Governing Maritime Borderlands in an Archipelagic Frontier: Institutional Fragmentation, Security Pressures, and Policy Integration in Indonesia’s Kepulauan Riau Province
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.69812/jgs.v3i1.222Keywords:
Archipelagic Borderland, Integrated Governance, Institutional Fragmentation, Maritime SecurityAbstract
This article examines maritime border governance in Indonesia’s Kepulauan Riau Province as a multi-scalar archipelagic governance problem rather than as a narrowly defined security issue. The province combines intense cross-border exposure, strategic shipping routes, dispersed islands, fisheries and blue-economy potential, and a dense institutional landscape in which authority is distributed among security, border-control, sectoral, and subnational agencies. Using an integrative qualitative literature and document review of recent scholarship published from 2017 to 2026, the study synthesizes evidence on maritime security, border administration, institutional coordination, marine resource governance, and blue-economy justice. The analysis identifies four interlocking findings. First, institutional fragmentation is not simply a shortage of coordination but a structural condition created by overlapping mandates, organizational interests, and uneven vertical integration. Second, sovereignty and security pressures particularly illegal fishing, cross-border illicit mobility, and enforcement challenges become more consequential when information and operational coordination are fragmented. Third, border governance effectiveness depends on linking security with public services, livelihoods, marine spatial governance, and ecological sustainability across dispersed islands. Fourth, a sustainable blue economy requires distributive, procedural, and recognition dimensions of justice, not economic expansion alone. The article proposes an Integrated Maritime Border Governance framework organized around legal clarity, shared maritime-domain information, inter-agency coordination, border-island resilience, and inclusive blue-economy governance.
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