Our Fellows
Muhammad Fajar, PhD
IFAR Fellow
Muhammad Fajar obtained his PhD in the field of comparative politics from Northwestern University. His dissertation explored the impact of Indonesian student movements during the regime transition period (1998-1999). The dissertation was an intersection of his research focuses on social movements, state formation, and youth activism from a comparative perspective. He is now working on research projects on the digital activism divide among Indonesian civil society organizations and the comparative study of Indonesian environmental youth movements. His research can be found in media outlets such as The Conversation and Fulcrum.
Yoes C. Kenawas, PhD
IFAR Fellow
Yoes C. Kenawas is a political scientist with 15 years of experience working on democracy, political parties, subnational politics, and international relations in Southeast Asia. His dissertation research is on the subnational variation of dynastic politics in Indonesia. He combines quantitative and qualitative data collection and analysis methods in his research. His research on dynastic politics has been featured in national and international media, including The Economist, Reuters, Al-Jazeera, South China Morning Post, Kompas, and Tempo. He is interested in two other issues that seem worlds apart: the use of blockchain technology to improve the quality of democracy and how mystical beliefs influence politicians’ behavior. He believes in the power of comedy to build a mature democracy. He is actively involved in various forums on democracy, both in Indonesia and the Asia-Pacific.
Rahardhika Utama, PhD
IFAR Fellow
Rahardhika Utama is a sociologist with a PhD from Northwestern University, specializing in comparative-historical research of development. Rahardhika is passionate about conducting high-impact research that solves real-world problems by incorporating innovative methods stemming from data science, ethnography, and comparative historical social science. His research interests are in the areas of comparative development, corruption, bureaucracy and politics, social policy and inequality, and social determinants of health. Rahardhika’s current research investigates the variation of development among agrarian economies of Southeast Asia. In his dissertation, Embedded Peasantry and Economic Transformation in the Asian Rubber Belt, he explains why some countries have seen miraculous economic growth while others have not by focusing on how changes in agricultural political relations structured the trajectory of economic transitions in Southeast Asia. His research has been honored with the 2024 Theda Skocpol Best Dissertation Award in Comparative and Historical Research, and working papers from this research received two national awards for the best graduate research paper from American Sociological Association (ASA) and American Political Science Association (APSA).
Dr. Ratri Istania
IFAR Fellow
Dr. Ratri Istania is an associate professor at the NIPA School of Administration (Politeknik STIA LAN) Jakarta, Indonesia. She graduated with a PhD in Political Science in 2019 from Loyola University Chicago, USA. Before pursuing her doctoral degree, she attended Padjadjaran University, Bandung, Indonesia, earning a Bachelor of Political Science in 1999. From 2004 to 2006, she attended Ohio University, USA, through a Fulbright scholarship, where she received a Master of Arts in Political Science. Dr. Istania is also a senior researcher at Populi Center for Public Opinion and Policy Research. After completing her highly competitive AIFIS-Luce research fellowship in 2024, she is now an inaugural fellow at Cornell Jebb E. Brooks School of Public Policy (2025-2026). Her research interest is on territorial policy, power sharing, identity politics, gender and democracy