Javanese Public Administration

Javanese Public Administration

In the past, Javanese administrative practices regulated public affairs and set behavioral norms in a succession of the island's notable empires, including Sailendra Mataram, Majapahit, the Demak confederacy, and seventeenth-century Mataram. This tradition continued for nearly a millennium before succumbing first to colonial practices, and subsequently to global standardization. Today these administrative practices survive in modified form as dominant elements of Indonesia's public administration. In order to better understand what the Javanese public administration is like today, it is a good idea to study what it was like in the past as well.