A. Soeharto: high consolidation, low legitimacy abrupt tipping
Under Soeharto's New Order regime (1966--1998), the system displayed a paradoxical stability. Elite management, institutional consensus, and narrative control were consolidated to near-maximum levels, creating a strong coefficient in our formalism. This yielded high apparent resilience: protests were suppressed effectively, and the black horse potential () remained close to zero for decades. However, legitimacy was chronically low, derived from authoritarian control rather than democratic mandate. In our sensitivity analysis, this situates Soeharto near the upper peak of the repression curve but on the low end of the legitimacy curve.
The consequence was a regime that could withstand routine disturbances but was extremely brittle under extreme stress. When the Asian Financial Crisis of 1997--98 sharply increased economic stress (), the system crossed its bifurcation threshold abruptly. Trust () collapsed, protest intensity () surged beyond repression capacity, and the black horse potential () rapidly emerged, enabling Reformasi leaders to challenge the regime. Mathematically, the trajectory resembled a saddle--node tipping: stability persisted until the system was pushed beyond the fold, at which point equilibrium vanished and regime collapse became irreversible.
Thus, Soeharto's case illustrates how high consolidation without legitimacy can create long-lived but brittle equilibria, where stability is an illusion that masks underlying vulnerability. In our formalism, Soeharto exemplifies an abrupt tipping regime: resilient under moderate shocks, but catastrophically unstable once critical stress is exceeded.
B. SBY: high legitimacy, moderate coalition resilient
Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono's presidency (2004--2014) represents a contrasting configuration to Soeharto's New Order. Whereas Soeharto relied on consolidation and coercion, SBY governed with comparatively high legitimacy derived from democratic elections and sustained public trust. In our formalism, this translates into a high value of the legitimacy parameter, which strongly raises the stability coefficient . As a result, the system's critical threshold was shifted upward, allowing the polity to absorb larger shocks without losing stability.
Coalition management under SBY was moderate rather than absolute. While he did not command the same total consensus as Soeharto or Jokowi, his reliance on institutionalized coalitions and consultative styles created a balanced equilibrium. This configuration sits near the rising linear portion of the legitimacy curve in our sensitivity analysis: resilience grew steadily with legitimacy, even in the absence of extreme repression or elite saturation.
Simulations of the model under SBY-like parameters show that trust () decays slowly under stress, while protest intensity () remains bounded. Importantly, the black horse potential () seldom rises above a negligible baseline, reflecting the lack of viable outsider challengers during his tenure. Economic turbulence, such as the global financial crisis of 2008, did not destabilize the system: protests were limited, and trust levels recovered relatively quickly once external stress eased. This dynamic resembles a system near but safely inside the stability basin, with no bifurcation triggered.
In short, SBY's regime exemplifies resilient equilibrium: high legitimacy provided a strong buffer against economic stress, moderate coalition management preserved systemic flexibility, and the calibrated use of narrative and repression kept black horse emergence suppressed. Within our framework, SBY demonstrates how legitimacy-centered leadership can prevent tipping events even amid significant external shocks.
C. Jokowi: strong narrative, elite cooptation stable until sudden shift
Joko Widodo's presidency (2014--2024) highlights the power and limits of narrative saturation combined with elite cooptation. Unlike Soeharto's coercion-heavy model or SBY's legitimacy-centered approach, Jokowi emphasized broad narrative framing---"infrastructure acceleration" and "down-to-earth populism"---that boosted trust () even during periods of economic stress. In our model, this translates into a high narrative coefficient in , raising the conversion of stress into resilience. Simultaneously, Jokowi's skillful elite cooptation elevated the consensus parameter, pushing the stabilizing term near its maximum.
