In Indonesia's cities, public space is hotly contested. Consider the following two examples. In 2019 the Supreme Court ruled to annul part of a by-law in Jakarta on allowing street vending. The plaintiffs were individuals from the Indonesian Solidarity Party. They argued that street vendors restrict the rights of other citizens, especially pedestrians, to use sidewalks and that they profit commercially from their operations on public space at the expense of pedestrians’ and other people's access. The Supreme Court ruled in favour of the plaintiffs and ordered the revocation of chapter 25(1) of Regional Regulation 8/2007 of Jakarta, which authorised the governor of Jakarta to decide that parts of public spaces could be used for street vending. The ruling stripped the governor of some power to govern sidewalks. At the same time, this ruling is an indication of how the Supreme Court views who the ‘public’ is, at least in the case of sidewalks in Jakarta (Padawangi 2019b). The outcome of the case, which excluded street vendors from using sidewalks for business, was also a manifestation of the Supreme Court's view on what is appropriate use of public space.

The exclusion of street vendors from public spaces in this Supreme Court ruling is similar to the second example: a large project a decade and a half earlier. In 2003, then Jakarta Governor Sutiyoso initiated the redevelopment of Medan Merdeka Park—arguably Indonesia's bestknown public park, which surrounds the National Monument (Monumen Nasional) and is lodged amid several of Indonesia's most important government buildings, including the Presidential Palace. Governor Sutiyoso ordered the building of four-metre-high fences around the park, which displaced thousands of street vendors who had long been operating in the area. The project prompted civil society activists to form a ‘human chain’ around the park to protest. Yet the provincial government continued to build the fences and consequently evicted 3,000 street vendors. Although the project also included more greenery in the park, historian J.J. Rizal called it an expression of ‘feudalism’, because the limitation of access resembled the exclusivity of parks around kraton (sultans’ palaces) rather than the original vision of the Medan Merdeka Park as a space open to people from all walks of life (Yuniar 2020).