Education and the Indonesian Revolution

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Education and the Indonesian Revolution: Education and Bureaucracy in the

Establishment of a United and Independent Indonesia

Scott Abel

During the latter years of colonial rule in the Dutch East Indies, the colonial

education system incubated nationalist ideology that exploded into violence at the end of

World War II. The Dutch East Indies state education system prior to the occupation by

Imperial Japanese forces perpetuated an unequal society and oppressive bureaucratic

system by maintaining the power of colonialists, the traditional aristocracy, and

sympathizers at the expense of the common peasant. Dutch policymakers maintained

authority through an oppressive colonialist and aristocratic bureaucracy that applied

education for their nations economic advancement in the East Indies. Many indigenous

families sacrificed great hardships for a childs education within a social hierarchy that

remained relatively fixed. The education system increased the labor supply for more

complex positions that required basic knowledge in sustenance of the colonial state.

Ultimately, contrary to the objectives of Dutch colonialists, the education system fostered

an independence movement in the future Indonesia through uniting the humiliated and

suffering colony against Dutch authority despite its role as a principle element of the

bureaucracy and preserver of thestatus quo. After the Indonesian Revolution, education

became a core component for an independent and united Indonesia, but the failure to

accept its limitations by the Indonesian leadership led to future hardship and strife

because a unitary state imposed a new identity on a diverse population.

The education system of the Dutch colonial period contributed in three major

ways to the loss of the Netherlands colonies in East Asia. First, the schools unwillingly

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facilitated the spread of nationalist ideas through official and unofficial groups of

students that provided them with contacts from throughout the archipelago. Second, the

strains caused by the cost and the limits of who obtained an education exacerbated class

tensions between the social groups. Elements of discontent who received an education

employed their knowledge in the cause of independence. Third, the inadequate education

in particular fields of native administrators created an environment of inflexibility that

hampered their ability to effectively respond in crises. The combination of these three

factors accelerated the independence movement in Indonesia and made education an

important cause for the revolution and the development of a sovereign Indonesia. The

relationship between education, society stratification, and an aristocratic support of

imperial powers convinced the Javanese and Sumatran public of the necessity for a social

revolution that virtually annihilated much of the old authority in particular regions, along

with its supportive bureaucracy. Demand for economic efficiency for the colony through

native education strengthened the Indonesian nationalist and independence movements

for a united Indonesia in the long-run.

The leadership of a sovereign Indonesia recognized the significance of education

and its role within the nationalist movement. However, the reformed education system

failed to undo the damage left by the political and social revolutions. The social

revolution resulted in severe damage to Javas middle classes, which stalled economic

recovery after the revolution. The colonial education system contributed to a socially

divided colony and the subsequent violence of the general populace toward merchants

and the educated classes, usually the Chinese and Eurasians, made the functioning of an

economy more difficult after independence. Leaders such as Sukarno pushed for a

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Javanese-centric approach to unifying the country under a unitary government because

their educational experiences created the false impression of unity throughout the

archipelago. The failure to adjust for the significant ethnic differences between the

populations of the archipelago resulted in violence and political strife for decades.

The secondary source historiography of education policy in the colonial Dutch

East Indies and independent Indonesia usually focused on specific topics within the

colonial era or as a minor topic within the context of the Indonesian Revolution. Takashi

Shiraishi explored the context of education within revolutionary movements inAn Age in

Motion, Popular Radicalism in Java, 1912-1926but focused his attention on the prewar

era of the East Indies rather than the direct effect of the colonial era education system in

the wartime and postwar era. Kees Groeneboers Gateway to the West: The Dutch

Language in Colonial Indonesia 1600-1950 focused on Dutch language policy in the

colonial education system but not significantly in regard to its impact on revolutionary

movements within the colony. Indonesian National Revolution 1945-1950 by Anthony

Reid and One Soul, One Struggle: Region and Revolution by Anton Lucas focused on

education as significant topics, but dedicated little content regard to it as part of the

overall revolution. Benedict AndersonsImagined Communities placed a framework for

understanding the development of nationalism as an idea, but focused only a little

attention on the details of Dutch colonial and Indonesian education policy.1 J. D. Legge

in Sukarno emphasized the all-important advantage of a Dutch education for Sukarno

1 Takashi Shiraishi,An Age in Motion: Popular Radicalism in Java, 1912-1926, (Ithaca, NY: Cornell

University Press, 1990); Kees Groeneboer, Gateway to the West: The Dutch Language Policy in Colonial

Indonesia, (Amsterdam: Amsterdam University, 1998); Anthony Reid,Indonesian National Revolution1945-1950, (Hawthorn, Australia: Longman, 1974); Anton Lucas, One Soul One Struggle: Region and

Revolution in Indonesia , (Sydney: Allen and Unwin, 1991); Benedict Anderson,Imagined Communities ,

(New York: Verso, 1991).

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but scarcely for the rest of the Indonesian independence movement leadership. 2

Historians generally acknowledged the importance of education particularly in regard to

the formation of the intellectual basis of the Indonesian state but neglected the physical

transmission of nationalist ideas and how education policies untied Indonesia together

after independence.

Dutch colonial policy regarding the East Indies changed around the turn-of-the

century with a greater emphasis on education as part of an overall trend in patriarchal and

progressive policies. Only a small proportion of the entire population of the Dutch East

Indies spoke Dutch fluently around 1900 with only 42,000 Dutch speakers out of 35

million inhabitants. Although schools taught Dutch to native elites since the 1860s, the

speaking of Indo-Dutch resulted from inadequate teaching. The colony needed native

administrators for the colonial government because of their cost effectiveness over

European administrators.3 In The Hague, Colonial Minister Idenburg proclaimed the

slogan Education, Irrigation, Emigration, as the tenants of his new policies. The

colonial government dedicated its efforts for the improvement of the education for the

elites and not the peasants.4 Also, the integration of the native elites with the Dutch

colonialists within the political structure of the colony legitimized Dutch rule to a large

extent, but also made the two groups political partners. By 1900, the Dutch East Indies

risked losing their Dutch character particularly in regard to the speaking of Dutch as an

important language in the region and therefore required a greater emphasis on education

within the archipelago. Furthermore, the ethical policy fit within a general movement

2 J. D. Legge, Sukarno: A Political Biography, (Singapore: Archipelago Press, 2003), 31.3 Kees Groeneboer, Gateway to the West: The Dutch Language Policy in Colonial Indonesia, (Amsterdam:

Amsterdam University, 1998), 153-154.4 Legge, Sukarno, 49.

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toward a progressive political economy throughout much of the world in the early 20 th

century.

Education was an aspect of the colonial bureaucracy for a long period of time, but

it ultimately took until the 20th century before it truly became an important part of the

lives of indigenous students. The origins of the relationship between the Dutch East

Indies civil service and the education system started as late as 1830 when the Chief

Commissioner of Education hired European students who completed European Primary

School or ELS (Europeesche Lagere Scholen) as government clerks to limit the number

of dropouts in schools.

5

By 1900, 10.4% of the ELS students were non-European, 30%

of whom attended special training schools in preparation for the civil service exam as part

of a new ethical policy in the Indies. Once a student completed ELS, he or she

advanced to the HBS (Hogere Burgerscholen) the equivalent to an American high school

education.6 The education system provided by the Dutch colonial powers created

opportunities particularly for European advancement in colonial society, but a growing

percentage of non-Europeans desired an education for their children.

The education system permitted some native students with exceptional bright

prospects academic advancement in more challenging settings. After Europeans, the

school services focused on Eurasians, then indigenous populations, and finally the ethnic

Chinese.7 The percentage of non-Europeans in ELS level rose to 22% by 1905 even with

more rigorous standards for indigenous students. The demand for education by non-

Europeans led to the development of Dutch-Native Schools or HIS and Dutch-Chinese

5 Groeneboer, Gateway to the West, 81.6 Takashi Shiraishi,An Age in Motion: Popular Radicalism in Java, 1912-1926, (Ithaca, NY: Cornell

University Press, 1990), 29; Legge, Sukarno, 40.7 Groeneboer, Gateway to the West, 153-155.

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Schools or HCS for speakers of Dutch as a second language.8 Education became a

critical part of colonial administration because it trained future government employees,

but the majority of the indigenous population a western education was not a possibility

regardless of merit. Native students fluent in Dutch and who passed examinations of the

highest standards attended MULO or intermediate level schools, where they learned

about technology. Native students from throughout the archipelago graduated from

MULO level schools and higher during the 1920s and eventually became the leaders of

the revolution in the 1940s.9 Other types of schools contributed to the growth of an

Indonesian intelligentsia such as training professionals for government service and

private enterprise, along with the Native Doctors Training School (STOVIA) and

Training School for Native Officials (OSVIA). The schools became the basis of native

entry into the emerging middle class of the Dutch East Indies.10 The rigorous standards

of the Dutch education system and the exposure to western ideas to intelligent students

initiated their role as dissidents.

The colonial government lacked a monopoly on education, however, as native

private institutions filled the demand for education for the native population. Although

natives distrusted the colonial education system at first, many changed their minds and

saw institutionalized education as a means for advancement in society. Schools set up by

natives, though threatening to Dutch authority, offered a basic education for entrance into

the lower or mid-levels of the civil service. Students learned literacy and basic arithmetic

for five years an elementary education but little on scientific or cultural subjects.11 The

private native schools, known as wild schools, educated students with a political slant

8 Groeneboer, Gateway to the West, 160-161.9 Anthony Reid,Indonesian National Revolution 1945-1950, (Hawthorn, Australia: Longman, 1974), 3.10 Shiraishi,An Age in Motion, 29-30.11 S. Takdir Alisjahbana,Indonesia: Social and Cultural Revolution, (London: Oxford UP, 1966), 27.

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in regard to Islamic, Marxist, or cultural-nationalist parties by the 1920s. By 1936, 1,663

wild schools accounted for 114,000 pupils of whom girls composed almost a third. Just

one year later, an estimated 2,000 wild schools taught over 140,000 pupils often with

inadequately trained teachers and outdated teaching materials. Dutch authorities

observed private schools for fear of the creation of a semi-educated class of students

incapable of passing civil service exams and with political affiliations that threatened the

status quo.12 Private schools offered an education of dubious quality at times for natives

who found themselves unable to attend public ones, but the schools offered an education

that countered the ideal Dutch notions of native obedience to colonial authority.

A Dutch education offered opportunities for native elites for finding a career that

proved otherwise virtually impossible. Shortages of staff within the colonial bureaucracy

and the private sector, along with the realization that education opened doors to new

opportunities for natives with elevated self-respect as graduates of schools with ideas

about justice and freedom. Colonial authorities realized that educating natives weakened

their political position but continued the system because of the demand for skilled labor.

The increased standards of living from a modern education allowed a level of modernity

for many elites brought greater demand for education and required much sacrifice. The

more prestigious the school, often the farther away students went from their families.13

The possibility through social advancement created an incentive for families to send their

children far away from home for an education.

The vast separation between students in the official education system and the rest

of the population created a uniform bubble within the schools that bled out cultural

12 Groeneboer, Gateway to the West, 233-236.13 Takdir Alisjahbana,Indonesia: Social and Cultural Revolution , 25, 28-29.

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differences between the East Indies numerous ethnic groups, which also created its

impression of greater cultural unity to the student groups. Thepriyayi, particularly in the

upper echelons developed western tendencies with their education in Dutch language

schools or in the Netherlands itself, became disconnected with much of the indigenous

population. The regency or major administrative towns modernized with running water

and electric lamps, while urban residents spoke Dutch on the streets .14 The emergence of

a new elite culture through education came at an enormous cost in finance, which meant

the limitations of who attained a Dutch education. Therefore, wealthy and elite members

of Javanese society usually received colonial government positions. The urban center,

the location of the most reputable schools, limited the physical contacts between the

future elites and the rest of the native population.

The relative cultural homogenization of the new elite through an education system

represented an aspect of modernity that altered the consciousness and identities of native

students. Within the classrooms students saw Mercator maps delineating territorial

boundaries unlike previous maps in Southeast Asia. They distinguished colonial

territories through color logos for each European colony. The distinctions between

territories convinced Indonesian nationalists that the colonies contained a single national

identity.15 The young educated elite orkaum muda acquired western habits with the

formation of salaried middle class, along with understanding the Dutch language. They

contributed to a national consciousness with their modern education that permitted them

to enter modernity with other ethnicities under the Dutch flag. The modern education of

the first generation of the nationalist movement differed from previous generations

14 Anton Lucas, One Soul One Struggle: Region and Revolution in Indonesia, (Sydney: Allen and Unwin,

1991), 2-3.15 Benedict Anderson,Imagined Communities , (New York: Verso, 1991), 171-178.

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because of the state efforts for the creation of a secular education system where as

previous education systems generally involved religious elements.16 The development of

a modern education system resulted in a collective national consciousness for the

nationalist movement under Dutch language and an Indo-Dutch culture.

The development of a collective national identity required the loss of considerable

traditional aspects regarding ethnicity such as language and culture from throughout the

Dutch East Indies diverse archipelago. Children of elites from islands faraway from Java

required two weeks to sail to their schools making returning home for vacation extremely

difficult. Despite the immense sacrifices by families through sending half their income or

more to support a child or two, their children often returned home a stranger to their own

families. The students often married on other islands or at schools, which made the blood

relatives even more foreign. The successful students who found a career in Java usually

became less interested in returning home to help their families or complete their

traditional obligations for their families and communities. The distances between family

members created by the education system resulted in separate spheres for the modern

nationalists consciousness and the traditional family structure.17 The separation from

traditional political structures and the mixture of students from various locations from

throughout the East Indies in schools consolidated a new national identity based on Dutch

colonialism. The students synthesized a new Indonesian identity that fused the identity

influenced by the Dutch and their traditional backgrounds. However, the severing from

their traditional backgrounds created a sense of unity with the rest of the natives from

16 Shiraishi,An Age in Motion, 29-32.17 Alisjahbana,Indonesia: Social and Cultural Revolution , 28-31.

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throughout the archipelago as the students weakened their connections to their

birthplaces.

The rise of a modern education system coincided with the shuffling and expansion

of the Dutch East Indies colonial bureaucracy. In 1905, the Dutch established

municipalities as an administrative unit in an attempt toward political decentralization.

Populations throughout the Dutch East Indies experienced physical and social separation

from other groups in a pluralistic society based on ancestry, economic status, and

language. Municipal councils received representatives from various ethnic groups but the

Dutch always possessed a majority, thus continuing discrimination along ethnic lines

within the government administration. Municipal councils educated the future leadership

of Indonesia particularly when they participated in colony-wide proceedings in Batavia in

republican procedures.18 Indigenous leaders learned about statesmanship outside the

classroom, which may was not apart of the formal education bureaucracy but rather a

portion of the educational system as a whole. Colonial administration in the early 20th

century within the Dutch East Indies adapted to the new century through limited

liberalization exemplifying superficial republicanism.

Taxation supported the colonial bureaucracy and social structure, which abused

the peasants of the archipelago in favor of the elites. High taxation angered peasants

more than any other government activity because of its unfairness toward the poor and

generosity toward the wealthy. Local administrators or village headmen called lurahs,

based taxation on estimations of crop yields rather than counting them. With relatively

flat tax rates, poor farmers paid the same rate as wealthy landowners, which increased

18 Robert Cribb, Gangsters and Revolutionaries: The Jakarta Peoples Militia and the Indonesian

Revolution 1945-1949, (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1991), 13, 14.

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popular aggravation. To make up for revenue shortfalls, lurahs unofficially acquired

crops through dubious means to fill quotas. The bureaucracy supported the commercial

export sector, while the government elite orpriyayi benefited from the political structure

of society to large extent. The political, bureaucratic, and trading elite often received a

Dutch education that adapted them to western culture.19 In the eyes of many peasants, the

colonial bureaucracy perpetuated unfairness and economic disparity that caused immense

suffering for the poor. The association between the indigenous members of the

bureaucracy with corruption and the colonial oppressors eventually weakened the

bureaucracys position.

The Dutch controlled Java through the native elite that solidified its power

through great social stratification and therefore made advancement of most indigenous

Javanese virtually impossible. The native regents orbupatis worked for the Dutch under

the promise of a de facto hereditary succession. Various irrigation projects channeled

water purposively to all farmers but wealthy landowners bribed officials for more water.

Lurahs leased communal land for their own profit and remained in office for life, which

allowed them to accumulate significant quantities of wealth. In addition to taxes,

peasants labored on public works projects in supplement to taxation that forced cycles of

indebtedness nearly impossible to escape. When peasants possessed no ability to pay,

Arab, Chinese, and Javanese creditors often appropriated their property.20 The

bureaucratic administration throughout much of rural Java made life extraordinarily

difficult for small landowners with the perpetuation and widening of economic disparity.

Obtaining positions in the bureaucracy through passing an examination or using an

19 Lucas, One Soul One Struggle, 2, 5-6.20 Lucas, One Soul One Struggle, 3-7.

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education in the private sector often offered much better prospects than alternative

careers.

The Dutch East Indies oriented its economy toward exporting materials for sale

abroad, which also financed the government but also increased the repression of rural

peasantry. Until 1920, Java was the second largest exporter of sugar, which benefitted

both Europeans and the native elite, the latter of whom received a percentage of the

profits at the expense of the peasantry. Peasants received little recourse for complaints

because even when Dutch authorities addressed their issues, the local native authorities

often simply ignored them. The collective interests of the colonialists and native elite

required cheap land and labor for the sugar fields, mills, and infrastructure at the expense

of the peasants. The religious elite orkyai also benefitted from the sugar industry

through its finance of construction projects such as mosques and prayer houses.

Particularly in the Pekalongan Regency, the seventeen sugar mills placed great pressures

on the peasantry that only became worse with the Great Depression. Drops in demand

caused falls in wages and community investment with the closure of thirteen mills. Even

by 1937 with the reopening of some mills, wages remained stagnant while the authorities

took the peasants blame.21 The alliance between economic, political, and spiritual

authorities brought misery to much of the native population and made reforms in their

interest extremely difficult.

The colonial government possessed a variety of means of repression and

maintaining power. The secret police and informants were the more conventional

instruments paid for by Dutch colonial authorities, but often native authorities

21 Lucas, One Soul One Struggle, 8, 10, 11.

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supplemented with their funding with their own money.22 Another instrument of

authority, albeit more benign than the secret police, was the colonial education system

that perpetuated societys stratification and colonial rule. Education offered children a

potential career in the civil service and in private enterprise, but only a few entered

schools because of the immense cost and high academic standards. One student, Sutan

Melaju, entered elementary school created for the sons of the elite through the sacrifice of

his entire family who spentpikuls23of rice for his education. When students took an

examination to go to Kings College, their entire families gave the event great

significance.

24

The education system favored the children ofpriyayi for the maintenance

of the colonial social structure and to keep the financial burden on the state low, but

individuals who eventually opposed the colonial system entered anyway through the

sacrifice of their families and their own determination.

During the early years of the 20th century, the development of a modern education

system based on the western models reframed anti-Dutch movements throughout the

Dutch East Indies particularly in regard to the education of future pro-independence

leaders. The first generation of active proponents of what became Indonesia possessed

backgrounds in the finest western-style education available in the colonies. Early

revolutionary leaders such as Tirtoadhisoerjo and Soewardi received an education from

ELS, HBS, and eventually onto professional schools such as OSVIA and STOVIA for a

system developed for them to fill positions within the civil service and Dutch private

enterprise as Dutch-speaking native elites. Umar Sayed Tjokroaminoto born into a

priyayi family of high status in 1882 graduated from OSVIA of Magelang and joined the

22 Lucas, One Soul One Struggle, 11.23 One Pikul equals roughly 62.5 kilograms, Barbara Watson Andaya and Leonard Y. Andaya,A History of

Malaysia, (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2001), 374.24 Alisjahbana,Indonesia: Social and Cultural Revolution , 25.

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pangreh pradja until he resign from the bureaucracy 1907.25 The first generation that

pushed for an independent modern state learned from the colonial Dutch education

system that exposed them to modernity and the West in an attempt to place them within

the colonial structure.

The effect of urban elites educated in the western style from the top echelons of

the society possessed a limited reach without an extensive network that stretched into the

rural areas. However, the expansion of the colonial state and private enterprise further

into the rural heart of Java ultimately permitted greater integration with the urban centers

and created a sense of modernity. The towns of Java before independence possessed

relatively few inhabitants in comparison to the rural areas, but were the homes of the

traditional aristocracy and royalty. The establishment of agricultural estates along with

the extension bureaucracy included not only administration and tax collection, but also

the education and public health systems that brought natives into contact with the global

agricultural export market without much opportunity to benefit from such integration.

Towns became the incubators of Indonesian nationalism because of greater access to

education and the wider world. Suspicion toward westernization slowed most peasants

conversion toward nationalism but eventually forced attendance in schools came with

modernization of rural villages.26 Although nationalism developed mostly in East Indies

towns, access to education and connectedness with the global markets arrived in rural

areas that eventually became important to the independence movement and national

unity.

25 Shiraishi,An Age in Motion, 53, 81.26 Justus M. Van Der Kroef, Society and Culture in Indonesian Nationalism,American Journal of

Sociology 58, No. 1 (1952), 12-13.

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World War II placed the Dutch East Indies under immense duress during the

occupation by Imperial Japanese forces from 1942 to 1945. After the raid on Pearl

Harbor, the colonial government mobilized the Dutch male population under 45,

including a teacher named Johannes Vadenbroek, along with his colleagues in

preparation for war. Without aerial or naval support resistance was essentially ineffective

resulting in the colonys quick surrender, which meant the Dutch population, including

administrators and teachers, endured three years of internment camps if they survived.27

The Japanese taxed the natives heavily with the distribution of rations focused on the

urban centers rather than the countryside. The quality of rice decreased dramatically

because suppliers mixed it with sand and gravel up to a quarter of the overall quantity,

which destroyed the teeth of many peasants.28 The Javanese bureaucracy became the

enforcers of harsh Japanese policies earning the hatred of the local populace, although

Nine Brothers, a group of sons of government officials with degrees from HIS and some

experience in MULO resisted Japanese rule quite successfully.29 The war purged the

Dutch, including teachers and law enforcement from the East Indies, tainted much of the

leadership, and brought a population eager for independence.

In the closing months of World War II, the Japanese Empire realized the

weakness of their position and initiated procedures for an independent Indonesia. On

May 28, 1945, the Japanese government permitted the sixty-two Indonesian leaders with

a particular emphasis toward Sukarnos Javanese secular nationalists at the expense of the

outer islands and Islamic-leaning representatives. The 1945 Constitution outlined a

27 Johannes Vandenbroek, A Teacher Turned Soldier and Imprisoned by the Japanese, The Defining

Years of the Dutch East Indies, 1942-1949, ed. by Jan A. Krancher, (Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Co.,

1996), 64-70.28 Lucas, One Soul One Struggle, 33-35.29 Lucas, One Soul One Struggle, 49-50, 60, 64.

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unitary republic over a monarchial or federal system with Hatta and a few others in the

opposition. The few Indonesians born outside Java opposed such measures in vain as the

Javanese outvoted attempts for decentralized authority and the rights of the rest of the

archipelago. A bad harvest exacerbated wartime shortages and led to immense misery

and political discontent that led to anti-Japanese violence. Educatedpemuda groups

worked with an overall anger at the Japanese resulted in immense pressure on Sukarno

and Hatta for independence. On August 17, 1945, Sukarno and Hatta declared

Indonesias independence from the old British Consulate under Japanese supervision.30

The declaration of independence was hardly the end of the issue, but rather one step in a

long road to freedom from foreign rule. Also, the Javanese-centric approach to

governance created problems for the future of the Republic of Indonesia.

The training, education, and culture of the East Indies administrators in Java

slowed their response particularly with the weakness of the government in the aftermath

of World War II. Javanese administrators responded cautiously with news of Japans

surrender expecting the return of Allied troops and were uncertain toward the reaction of

Japanese soldiers with the flying of Indonesian flags while the Japanese remained

nominally in control. Thepemuda groups perceived the hesitation of the elite with

disappointment, particularly when local officials stalled in announcing the declaration of

independence.31 Local magistrates retained rice paddy stock despite the hunger of the

general population throughout Java because orders failed to reach them from their

superiors fast enough from October to November 1945. The magistrates followed their

training and education by the Dutch to wait for their orders or superiors before

30 Reid, The Indonesian National Revolution, 19-28,31 Lucas, One Soul One Struggle, 69-77, 83.

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distributing the food. The hesitation led to peasants destroying the old bureaucratic

system in the countryside, resulting in the deaths of many officials.32 The education the

administrators received revolved around the basic knowledge of literacy without any or

sparse official education in the humanities and social sciences. The strictness and

inflexibility created for the colonial system for the maintenance of colonial power

ultimately broke under the frustration of Indonesians demanding fairness.

The new bureaucratic system emerged from the ashes of the old order that

rewarded some with an education but punished others deemed too collaborative with the

old order. Aside from attacking government officials, peasants attacked Chinese

merchants, along with plundering their stores and seizing their sugar mills.33 Eurasians in

particular suffered under the new system because they benefitted under the colonial

system with their education and wealth from more complicated tasks in the sugar mills.

Teachers, including nationalists and Islamists often benefitted from the change in

political fortunes accounting for 28% of new government positions in elections.34

Chinese and Eurasian misfortunes from the revolution damaged the Indonesian middle

class because they often provided services that required a particular education and

commercial connections. Restarting the Indonesian economy with a weakened middle

class meant a loss in skilled worked that took years to replace.

The leadership behind the Indonesian Revolution usually emerged from the

colonial education system with grievances against the colonial state. The initial wave of

radicals emerged from well-off backgrounds that deceived the Dutch into inaction. The

founder of a western-educated radical was Dr. Tjipto Magoenkoesoemo, an exceptionally

32 Lucas, One Soul One Struggle, 103, 112.33 Lucas, One Soul One Struggle, 106, 111, 113.34 Lucas, One Soul One Struggle, 118, 137.

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brilliant and brave son of a government school teacher. Born in 1886, he graduated from

ELS and then STOVIA in 1905. After school he worked for the government as a medical

doctor, earning the Knights Cross during an epidemic for his bravery. He displayed

moral fortitude higher than thepriyayi earned the respect of the Javanese people. His

revolutionary proposition for native progress through political liberation eventually

resulted in his exile to Holland in 1913.35 Magoenkoesoemo set a trend for discontent

intellectuals seeking to improve the lives of fellow natives through political power,

becoming the first among many graduates of a western education to express a desire for

radical change.

Tan Malaka recounted how his experiences in the Dutch education system in the

Netherlands and elsewhere affected his commitment to the nationalist movement in the

Dutch East Indies. The same year Magoenkoesoemo departed for the Netherlands,

Malaka left for the Netherlands to study in Rijksweekschool, a government teachers

training school with a loan to pay for food, insurance, and housing. When Malaka

became ill and missed class, he took the missed tests and passed them both. Malaka

expressed his frustration with the two year program as it was accomplishable in three

months for him. Malaka was one of three accepted from the MULO level in his school at

Bukit Tinggi, which had two to three hundred applicants for the government education in

Europe. While in the Netherlands, school exposed him to new subjects such as Dutch

history, world history, algebra, mechanics, and trigonometry. He felt an advantage only

in chemistry and agriculture, but was at a similar level in fields such as pedagogy,

geometry, and geography.36 In the Netherlands, school exposed Malaka to new ideas

35 Shiraishi,An Age in Motion, 117-119.36 Tan Malaka,From Jail to Jail, (Athens, Ohio: Ohio University Press, 1991), 18-22.

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regarding history, but also revealed the brilliance of those lucky enough to go to school

abroad and the volume of students who remained in Indonesia with less of chance to

implement their education fully.

Tan Malaka felt the sting of racism during his years in the Netherlands as being

treated differently from other students, along with the difficulty as being poor in a

different climate. The school constantly moved him around from class to class, making it

difficult to learn, which required Malaka to memorize as much as possible. He impressed

a mathematics teacher who previously thought Indonesians incapable of learning

mathematics, which helped Malakas circumstances. Being miserable with the same

wretched food everyday and the difficulties he faced, Malaka resented his goal of

becoming a Dutch teacher. Snouk Hurgronje, a teacher Malaka respected, told him that

because he was not raised Dutch, he never fully understand the Dutch childrens spirit.37

The buildup of resentment toward the Netherlands and his misery there contributed to his

eventual struggle against the kingdom.

Malakas political conscious grew after he moved to a working class attic in the

Netherlands, where he learned about radical politics. The exposure to books in the

Netherlands and the witnessing of colonial soldiers fighting in World War I, along with

the Russian Revolution prompted his desire to learn more about Marx and Engels.

Malaka received a scholarship in the form of a loan from van Heutsz the former

Governor-General of the Dutch East Indies, which allowed Malakas move to a middle

class home where he recovered his health with good food and doctors visit. His

improved lifestyle only reinforced revolutionary beliefs and he wanted to return to

Indonesia to teach his people even if it led to conflict with colonial policies. Malaka

37 Malaka,From Jail to Jail, 23-24.

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supported the idea that all Indonesians should receive a state education from primary to

high school so that Indonesian could transform itself from a poor to a wealthy nation.38

Malakas education in the Netherlands convinced him of the importance for a Marxist

system in Indonesia to raise it from poverty. Though Malaka failed to become an

important leader in an independent Indonesia, his ideas symbolize the disillusionment

with the Dutch colonial rule and the faith in education as means to improve ordinary

peoples lives.

Tan Malakas return to the Dutch East Indies brought him into direct contact with

the established system, but he decided to be apart of a plantation in Deli to repay his

debts and earn a living. He became an assistant supervisor for children at a plantation

with a fair amount of resources to teach them and lived in relative comfort from 1919 to

1921. Europeans treated him better than other natives because he was western educated

and picked up western culture. Despite their relative kindness, he gave the plantation

children an education, but came into conflict with his co-workers in regard to the

direction of the education system he issued. Malaka taught the children how to sharpen

their intelligence and strengthen their will, which contradicted the concept that the

plantation children should learn obedience. A strong education would only create more

malcontents who opposed the colonial system despite the long-term payoff.39 The

plantation placed limits on what Malaka could set up for his students, pushing him more

toward radical means to educate.

Upon the invitation of Dr. Janssen, a sympathizer for improving the East Indies

education system for the masses, Malaka moved to Semarang to mold the minds of pupils

38 Malaka,From Jail to Jail, 25-30, 33.39 Malaka,From Jail to Jail, 35-56.

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as if they were raw materials. Malakas old mentor Horensma became the Inspector of

Dutch East Indies Primary Schools encouraged his endeavor to spread education in Java.

Malaka worked with Tjokroaminoto ofSarekat Islam to establish a radical school in

Semarang. Using the headquarters ofSarekat Islam, Malaka established a classroom

with blackboards and benches to teach fifty pupils, not to become government clerks, but

to learn without the colonial obstruction regarding politics. The students learned about

the creation of mass movements that harmonized interests and the avoidance of

oppressing others. The pupils were children of mostly the poor, particularly peasants,

laborers, and small traders. Although Sarekat Islam lacked the resources to fund the

schools properly, the amount of pupils grew to two hundred and educators volunteered to

teach there. With funding from wealthy donors, Sarekat Islam constructed a new school

in Bandung that housed two to three hundred students. The movement hoped to set up

trade unions and peoples cooperatives to further the goals of the movement. Malaka

hoped that the students from his schools would eventually become the heroes that

liberated his people.40 The establishment of a school as the first step in Malakas life as a

professional radical revealed the importance that an education system had on the

development of a nationalist movement in the Dutch East Indies. Education spread ideas

to the masses that otherwise languished in the heads of revolutionaries like Malaka.

During the Indonesian Revolution, the military officers often received a

respectable education in the East Indies and the Netherlands. The military played a

critical role in keeping the cause alive after a series of disastrous setbacks for the

Republic of Indonesia. Hidajat Martaamadja, born 1916 in West Java, attended the Royal

Military Academy in Breda, the Netherlands before joining the Royal Dutch East Indies

40 Malaka,From Jail to Jail, 63-65.

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Army (KNIL) in 1938 as a Second Lieutenant. He became the Deputy Chief of Staff of

the Armed Forces of the Indonesian Army. Sukardu Bratamenggala, born 1917 in West

Java graduated from a teachers college and eventually became the Depute Chief of Staff

of the Java Command. Colonel A. H. Nasution of Java Command, born in 1918,

graduated from the Teachers College in Bandung in 1939 and entered the Royal Military

Academy at Bandung in 1940. Nasution became the Chief of Staff of the Indonesian

Army. When the Royal Dutch Army assaulted Yogyakarta, the capital of the republic, it

captured President Sukarno and Vice President Hatta in the shock of the attack. The

cause of independence relied on the Indonesian National Army to continue the war.

41

The education of the military officers like those mentioned above employed their

knowledge from civilian and military schools to continue the fight. Some graduated from

teachers colleges and possessed the ability to share the tenets of nationalism even with

much of the leadership captured.

The disastrous fall of the capital in December 1948 and the eventual fall of all

major cities in Java to the Dutch Royal Army, along with the capture of the cabinet meant

little strategically. The government focused on using diplomacy to defeat the Dutch

rather than military force. Republicans remained in the rebellions ranks rather than

defecting to the Dutch, while the United Nation turned against the Netherlands. The

United States suspended its Marshall Aid to the Netherlands for its military actions

against previous agreements. The Dutch risked losing out in the establishment of NATO

if they continued the conflict. The military resistance of the guerrillas drained resources

and manpower for the war. Large swaths of Sumatra resisted Dutch armed forces after

41 Tahi B. Simatupang,Report from Banaran: Experiences During the Peoples War, (Ithaca, NY: Cornell

University Press, 1972), 14, 19, 25.

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eliminating the bureaucracy that supported colonial rule. The republic resumed control in

Yogyakarta on July 6, 1949 with its sultan acting as Indonesias representative until then.

The Republic of Indonesia, a unitary state, successfully emerged as a sovereign and

united country on August 17, 1950.42 The overall speed in which the nationalist

movement emerged and attained its independence was astonishing particularly given the

disparity between the modernity of Dutch and Indonesian societies.

Many of the Indonesian government officials and other influential people received

an education through the official Dutch system. Sultan Hamengku Buwono IX of

Yogyakarta, born in 1912, sailed to the Netherlands for his education and enrolled in

Leiden University, but he returned because of his fathers illness. In his strong support

for the Republic of Indonesia, he represented it during the occupation of the capital

revealing his willingness to contribute to the cause and he later became Minister of

Defense under Hatta. Simatupang graduated from Salemba Christian Senior High School

of Jakarta before becoming a participant in the revolution. Chaenrul Saleh from West

Sumatra studied at the Law Faculty of Jakarta in the 1930s around the same time as the

future Prime Minister of East Indonesia Anak Agung Dge Agung, the son of a ruler in

Bali. Saleh entered radical politics and later coerced Sukarno and Hatta to declare

independence in 1945. Maria Ulfah Santoso Wirodihardjo from Serang became a women

cabinet member as Minister of Social Affair under some of the Sjahrir cabinets.43 The

future government officials had a diversity of backgrounds but usually were part of the

elite and possessed some formal education.

42 Reid, The Indonesian National Revolution, 150-168.43 Simatupang,Report from Banaran, 20-21, 25, 34, 40.

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Mohammad Hatta represented the counter to the Sukarno and the Javanese-centric

approach to independence. Born in Bukit Tinggi of Minangkabau, Sumatra in August

1902, Hatta received a more religious education than his counterparts in the first decades

of the twentieth century, which perpetuated his devoutness to Islam. He believed Islam

was compatible with modernity through reforming social structure to uplift the masses

through humanitarianism. Hatta became a leader in the Union of Young Sumatrans, a

pemuda group and expressed a willingness to help his people as a Muslim. To advance

his education, Hatta enrolled in Prins Hendrik School, a senior commercial school in the

Netherlands. Although a socialist, Hatta disliked the communism emanating from the

Soviet Union because it infringed upon religion and democratic ideals. He based his

politics on Islam, traditional Javanese communalism, and democratic principles from

western nations.44 His experience in Europe cautioned him against the empty promises of

contemporary Marxism and Soviet-style governance, while other intellectuals such as

Tjokroaminoto shared beliefs in the parallels between Islam and socialism.45 Hattas

ideas regarding the future structure of Indonesia, particularly regarding decentralization

of the government. Religion was more of a reason for helping the poor of Indonesia

rather than consolidating clerical power because his beliefs fused with democratic ideals

with Islam.

Hatta also believed in the importance of education for the native people of the

Dutch East Indies as a means to uplift them. Seeing himself more as a teacher than a

politician, Hatta gave lectures to students at the Gadjah Mada University of Jogjakarta,

along with the Army Command and Staff College of Bandung. As a politician and

44 Mohammad Hatta,Portrait of a Patriot, (Paris: Mouton Publishers, 1972), 5-8.45 Moerdiono, A Reflection of Indonesian National Revolution, The Heartbeat of the Indonesian

Revolution, ed. Taurik Abdullah, (Jakarta: PT Gramedia Pustaka Utama, 1997), 7.

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educator, he denounced the transfer of wealth from the Dutch East Indies to the

Netherlands as sapping his peoples land and labor in exchange for misery. To improve

the lives of his people, the economy needed restructuring.46 Hatta attributed the

organizational birth of the Indonesian independence movement with the establishment of

Boedi Oetomo in the STOVIA in Jakarta in 1908. The independence movement grew,

adopting the name Indonesia from European ethnographies, stemming from a common

sense of inferiority and the shame of being secondary to Europeans. Hatta emphasized

the importance of education to release people from fear and the feeling of inferiority.47

Hatta attained a western-style education and a political consciousness, which permitted

him to educate others politically. Education became a remedy for the grievances against

colonialism, mainly the feeling of shame and subordination that radiated from it.

The youth movement emerged from the elite as education became a means to end

colonialism and end the humiliation of subservience. The children of the elite often

believed their parents lied about the colonial system to them as those such as Hatta

discovered that the education system furthered colonialism through the spread of

utilitarian concepts that reinforced subservience to the colonial order. As a result, youth

movements orpemuda groups emerged in resistance to the notion that a western

education drained their originality and spirit of initiative. Hatta supported education as a

means to reverse the backwardness of society through the employment of knowledge. He

called upon the educated youth to liberate their people from the intellectual shackles of

colonialism that forced them into fear and humiliation. Although Hatta proclaimed that

Indonesians will eventually free themselves, the return of the educated to their homes

46 Hatta,Portrait of a Patriot, 10-12, 32-33.47 Hatta,Portrait of a Patriot, 104-134.

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would enhance the Indonesians willpower for the revolution.48 Students versed in a

western-style education strengthened the independence movement as leaders, allowing

the solidification of the movements objectives.

Sukarno, a national movement leader, advanced through the education system

because of his family sacrificed for him to earn an engineering degree. Born in 1901,

Sukarno claimed royal descent as the son ofRaden orLordSukemi Soosrodinardjo, an

employee of the Department of Education in Surabaya, Java. Sukarnos father

emphasized education from an early age as a teacher and pushed his son from HIS to ELS

by the fifth grade because native students could only advance in government with a

Dutch education.49 Furthermore, advancing through ELS schools required less time than

the HIS and Indies residents considered ELS first class schools.50 While in the ELS at

Mojokerto, he became fluent in Dutch allowing him to continue his education through the

Dutch system. Colonial policymakers ensured parity in the quality of high-level of

schools in the East Indies and in the Netherlands in regard to the curriculum. 51 The

colonial education system was sufficiently advanced in the Dutch East Indies to provide

the education necessary for the development of nationalistic ideas and train future leaders

in the Republic of Indonesia. Even with the personality and intelligence of Sukarno, the

future elite of the country needed fluency in Dutch for personal and political

advancement.

Although the formal education system contributed much to the development of

nationalist ideology, informal and unofficial aspects of the colonial system such as

libraries and clubs created an atmosphere of nationalistic learning. Sukarno read at the

48 Hatta,Portrait of a Patriot, 416-420.49 Sukarno, Sukarno: An Autobiography, (New York: Bobbs-Merrill Co., 1965), 17, 19, 21, 22, 28, 29.50 Groeneboer, Gateway to the West, 195.51 Legge, Sukarno, 37-39.

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Theosophical Society Library with the reading skills he learned at school about a variety

of historical figures from patriots in the American Revolution to Karl Marx and Vladimir

Lenin, which provided anti-colonial materials unavailable from schools. Books on

European history particularly of the French Revolution inspired him and he admired

liberal statesmen such as William Gladstone and Danton. The transfer of wealth from the

Indies to the Netherlands angered him as did the oppressive colonial system. Sukarno

became apart of the Study Club where he practiced his oratory and speechmaking ability

from age 16 as an extracurricular activity.52 The colonial education system failed in the

control of information available to students and ensuring the loyalty of native students

during the years of ethical policy even with the restrictive entrance policies.

Despite the merits of Sukarnos academic achievements he never became an equal

to his fellow Dutch students throughout his academic career, which was indicative of the

entire colonial system. In his autobiography, Sukarno recalled how Dutch boys treated

natives as second class citizens and called them dumb natives. He also recalled a

Dutch boy slapping him for no reason other than he was a native at age 15.53 The

colonial authorities enforced segregation that kept even the descendants of Javanese

kings separate from whites, which utterly humiliated native elites.54 The Dutch education

system lacked any direction or ultimate plan for the development of employment for the

vast native elite. The results left elites underemployed with abilities from education

outweighing the tasks the colonial state issued them. As a result the Javanese elites

became inferior members of the bureaucracy with favor granted to Europeans. The gross

disturbances to the traditional power structure of Java created tension and distrust in the

52 Sukarno, Sukarno: An Autobiography, 39-42.53 Sukarno,Autobiography, 6, 42.54 Legge, Sukarno, 63.

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20th century between a significant proportion of the traditional elite and the Dutch

colonial authorities.55 A western education gave the elite a framework to create a new

state that united a great number of ethnicities throughout the archipelago, along with the

knowledge and abilities to create such a large unified state.

Sukarnos adherence to the colonial education system permitted his advancement

to the highest levels of the system even under the tutelage of Indonesias nationalist

movement leader. After graduating from ELS, Sukarno moved to the port of Surabaya

for his education at the HBS level in 1916 while living with Umar Sayed Tjokroaminoto

the chairman ofSarekat Islam as Sukarnos mentor.

56

Tjokroaminoto became Sukarnos

idol and teacher by instructing him on the importance of independence, along with

imparting Sukarno with his values and books. According to one of Sukarnos memories

Tjokroaminoto and Alimin explained to Sukarno their grievances against the colonial

system, the Netherlands absorbed much of the East Indies income while peasants lived

in poverty and the role ofSarekat Islam was the improvement conditions for natives.

Sukarno learned that the disunity of the archipelago allowed the Dutch to conquer such a

vast area. He inherited the humiliation that the nationalists felt from his mentors.57

During his HBS years he trained his writing abilities through his political writings that

condemned colonialism.58 Sukarnos mentorship with Tjokroaminoto influenced his

movement toward nationalism and the importance of the synthesis of a new nation.

Rather than working with Sarekat Islam, Sukarno left Tjokroaminotos care for

his education because completing a degree was more important than politics at that time.

In 1921, Sukarno graduated from HBS and began university studies in Bandung to

55 Legge, Sukarno, 51-53.56 Legge, Sukarno, 40.57 Sukarno,Autobiography, 38-41.58 Sukarno,Autobiography, 49-50.

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become an engineer at Technishe Hogeschool(THS) or Technical Institute. Though

Sukarno dressed in nationalist garb at school, he focused mostly on completing school

over political radicalism.59 Despite a brief departure from school to help Tjokroaminotos

family after the formers arrest, he returned to Bandung and graduated in 1926 as an

engineer after writing a thesis on harbor design under the mentorship of Professor Wolf

Schoemaker.60 After graduating he taught history and mathematics at the Ksatriya

Institute School, but lost his job after an inspector from the Dutch East Indies Department

of Education inspected his class while he lectured on the topic of imperialism.61 He

dropped the title Raden from his name for equalitys sake and advocated bahasa

Indonesia as the main language for the archipelago.62 Sukarno recognized the impact of

education on his own development and the importance of a strong education system for

the development of a new nation.

The significance of a new education system based on Indonesian nationalism

rather than Dutch colonialism emerged in the post-independence era. In Under the

Banner of Revolution, President Sukarno of the Republic of Indonesia reserved the final

chapter for Being a Teacher in an Epoch of Awakening and proclaimed all leaders must

also be teachers during such an epoch. Rather than just soaring rhetoric, Sukarno

expected that leaders in all important professions teach their subordinates as a school

teacher instructs students. School teachers were especially important because they

molded the minds of children who later made decisions for the future. Teachers earned

Sukarnos respect teachers because they chose the education of the youth as their

59 Legge, Sukarno, 82; Sukarno,Autobiography, 51-52.60 Sukarno,Autobiography, 54-55, 66-69.61 Legge, Sukarno, 89; Sukarno,Autobiography, 70.62 Sukarno,Autobiography, 72-73.

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profession over other equally accessible careers.63 The recognition of the importance for

an education system in the modern nation-state proved a positive step for the unity of

Indonesia and was a legacy of the colonial system in some sense because the national

leadership learned of the importance of education in their development in Dutch schools.

The existence of radical wild schools during the colonial era played a role in the

construction of Sukarnos national consciousness. He reflected on the importance of the

colonial era wild schools such as Taman Siswa, MuhammadiyahNadatful Ulama, and

Perguru Rakjatfor the development of a national education system after independence.

Teachers were Apostles of Awakening who solely possessed the power to mobilize the

youth as role moles almost as if they were the childrens parents. The teachers spread

new ideas to students as the vanguard of movements to improve the lives of the masses.

Unlike the colonial system, however, an independent education system possessed more

than simply literacy training and arithmetic, but the spread of a culture and national

spirit.64 The development of a new education system based on Indonesian nationalism

rather than Dutch colonialism focused around the construction of a national

consciousness with teachers at the forefront of the national movement.

Sukarno glorified teachers as critical builders of a new nation who provided the

knowledge for the next generation to maintain the state for which so many sacrificed their

labor and lives. He likened teachers as soldiers, proclaiming them heroes of the republic,

but unlike the system when he taught, he supported the right of teachers freedom of

speech as an important function of democracy and an independent Indonesia. According

to Sukarno, a strong education system was the most important element in a democracy.65

63 Sukarno, Under the Banner of Revolution, Vol. I, (Jakarta: Publication Committee, 1966), 581.64 Sukarno, Under the Banner, 582-583.65 Sukarno, Under the Banner, 584.

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Without a national education system, a united independent Indonesia would likely never

exist because of the sheer size and diversity of the archipelago. Sukarno recognized the

importance of a strong education system as a unifying factor for his nation through his

own personal experiences.

The development of the new education system possessed a critical flaw in

Sukarnos vision of it as it largely neglected the ethnic diversity of his nation. Although

he approved teaching ancient history as he respect it, Sukarno pronounced the

unhelpfulness much of history because the world progressed too much for it to matter.

Progress and dynamism made history obsolete according to him,

66

despite how history

helped him achieve his own position of power. Sukarnos decision to neglect certain

aspects of the past, namely the diversity of the history and culture of his nation created

long-term problems for Indonesia. Despite Sukarnos beliefs, the weakness of the state

prevented the sweeping away the traditions and identities created over the centuries

throughout the archipelago. The failure to recognize the diverse composition of

Indonesia and the lack of respect for differences within the archipelago plagued Indonesia

for decades to come.

The development of a national education system in the post-war era, among other

bureaucratic institutions held together Indonesia during years of immense hardship. The

Indonesian nationalist movement had little chance of seizing the smaller inhabited islands

of the archipelago during the revolution resulting in a disconnection between the

independence movement and the islanders for a decade. To foster a national identity the

Indonesian Ministry of Education commissioned paintings of events throughout the

peoples history with one set dedicated to Borobudur, the ninth-century Hindu-Javanese

66 Sukarno, Under the Banner, 584-585, 587-588.

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stupa with a plethora of religious sculptures. The print reproductions distributed

throughout the public school system lacked the sculptures and the jungle that surrounded

it.67 The sanitized prints of Borobudur revealed insecurity about the Indonesian national

consciousness, because it imposed an identity on people lacking any previous

understanding of Borobudurs history or its context within a new Indonesian nationalism.

The Indonesian government enacted policies that emphasized the creation of a national

identity in schools usually with a Javanese-centric approach.

Key to the development of united nation, Jakarta needed a plan to bring the vast

Indonesian archipelago under its rule. The east of the archipelago included important

islands such as Sulawesi, Ambon, and islands of Maluku, along with many others that

witnessed the devastation of World War II that made transportation and communication

between the islands difficult if not impossible. The war cut off the Babar islands from

the central government until 1949, leaving the populace completely unaware of the

declaration of independence. The islanders even celebrated the birthday of Queen Juliana

of the Netherlands in Marsela for years after 1945. The annihilation of interisland trade

for over decade meant the eastern islands lacked commodities from around the world

until the years of the Korean War (1950-53) with the reestablishment of the Royal Dutch

Shipping Company (KPM) in the region.68 The Republic of Indonesia possessed the

difficult task of bringing in a vast archipelago of islands often ravaged by war and

without infrastructure.

The Indonesian government brought in the necessary materials and people for the

spread of modernity to the populated islands of the republic to reestablish regular contact

67 Anderson,Imagined Communities , 183-184.68 Abe L. Kelabora, Post Independence Life in East Indonesia,Indonesian Nationalism: Six First Hand

Accounts, (Victoria: Monash Univesrity, 1969), 26, 27.

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between the islanders and the outside world. The Republic of Indonesia dispatched an

Assistant Administrator orKepala Pemerintah Setempat(KPS) to the Barbar Islands

from Ambon to set up an office for modernizing its society. The government sent a

police force and nurse who trained locals to operate a small clinic in consolidation the

governments control over the islands.69 The governments strategy to provide some

basic services to people cut off from the rest of the world brought islanders closer to the

Indonesian state. However, such services of insufficient means by themselves were less

effective in creating a truly national consciousness.

The most important aspect of government authority for most of those children

living on the smaller islands of the archipelago was the development of a modern

education system. The Dutch colonial education system neglected most of the islands in

the archipelago. Although the system extended to a privileged few in places such as

Makassar and Ambon, even these schools shut down during the war. The national

education system took time to establish itself throughout the archipelago especially with

the immense cost of the war and revolution. Christian schools remained in the area and

filled the void until the establishment of an official state education system. Kelabora

recalled his first teacher from 1948 to 1952, Mr. Maelisa, who also conducted religious

services taught hundred to one hundred-fifty students of various ages in the local church

of Lawawang, Marsela with only a chalkboard and a few books. The students only

received notebooks three years into the establishment of the program and the teacher

worked between ninety and a hundred hours per week with irregular pay. The

community appreciated his work enough to supply him with water and fuel.70 The

69 Kelabora, Post Independence Life in East Indonesia, 27.70 Kelabora, Post Independence Life in East Indonesia, 27-28.

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Indonesian government lacked resources in the early years of its existence but the people

from throughout the archipelago appreciated the importance of education even without

the sufficient materials.

As the Indonesian government gained its strength, a new education system

developed with goals of molding nationalistic youth. Kelabora relocateded to a better-

equipped school in town Tepa in the Barbar Islands as the school system underwent

changes. A new teacher training school opened that later reorganized as a Primary

Teachers Training School or SGB that took students from the Tepa primary school and

gave them a government scholarship under the promise that the student would work for

the government upon graduation. As a result, the parents of Tepas children wanted them

to graduate from SGB and crowded the school system. The school ordered that students

dress like the teachers, along with replacing the title of Tuan or Sir for Bapak or

Father in creation of greater equality between the two. The teachers were usually

young and nationalistic adults from Java who graduated from their own SGB program

often in Surabaya.71 The Indonesian government dispatched teachers with radically

different notions of teaching methods than in the old system throughout the archipelago

to convey the revolutionary spirit.

The new teachers from Java spread the new nationalistic fervor to the youth

throughout the archipelago. They tapped into the long history of Javanese civilization to

foment nationalist feelings through the Hindu epics ofMahabharata andRamayana.

Teachers proclaimed with great emphasis how Dutch colonialism suppressed the

greatness of the Indonesias past for three hundred-fifty years. The schools imparted

national unity through classes on bahasaIndonesia as the national language, geography,

71 Kelabora, Post Independence Life in East Indonesia,28-29.

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and the history of Indonesia. The teachers glorification of Indonesias past created

feelings of nationalism for the students. When Kelabora continued his education in a

SGB program in Ambon, he experienced only a bit more subtle form of nationalism from

teachers who usually graduated from universities in Jakarta and Surabaya on the island of

Java. Students read the literature of radical Indonesians from the 1920s and the

revolutionaries of 1945. Kelabora concluded that his generation of students grew up on

romantic nationalism based on a sense of Indonesianess.72 Kelabora and his fellow

students learned from a Javanese-centric approach toward Indonesian nationalism as Java

was the center of the revolution and home to ancient civilizations that predated

colonialism by centuries.

The Javanese-centric approach to Indonesian nationalism worked sufficiently on

the first generation of students as the government invested money in schools throughout

the archipelago. When Kelabora moved to Manado, Sulawesi in 1960 for a university, he

met students from Timor, Maluku, and Borneo who were also nationalistic Indonesians

desiring the socio-economic development of their nation. The government established

schools of all levels throughout the archipelago, including a Junior High School (SMP) in

Lawawang and a high school in Tepa. The establishment of schools throughout the

archipelago became symbols and engines of progress as students learned more about their

wider world.73 The education system provided an opportunity for careers people never

possessed before the establishment of new schools. Although the schools benefitted the

general populace and created the enduring foundation for the Republic of Indonesia, the

Javanese-centric model failed to fully address the diversity of the new republic. In the

72 Kelabora, Post Independence Life in East Indonesia, 29.73 Kelabora, Post Independence Life in East Indonesia, 29-30.

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future, not all islands or regions fully accepted the imposition of such a model by the

central government.

Ultimately, Dutch authorities in their quest to unite the East Indies under their rule

created an economically, politically, and socially unsustainable system with the

development of a modern education system for the native elites. Even when a descendent

of royalty achieved academic greatness on par with his Dutch colleagues, he was still

inferior because of his race and possessed little or no chance of truly living up to his or

her potential. The education system churned out thousands of graduates, though a small

percentage of the overall population and the Dutch often left them to market forces rather

than incorporating all educated individuals into the system effectively. The students

represented the inadequacies of the colonial system because a significant number felt

oppressed by the colonial system. Rapant Dutch racism and bigotry toward even the

wealthiest of natives created hatred and resentment. The colonial government failed in

the observation of radicals, especially those who took on students to perpetuate their

cause and halt the development of radical schools. The Dutch colonial government

instituted a modern education system in a police state that ultimately failed in the

containment the ideas it perpetuated.

The colonial education system provided the basis for radicals to meet, formulate,

and disseminate ideas regarding the establishment of a united and independent Indonesia

to the chagrin of Dutch officials. Their collective education created a sense of unity for

the children of elites from throughout the archipelago, despite their distinct ethnic and

linguistic backgrounds. The schools inadvertently became creators of a new national

consciousness as resistors of Dutch colonialism employed instruments of imperialism

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against their own masters. The graduates of a modern education overthrew the colonial

system with their knowledge through skilled diplomacy and the ability to hold the cause

together under immense duress until international pressure forced the Dutch out of

Indonesia. In the post independence era, a new education system forged the shards of the

former colony together as the most important aspect in the creation of a collective

national consciousness that ultimately unified the state. In the postwar era, the creation

of a national consciousness was critical because otherwise Indonesia risked becoming a

new Javanese empire. The colonial and post-independence education system permitted

the existence of a unitary republic in Indonesia through the establishment of a collective

national identity. Although the education system largely succeeded in the development

of a national consciousness, the system failed to account for the development of various

other identities. The failure to account for such differences within the Indonesian

national construct compounded problems with various groups in the future because

discrepancies with national and ethnic identities.

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Works Cited:

Primary Sources:

Hatta, Mohammad.Portrait of a Patriot. Paris: Mouton Publishers, 1972.

Kelabora, Abe L. Post Independence Life in East Indonesia. InIndonesian

Nationalism: Six First Hand Accounts. Victoria: Monash Univesrity, 1969).

Malaka, Tan.From Jail to Jail. Athens, Ohio: Ohio University Press, 1991.

Moerdiono. A Reflection of Indonesian National Revolution. In The Heartbeat

of the Indonesian Revolution. Edited by Taurik Abdullah. Jakarta: PT Gramedia PustakaUtama, 1997.

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Documents

Education and the Indonesian Revolution