democracy (Perludem)