This thesis is both a conceptual analysis of securitization and an analysis of the political and societal security threats that plagued the Sukarno and Suharto regimes in hidonesia. It charts securitization's place within the current security hterature and examines the critiques of these sectors. It addresses the criticism that political security is too broad and lacking a distinct identity of its own. Using the work of Alagappa and Ayoob allows us to expand our understanding of political securitization, the nature of the threats to the sector, define a clear referent object, and apply securitization logic to the study of authoritarian regimes. Secondly, with respect to societal securitisation, this dissertation will develop the current literature to incorporate social psychology theory, which provides us with a clearer understanding of not only how and why social groups, and thus social identities, form but also why it is people need these groups in the first place, and also why inter group conflict can occur. This in turn provides a more robust conception of societal security. The thesis then uses these operationalised security concepts and uses them to analyse postcolonial Indonesia. It argues that the central principles of both the Sukarno and Suharto political regimes had within their guiding principles the antecedents that would lead to their ultimate failure. It also argues that the oppressive policies of the New Order towards ethnic minorities, rather than destroying the targeted groups actually defined and strengthened notions of what it was to be Indonesian
