The talk on the street is all about electric cars and scooters as Indonesia strives to become a regional centre for manufacturing electric vehicles. At the heart of that goal is constructing a national supply chain of locally built battery hubs to drive the transition to electric.

But as my current guest reminds us, harnessing electricity has always been at the centre of Indonesia’s dreams of development. Indeed, the very establishment of PLN, Indonesia’s ubiquitous state electricity company, was part of a wider nation building project to create a prosperous and socially just Indonesia.

To talk about the role of electricity in the forging of Indonesia, Dr Anto Mohsin chats with Jacqui Baker. Anto is an assistant professor in the Liberal Arts at North-Western University in Qatar.

In 2024, the Talking Indonesia podcast is co-hosted by Dr Jacqui Baker from Murdoch University, Dr Elisabeth Kramer from the University of New South Wales, Dr Jemma Purdey from Monash University and Tito Ambyo from RMIT.