ABSTRACT
This chapter shows how the present political system in Lombok can be seen as a continuation in many ways of the abovementioned traditional ideas of power and based on patron-client relations. It presents a story of politics and elections in a village in north Lombok that will allow us to see what happens when patronage and traditional authority are in operation but also when other political factors, such as intimidation and force, and at times also religious orientation, are important for political choices. Party politics first entered Bayan in the early 1950s, as it did in the rest of rural Indonesia. Having briefly sketched the local party politics in Bayan up to the mid-1990s, the chapter looks at the campaign which took place during the 1997 election, the last before the fall of Suharto.
