WP34 02 Wee - City University of Hong Kong · ethnic nation-states vary in their ability to command the loyalty of different ... major ethnic groups and hundreds of minor ones in

Vivienne Wee

Will Indonesia Hold? Past, Present and Future in a Fragmenting State

Working Papers Series

No. 34 October 2002

The Southeast Asia Research Centre (SEARC) of the City University of Hong Kong publishes SEARC Working Papers Series electronically. ©Copyright is held by the author or authors of each Working Paper. SEARC Working Papers cannot be republished, reprinted, or reproduced in any format without the permission of the paper's author or authors. Note: The views expressed in each paper are those of the author or authors of the paper. They do not represent the views of the Southeast Asia Research Centre, its Management Committee, or the City University of Hong Kong. Southeast Asia Research Centre Management Committee Professor Kevin Hewison, Director Professor Joseph Y.S. Cheng Dr Vivienne Wee, Programme Coordinator Dr Graeme Lang Dr Zang Xiaowei Editor of the SEARC Working Paper Series Professor Kevin Hewison Southeast Asia Research Centre The City University of Hong Kong 83 Tat Chee Avenue Kowloon Tong, Hong Kong SAR Tel: (852) 2194 2352 Fax: (852) 2194 2353 http://www.cityu.edu.hk/searc email: [email protected]

Southeast Asia Research Centre, Working Papers Series No. 34, 2002 1

WILL INDONESIA HOLD? PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE IN A FRAGMENTING STATE1

Vivienne Wee Southeast Asia Research Centre

City University of Hong Kong [email protected]

FRAGMENTATION AND DEVOLUTION During the thirty-two years of Suharto’s New Order, popular discontent erupted time and again in Indonesia. But it was not until the Asian financial crisis of 1997 that Suharto’s authoritarian grip was finally broken by the student-led Reformasi movement. ‘When Suharto resigned on 21 May, there was an explosion of civil society. Demonstrations forced corrupt local officials from office around the country. Peasants occupied land taken from them in the past. Scores of new political parties, labour unions, anti-corruption bodies and other organisations were formed’ (Aspinall 2001). Separatist movements have escalated so sharply that the future integrity of the state has come into question. The most dramatic manifestation of this is East Timor’s secession from Indonesia in 1999.

The fall of Suharto’s regime allowed regional resentment against Jakarta to surface. There were protests against the effective appointment of regional heads of government by the centre, the exploitation of regional resources by central interests, the failure to take account of distinctive regional cultures and traditions, and the role of the army as the ultimate guarantor of government power (Crouch 2000)

However, the fragmentation currently occurring in Indonesia is not entirely a bottom-up process. A top-down process of devolution has also occurred. This took place during the post-Suharto Presidency of Habibie (1998-1999). He faced an immediate crisis of legitimacy when he came to office as a non-elected President by virtue of being Suharto’s Vice-President. So to gain legitimacy, he tried to embrace the Reformasi movement that had brought down Suharto. In this context, he initiated a process of devolution, by creating two regional autonomy laws. Law no. 22/1999 provides for the election of regional parliaments at the provincial and district level, with representatives accountable only to their own parliaments, not to a central body. Law no. 25/1999 increases the share of royalties due to the regions, as well as their spending

1 The research assistance of Joy Lam at the Southeast Asia Research Centre, City University of Hong Kong, is gratefully acknowledged.


responsibilities for routine items. It also gives the country’s provincial and district governments greater control over everything from taxation to public contracts. (see Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade 2001 and Business Week Online 2002) Devolution seems to have occurred in response to the following pressures:

• According to Ryaas Rashid, who drafted the regional autonomy laws, decentralisation was ‘a way to save the country, since the central government was preoccupied with macro economic affairs and the provinces did not have the authority to cope with regional problems’ (The United State-Indonesia Society 2001a).

• The timing of the regional autonomy laws is significant. They were legislated just before the June 1999 elections, the first democratic elections since 1955. The leaders of the Reformasi movement had pressured Habibie to work out a new and fair system of elections. So Habibie initiated devolution to ‘curry favor from political elites outside the island of Java’ (Schwarz 2000).

• A United Nations-supervised referendum on independence or autonomy for East Timor had been scheduled for August 1999. So the enactment of the regional autonomy laws was aimed at making autonomy a more attractive prospect.

• Unexpectedly, the party that lobbied hardest to change the previous system of proportional representation to a majority-based district system was the military-dominated party, Golkar, whose leaders calculated that ‘if they had to compete on a level footing with a large number of small parties, they stood the best chance under a district system’ (Bourchier 2000:17). They thus gambled on devolution as a strategy of divide-and-rule.

Has devolution worked as a strategy for containing separatism? Yes and no. On the one hand, there are to date only four explicitly separatist movements in Indonesia—in Aceh, Maluku, Riau and Papua 2 . But on the other hand, a plethora of minor movements has emerged in the original 26 provinces and 346 districts, seeking greater local autonomy. As of 10 October 2000, the Jakarta government had received 68 applications for the formation of new districts and eight applications for new provinces. 3 These should not be considered as

2 On 21 May 2002, the province previously known as ‘Irian Jaya’ was renamed ‘Papua’. This paper adheres to this new usage. 3 According to Schwarz (2000), changes to existing provinces include: • The division of the previous province of Maluku into two provinces, Maluku and Maluku

Utara (North Moluccas including islands of Halmahera, Morotai, Obi, Bacan, Makian, Tidore, and Ternate), as of 16 September 1999

• The creation of Banten province, out of 8,232 km² split from the province of Jawa Barat, as of 6 October 2000

• The creation of Bangka-Belitung province, out of these two islands split from Sumatera Selatan province, as of 21 November 2000

• The creation of Gorontalo province, out of 12,864 km² split from Sulawesi Utara province There is also a proposal to create a Kepulauan Riau province, out of the islands not adjacent to


separatist movements, as they seek greater autonomy within an umbrella Indonesian nation-state. Arguably, devolution has defused separatist sentiment by offering province-hood and district-hood, instead of statehood. But devolution also means the decentralisation of power. In this context, an intense debate has emerged between those who propose turning highly centralised Indonesia into a federal system versus those who are opposed to federalism. The former includes members of the Reformasi movement, as well as the two largest Islamic organisations—the 35-million strong Nahdlatul Ulama and the 20-million strong Muhammadiyah. The latter includes the Indonesian military, as well as Megawati and her Indonesian Democratic Party-Struggle (PDI-P) (see Asia Times 1999). In this context, the military-dominated Golkar Party seems to have done a U-turn, from a divide-and-rule strategy through devolution, to trying to close a Pandora’s box of local demands.

ETHNIC AND IDEOLOGICAL CONFLICTS Superficially, it may seem that this fragmentation arises from primordial ethnic sentiments that were previously kept in check by Suharto’s authoritarian government. Connor (1994) claims that a multi-ethnic nation is a contradiction in terms, as nationalism is inherently ethnic in character and the nationalisms mobilised in a multi-ethnic nation would pull in multiple directions. (2002) argues against this, pointing out the ‘remarkable cohesion of many multi-ethnic nation-states’. He notes that multi-ethnicity does not necessarily portend ethnic fragmentation and that other reasons need to be sought to explain why multi-ethnic nation-states vary in their ability to command the loyalty of different ethnic groups among their citizenry. The Indonesian reality validates Brown’s argument. While there are dozens of major ethnic groups and hundreds of minor ones in Indonesia, there are not correspondingly dozens or hundreds of separatist movements. Furthermore, there are ethnic groups in Indonesia that do not seek either separate statehood or greater local autonomy. These include the largest ethnic groups in Indonesia — the Javanese of Central Java and East Java, and the Sundanese of West Java, constituting 45 percent and 14 percent of the population, respectively. This indicates that ethnicity, in and of itself, does not necessarily generate ethno-nationalism. Furthermore, not all the conflicts that currently trouble Indonesia are ethnic in character; some are ideological conflicts. There are two major ideological conflicts:

• federalism versus unitary statism • secularism versus an Islamic state

the Sumatran portion of Riau province. This proposal is still under consideration by the House of Representatives. (See http://www.mindspring.com/~gwil/uid.html).


Significantly, federalism was ushered in during the administration of the only non-Javanese Presidency in Indonesia — that of Dr B.J. Habibie from South Sulawesi. The architect of the regional autonomy laws was Dr Ryaas Rasyid, also from South Sulawesi. However, federalism is being advocated not just by people from the Outer Islands, but also by those who are not themselves members of ethnic groups seeking either autonomy or statehood. The debate about whether Indonesia should be federal or unitary is not just between Jakarta and the Outer Islands; it is a nation-wide debate. Although the conflict between federalism and unitary statism is ideological, rather than ethnic, it nevertheless carries certain ethnic implications. The former implies ethnic pluralism, whereas the latter implies ethnic unitarianism. The other ideological struggle is between those who want to keep Indonesia as a secular state and those who wish to make it an Islamic state. In Parliament, a coalition of Islamic parties led by Vice President Hamzah Haz has been repeatedly proposing that Islamic shariah law should become the law of the land; this is a key step in making Indonesia an Islamic state. The motion has been repeatedly rejected, most recently on 13 August 2002, not only by the secular parties, but also by the two largest Islamic organisations — Nahdlatul Ulama and Muhammadiyah.4 Outside Parliament, Hizb ut Tahrir, an Islamic mass organization, recently launched a nation-wide campaign on 7 July 2002 called ‘Save Indonesia Through Shariah Islam’ (Khilafah.com 2002). In addition, there are militant groups with more violent means of asserting their aim of making Indonesia an Islamic state—for example, Darul Islam, Laskar Jihad and Jemaah Islamiyah. The conflict between secularism and Islamism also carries ethnic overtones.5 This struggle is largely played out in a Javanese context, not a nation-wide context, even though the membership of some Islamic organisations may extend to the Outer Islands. This view has also been expressed by Rizal Sukma (The United State-Indonesia Society 2002):

Radical Islam comes from several sources in Indonesia: moral frustration, ideological fear of globalisation and Western domination, a desire for a Pax Islamica in Indonesia, simply political opportunism, and economic and social resentments. It is a phenomenon not found outside Java … and is urban-based.

Why is the drive for an Islamic state of Indonesia initiated mainly by Javanese? My field experience indicates that whereas Javanese respondents — whether Muslim or not, whether radical or mainstream — seem comfortable in asserting, or at least debating, future directions for the nation-state as a whole, respondents from Riau, Aceh and Bali articulate a sense of marginalisation as 4 See the International Herald Tribune, 13 August 2002. 5 ‘Islamism’ refers to political Islam — i.e. Islam that is concerned with politics.


minorities who can legitimately assert their political rights only within their indigenous territories. Accordingly, Islamism in the Outer Islands tends to be articulated in the context of particular territories, such as Aceh or Riau, whereas Islamism in Java tends to be articulated in terms of Indonesia as a whole. The struggle between secularism and Islamism dates from the early days of state formation. In 1953, Sukarno gave his rationale for making Indonesia a secular state: ‘If we establish a state based on Islam, many areas whose population is not Islamic…will secede.’ In response to this, Acehnese rebels at that time issued a manifesto the same year stating,

Sukarno declared he is afraid that if the State is based on religion, those who do not want religion to be the basis of the State will secede from it. Very well: then we shall therefore be the ones to secede from a state that is based upon nationalism (Brown 1994: 123).

Although it was not until 1976 that the Free Aceh Movement declared the independence of Aceh, the Islamic rationale for secession had long been established. The Free Aceh Movement is currently advocating an Islamic state, but only in Aceh. While the Acehnese secessionists have scaled down their quest for an Islamic state to the territory of Aceh, other Islamic interests are scaling up.6 In July 2002, as an outcome of anti-terrorist investigations, Singapore government officials announced that they had uncovered a plot to create an Islamic state combining Indonesia, Malaysia and the southern Philippines. This was said to be the vision of a militant group called Jemaah Islamiah, led by Abubakar Ba’asyir who, significantly, is from Central Java (see Cameron-Moore and Monaghan 2002; CBSNews.com 2002). PAST AND PRESENT Both ethnic conflicts and ideological conflicts are linked to earlier events, as seen in Table 1.

6 This makes the Acehnese independence movement particularly complex, because it is simultaneously a minoritarian ethnic struggle, as well as a secessionist derivation of a more nation-wide struggle for an Islamic state (see Nielsen 2002).


Table 1: Historical link of ethnic and ideological conflicts

Dates Ethnic conflicts Ideological conflicts 1945 – 1950 While Sukarno and Hatta declared the

independence of the Republic of Indonesia in Jakarta, some parts of the former Dutch East Indies sought to establish alternative states, either as revitalised kingdoms (e.g. Riau) or as local republics (e.g. Maluku). Leaders of these ethnicity-based independence movements opposed both Dutch colonialists and the Indonesian nationalists until 1950 when the latter unified Indonesia through military force. Many activists in these alternative movements went into exile—for example, a government-in-exile of the Republic of South Moluccas was formed in the Netherlands.

1949-1962 In August 1949, Darul Islam ‘House of Islam’ declared itself the government of the Islamic State of Indonesia. In 1950-1959, it launched armed revolts in South Kalimantan (1950-1959), South Sulawesi (1952-1965) and Aceh (1953-1962). Sukarno’s government successfully quashed this rebellion.

1963 – present Following Indonesia’s annexation of West Papua in 1963, the West Papuan independence movement, which had previously obtained self-rule from the Dutch in 1961, transformed itself into the armed Free Papua Movement to resist Indonesian rule.

1975-1999 In November 1975, after Portugal withdrew, the Revolutionary Front of Independent East Timor (Fretilin) declared the independence of East Timor. In December 1975, Indonesia annexed East Timor and the East Timorese immediately began an armed independence movement to resist the Indonesian annexation. Following Suharto’s downfall, a referendum was held on 30 August 1999, resulting in 78 percent of voters in East Timor opting for independence. Indonesian troops and militias responded violently, leading to the expulsion of Indonesia’s presence and the United Nations taking over in October 1999.

1976 - present The Free Aceh Movement (Gerakan Aceh Merdeka) proclaimed Aceh as a sovereign state on 4 December 1976. An armed uprising was launched in 1977. This was quashed by the Indonesian military and the leaders of the Free Aceh Movement formed a government-in-exile in Sweden.


It is necessary to revisit these historical events because since 1998:

• East Timor has achieved independence (formally on 20 May 2002). • The independence movements in Aceh and Papua are more active

than ever. • Independence movements in Riau and Maluku that have been

dormant in Indonesia since 1950 have re-emerged. • Darul Islam has re-emerged as a militant movement seeking an

Islamic state in Indonesia. For those familiar with Indonesia’s chequered past, it would seem that history is repeating itself.7 If this were really the case, then we should expect all aspects of history to be repeated. But there is one significant part of Indonesia’s past that has not re-emerged — namely, the Communist past.8 Quite understandably, the revival of a Communist movement is not credible in the current post-Cold War era. This, however, raises the important factor of credibility. If it is not credible to revive a bygone Communist movement, why is it credible to revive ethnicity-based independence movements dating back to the formation of Indonesia or a defeated Islamic movement that had sought to transform the country into a religious state? The linkage of current conflicts to earlier events does not signify historical primordialism, in the sense of the past automatically generating the impulse for revival. While the historical past does provide symbolic resources (such as identities and myths), as well as social continuities (in terms of descent, kinship and community), these are no more than raw materials that can be activated for present purposes.9 It is therefore more pertinent to ask what it is about the present that motivates these historical usages. WHAT KIND OF A STATE IS INDONESIA AND WHO IS IT FOR? The re-emergence in Indonesia of movements that hark back to earlier days of state formation symptomises recurrent ills that have not been resolved. One recurrent problem concerns the nature and raison d’être of Indonesia as a nation-state. George Aditjondro (1995) asks pertinently: Is Indonesia the ‘heir of the Dutch East Indies’ or a ‘brand-new nation-state, which has liberated itself completely from the Dutch — as well as the Japanese — colonial yoke’? He argues that if it

7 For more information on Indonesia’s history, see, for example, Ricklefs (1981) and Cribb (2000) 8 In 1965, troops allied with the Communist Party of Indonesia attempted a coup, killing seven generals, thereby leaving General Suharto as the senior surviving command officer. The ensuing campaign to destroy the Left resulted in a massacre of at least 400,000 people and perhaps as many as one million. Suharto took formal power by 1967 (see Cribb 1990) 9 For more on this argument see Wee (2002a).


is the former, then ‘Indonesia should constrain itself to the Dutch East Indies borders, and not violate those borders as happened in the case of the annexation of East Timor’. But the latter would present a different scenario:

Then the territorial borders of the Indonesian Republic do not necessarily have to coincide with the Dutch East Indies territorial borders. This does not mean, though, that the entire archipelago or region will become fair game for Indonesia’s expansionism, but that those borders can continuously be re-negotiated and determined in accordance with the wishes of the people who live within those borders, based on the universally recognized right of self-determination (Aditjondro 1995)

Aditjondro thus points to a crucial linkage between the nature of the Indonesian state and its territorial scope. Embedded in current disputes about territory are more fundamental quarrels about Indonesian statehood as such. This perspective is corroborated by the one-page Declaration of Independence of Aceh - Sumatra of the Free Aceh Movement (4 December 1976), which identifies the Javanese as ‘neo-colonialists’ eight times, cites the Acehnese tradition of resisting ‘colonising’ powers, and justifies the separatist rebellion as a legacy of continuity for the Acehnese ‘historic right’ to self-determination. (see Nielsen 2002) Similarly, a recent statement issued by the Free West Papua Movement declares that West Papuans are a ‘colonised indigenous people…under the rule of Indonesia’ and that their ‘indigenous culture is being systematically destroyed … [by] Indonesian (Javanese) culture’ (see West Papua Niugini/ Irian Jaya Homepage). So is Indonesia a successor state of the Dutch East Indies and therefore a colonising power? And as such, is it a vehicle of Javanese imperialism? The first question points to a fundamental contradiction of Indonesia as a post-colonial nation-state. On the one hand, Indonesian nationalism was historically an anti-colonial movement. National consciousness in Indonesia arose in response to the ‘political deprivation, economic exploitation, and cultural marginalisation’ (Pabotinggi 1995: 230) brought about by Dutch colonisation. The Constitution of 1945 declared, ‘Colonialism must be abolished in this world as it is not in conformity with humanity and justice’; ‘the state of Indonesia…shall protect all the people of Indonesia and their entire native land’. On the other hand, who and which territory are to be included in ‘Indonesia’? The creation of one nation-state out of the remains of the Dutch East Indies has placed Indonesia in the position of a colonising power annexing territories against the will of various local populations. The struggle for statehood was not just between the Indonesian nationalists and the Dutch. Other nationalisms were also being articulated. The separatist movements currently active in Indonesia see themselves as continuations of these other nationalisms. From


their perspective, Indonesia appears to be a colonising power and a vehicle for Javanese imperialism.

MAJORITARIANISM AND MINORITARIANISM Crouch (2000) argues:

The perception of Indonesia as a ‘Javanese empire’ with a ‘Javanese army’…is a gross caricature. Of course, the Javanese, who make up by far the largest ethnic community with about 45 per cent of the population, are disproportionately represented in the national elite. But they have never monopolised the top positions in the state. Non-Javanese have always been well represented in the leadership of the government, the bureaucracy, military, political parties and various national institutions…. The common accusation that the wealth of the Outer Islands has been exploited for Java's benefit is misleading. The main beneficiaries of this exploitation were the members of the elite in Jakarta — both Javanese and non-Javanese — and the exploitation was felt not only in the Outer Islands, but also on Java itself.

But there is an important factor left out of Crouch’s argument—that is, the massive migration of people from Java (including Madura) to the other islands. Although such migration started in the 19th century under Dutch colonisation, it greatly accelerated under the government’s transmigration programme. ‘Between 1969 and 1995, more than eight million people were relocated to less populated islands including Sumatra, Kalimantan, Sulawesi and West Papua’ (Programme on Humanitarian Policy and Conflict Research 2001a). The transmigration programme has generated much resentment among indigenous host populations. Two examples illustrate this long-standing resentment. In 1965-1967, during the massacre of suspected Communists in the wake of the coup attempt of 1 October 1965, tens of thousands of Javanese migrants were killed in North Sumatra and South Sumatra, where many new settlements were located (see Cribb 2000:170). From 1996 to 2001, the indigenous Dayaks in West and Central Kalimantan revived a long-abandoned tradition of beheading their enemies — namely, the Madurese migrants who have settled in these provinces. 10 Virtually no Madurese remain in Central Kalimantan. While the fighting appears to have stopped for now, violence is likely to break out again if the displaced Madurese settlers were to return (Programme on Humanitarian Policy and Conflict Research 2001b). Significantly, all the areas where local nationalisms have sprouted have seen a massive inflow of migrants. For example, Papua has become the largest recipient of migrants, mostly Javanese, numbering at least 770,000 in a 10 Madura is an island off the north coast of Java; the Madurese constitute 7.5 percent of the population in Indonesia.


provincial population of 1,800,000. Papua now has one of the country’s highest provincial population growth rates. Non-Papua born residents already make up over 70 per cent of the province’s urban population (West Papua Information Kit, nd–1). Maluku too has received many migrants—97,422 official transmigrants from 1969 to 1999 and many other ‘spontaneous’ ones. What is particularly significant is that the 1995 census shows that Muslims now constitute the majority (59.02 percent) in this once predominantly Christian province. (Ambon Information Website 2002) The Field Coordinator for Médecins Sans Frontières in Ambon opines that the cause for the Christian-Muslim conflict stems, to a large extent, from the policy of transmigration (Rowat 1999). Overtly, transmigration is a development programme aimed at population redistribution, which is why it has received the World Bank’s sponsorship for as much as US$560 million. But human rights organisations argue that it has an underlying political agenda that acts against the interests of indigenous host populations.11 For example, Clause 17 of Indonesia’s Basic Forestry Act of 1967 says: ‘The rights of traditional-law communities may not be allowed to stand in the way of the establishment of transmigration settlements’ (Nietschmann 1999). Investigations by the United Nations and the World Bank also show how Indonesian forestry and land laws have been systematically used to dispossess indigenous peoples of their lands (see Programme on Humanitarian Policy and Conflict Research 2001b). As recently as September 1998, a new transmigration programme was launched in Aceh and Papua, with the aim of moving non-indigenous groups into these areas to bring about a mixing of religions and ethnicities, supposedly to strengthen a sense of Indonesian unity. This plan included the establishment of armed militias among transmigrants under the supervision of the Armed Forces.12 Lately, there is evidence of some new awareness of the political conflicts caused by transmigration. The government admitted that the existing policy failed to assess the social, cultural and environmental background of the target regions and people living there. In December 2001, it announced a reformed transmigration programme that will check the legal status of land before giving it to new migrants and that will ensure a 50:50 ratio between local people and transmigrants. But ‘critics say that the emphasis on the legal status of land will not improve matters for indigenous communities affected by transmigration unless the legal definition of land ownership is expanded to include adat (customary) land held by indigenous communities.’ (Programme on Humanitarian Policy and Conflict Research 2001b) 11 See, for example, Human Rights Watch 1999 12 See The Jakarta Post 12 December 1998; Suara Pembaruan 23 Setpember 1998; and Yayasan Hak (nd).


Furthermore, the reformed policy is silent on the official intent of achieving ‘national integration’ through transmigration (see Cribb 2000). Act of the Republic of Indonesia No. 15 on Transmigration Matters (1997) (see Ministry of Foreign Affairs 2000). Still states that the purposes of the implementation of transmigration are to improve the welfare of the transmigrants and neighbouring communities, increase and spread equally the development in the region and also strengthen national unity. An extreme interpretation of ‘national unity’ was articulated in 1995 by the then Minister of Transmigration, who stated that the goal of transmigration is ‘to integrate all the ethnic groups into one nation;... the different ethnic groups will in the long run disappear because of integration...and there will be only one kind of man [sic]’ (Programme on Humanitarian Policy and Conflict Research 2001). As stated in a recent UN report, transmigration is a major cause of inter-ethnic conflict, because it ‘sought to spread Javanese culture throughout the archipelago’ (United Nation Economic and Social Council 2002: 5), affected the demographic balance between different ethnic groups, and caused economic and political competition over scarce resources. I can corroborate this analysis from my research among respondents from Riau, Aceh and Bali. This view of transmigration can also be found on Web sites affiliated with various separatist movements. 13 Arifin (nd) explicitly states that Javanese cultural hegemony (‘Javanisation’) and the resulting marginalisation of minorities are the cause of ethnic fragmentation and separatism. This perception of Indonesia, however, contradicts its founding vision as a multi-ethnic civic nation. Was Indonesia founded as an ‘ethno-state’ (i.e. a state formed by a ‘people’) or a civic state (i.e. a state formed by citizens regardless of ethnic origins)? Indonesia’s national motto ‘unity in diversity’ articulates a vision of a united civic state made up of diverse ethnic groups. The 1945 Constitution states simply that ‘all citizens have equal status before the law and in government and shall abide by the law and the government without any exception’ (Article 27). ‘Indonesia was, and therefore is, the product of a conscious struggle for democracy and not a manifestation of a cultural, ethnic or religious unity’ (Lane 13 August 2002). Nevertheless, in its territorial annexations of Papua and East Timor and its transmigration programme, the government of Indonesia has clearly not acted in accordance with the popular will of indigenous populations. In response to this, local movements have emerged with the aim of carving ‘ethno-states’ out of territories currently claimed by Indonesia. In this struggle, Indonesia is viewed as a colonising ‘ethno-state’ where the majority is colonising the minorities. Significantly, as noted above, the largest ethnic groups are the ones that do not seek either separate statehood or greater local autonomy. This implies that the causes of separatism can be found in majoritarian versus minoritarian relations of power. 13 See, for example, West Papua Information Kit (nd-2); Aceh Links (nd); and Unrepresented Nations and People Organisation 2002


As argued by Deleuze and Guattari (1988), majoritarianism is both quantitative and qualitative. It is that which is most numerous, as well as that which is asserted as the official norm. I would argue that minoritarianism arises as a response to the hegemony of majoritarianism. By ‘minoritarianism’, I mean the attempt by minorities to turn themselves into majorities, both numerically and normatively. This struggle between majoritarianism and minoritarianism is at the heart of the ethnic conflicts in Indonesia. STATE CAPTURE AND SUBVERTED DEVELOPMENT It has been argued that Suharto’s New Order derived its legitimacy from economic development and political stability (see Prabotinggi 1995). Economic development as a basis for legitimacy was destabilised during the Asian financial crisis when the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in Indonesia dropped from a growth rate of 4.95 percent in 1997 to a negative growth rate of –13.7 percent in 1998. When that happened, the costs of authoritarian government began to outweigh its benefits, leading to the fall of Suharto. However, I argue that even before the Asian financial crisis, the legitimacy of Suharto’s government was already problematic, mainly because of the corruption that pervaded the country and subverted its development. Transparency International’s 1998 Corruption Perception Index placed Indonesia as 80th out of 85 countries worldwide (see Robertson-Snape 1999). As I have argued elsewhere (see Wee 2002b), the corruption in Suharto’s New Order was so institutionalised and systemic that it amounted to state capture. This means the capture of economic and political power by a complex network of élite interests, made up of ruling politicians and their family members, cronies, allies and loyal subordinates. As a result, these élite interests are able to capture development funds, tax revenue, bank loans, and other resources. The World Bank (Aslam 1999) estimates that at least 20 percent to 30 percent of development funds have been siphoned off by these interests. This subversion of the development process by kleptocratic élites is of particular relevance in the Outer Islands where many development projects are located. The top four provinces in Indonesia contributing the lion’s share of natural resources (minerals, forestry products, oil and gas) are Aceh, East Kalimantan, Riau and Papua. 14 It is more than coincidental that there are separatist movements in three of these provinces (Riau, Aceh and Papua) and movements for greater local autonomy in two of them (Riau and East Kalimantan). There has been massive appropriation of the resources in these provinces by Suharto-related interests. For example, my field research indicates that almost every large-scale development project in Riau has a Suharto family member or crony involved in it. This is still the case despite the fall of Suharto in 1998. The 14 Indonesian Central Bureau of Statistics, 1999.


same is true in Aceh, where ‘Suharto…insisted on being cut in on every major economic enterprise, and members of his family continue to own vast assets’ (Shalom 2001). In Papua, the world’s largest gold mine and third largest copper mine are partly owned by Suharto’s foundation, family and cronies (Weissman 1998). Similarly, in East Kalimantan, tens of thousands of hectares have been given as concessions to Suharto cronies (Inside Indonesia 1997). Furthermore, Suharto used ‘the entrenched patron-client system in which the patron provides a position to one’s subordinates in return for their loyalty’.15 So apart from his family members and close cronies, many loyal subordinates were placed in important government positions where they could exploit the resources under their control with impunity. This kind of institutionalised corruption spread deep roots throughout all levels of the bureaucracy and remains to this day. So pervasive was this system of extraction that ‘in many ways, government came to exist for the sake of corruption and personal enrichment [my emphasis]’ (Renoe 2002:5). These loyal subordinates included not only civilians but also military officers. Even during Suharto’s time, the central government’s security budget was estimated to cover only about 30 per cent of real military and police expenditure. So selected high-ranking military officers were given access to financial resources in the economy, so that they could supply a constant flow of funds to the army (Crouch 1975-76: 525). Local military and police commanders were expected to find their own sources of revenue to pay troops and meet operational expenses (Crouch 10 May 2002). This situation led to an extensive network of military-backed businesses, located throughout the archipelago, especially in the Outer Islands. Apart from legal businesses, the military is known to be involved in illegal activities, such as illegal logging, the drug trade, trafficking in girls and women, extorting payments for ‘protection’ from oil palm plantations, oil, gas and other companies, gun-running and making counterfeit money. What is more, individual soldiers are given leeway to supplement their own small incomes.16 Suharto’s downfall has not meant the end of the system he built. In post-Suharto Indonesia, state capture has not disappeared but has evolved into multiple oligarchies with their ramifying networks of dependents. According to Lindsey (2001: 283):

His departure left the corrupt political and business ‘franchise’…without its lynchpin, its ‘godfather’. This led to a fragmentation of systems of political control and rise of intense rivalry for power.

The state is still being captured, but now by competing élites seeking to capture different fragments of the state. Hadiz (2002: 8) observes that political parties in 15 See Renoe (2002: 6); Schwartz (1994: 136) and Sutherland (1979) 16 See Dharmasaputra, Wiyana, and Riyanto (2000) and The Jakarta Post 20 May 2000


post-Suharto Indonesia are now ‘populated by a variety of elements that were all a part of the vast network of political patronage that was the New Order. For such interests, parties and parliaments are the main avenue towards political power and control over state institutions’. SEEKING ALTERNATIVE MORAL UNIVERSES Corruption and violence became so institutionalised that Suharto’s Indonesia has been described as a ‘criminal state’. ‘The New Order state’s methods of operations—violence, extortion and secrecy—were…most closely analogous to those of criminal gangs’ (Lindsey 2001: 284). There has long been widespread distrust of the state and its institutions. But this groundswell of discontent surfaced only intermittently during the New Order, due to two factors:

• Despite the predations of kleptocratic élites, there was sufficient economic growth to generate a modicum of benefits for the population.

• The authoritarian government did not permit the expression of political difference.

The fall of Suharto allowed this long smouldering discontent to erupt. The underlying unity in the diverse conflicts and fragmentations is antipathy to Indonesia as a captured state. State capture is thus the root cause of the visible fragmentation that has occurred in Indonesia. In the face of a systemically corrupt and violent state, a consistent social demand for alternative moral universes has emerged, often taking the form of narratives of collective victimage. In this context, various movements are projecting alternative moral universes, where wronged victims are morally right. For example, the Moluccan Sovereignty Front (FKM), a separatist group established on 18 December 2000, is widely seen by local Christians as a ‘moral force’ defending the community against ‘evil oppressors’—namely, the armed forces and militant Muslims (Turner 2001). Similarly, the Alliance of Papuan Students describes itself on its Web site as ‘a moral force’ that was ‘established in 1998, in response to the well-known Bloody Biak 6 July 1998’, when 230 Papuans were variously arrested, injured, ‘disappeared’ or killed.’ 17 Apart from separatist movements, the minor movements seeking greater local autonomy also project alternative moral universes through the assertion of indigenous rights over land, resources and livelihoods. But the discourse of ‘moral’ politics is not limited to the Outer Islands. It was brought into Indonesia as a whole by the Reformasi movement. (Langenberg 2000) Although this movement also sees itself as a ‘moral force’, it does not project its alternative moral universe in terms of ‘ethno-states’ or

17 Homepage of the Alliance of Papuan Students (AMP)


indigenous rights. Instead, its concern is to reform and return Indonesia to its founding vision of being a democracy seeking to realise social justice, as stated in the 1945 Constitution. While the movement may no longer be so visible on the streets, the reformist impulse is still alive, for example, in the multitude of NGOs that now exist in Indonesia. There are laudable reformist initiatives, such as the anti-corruption investigations of Partnership for Governance Reform and the institutional audit of the Supreme Court done by the Indonesian Institute for An Independent Judiciary. Some of these efforts have percolated to the mainstream, to the extent of bringing about constitutional changes and institutionalised reforms. The most recent example is the constitutional change agreed upon in August 2002, which abolished parliamentary seats reserved for the military and provided for the direct election of the president (who was previously elected indirectly through the People’s Consultative Assembly).18 Significantly, the heartland of the Reformasi movement is in Java. While this location provides access to decision-making in the capital, this also limits the movement’s effectiveness in the rest of the country, especially in the Outer Islands where ethnically-based movements are more prominent. Furthermore, the endeavour by the Reformasi movement to reform Indonesia is confronted by a moral challenge of a different order—that is, the movement to Islamise Indonesia. As shown above, the attempt to make Indonesia an Islamic state dates from 1949. Even after Darul Islam, the advocating organisation, was quashed in 1962, advocates for an Islamic state of Indonesia continue to be found, even before the downfall of Suharto.19 There is evidently a constituency of support for Islamic resurgence. A nation-wide survey of public opinions about corruption in the country found that individuals and businesses concurred in ranking religious institutions as the least corrupt of all institutions in the country, while state institutions were mostly regarded as corrupt, differing only in their degree of corruption. (A Diagnostic Study of Corruption in Indonesia 2002) There is thus a social expectation that religious groups should be a ‘moral force’ in countering the corruption of the state. With Muslims constituting 87 percent of Indonesia’s population, this means a sizeable constituency for Islamic groups presenting themselves as moral alternatives. The problem, however, is the diversity of ‘moralities’ advocated, not just among Muslims, but also between different religious groups.

18 See International Herald Tribune, 13 August 2002. 19 For example, in July 1995, the Indonesian government detained 1600 people for promoting the idea of an Islamic state of Indonesia. Significantly, these 1600 people were all from West and Central Java (see Inside Indonesia, 9 February 1996).


ALLIANCES AND OPPOSITIONS The clash of ‘moralities’ between different religious groups is epitomized in the inter-religious conflict occurring in Maluku between the Muslim Laskar Jihad (‘Warriors of the Holy War’) and Christian militias, including the Laskar Kristus (‘Warriors of Christ’). Crouch (2002) interprets this clash as not a case of separatism but inter-communal conflict, where ‘the warring communities are not fighting against Jakarta but against each other’. This interpretation is debatable. The Christian militias are aligned with indigenous forces, some of which are clearly separatist in intent—for example, the Front for the Sovereignty of Maluku (Turner 2001). On the other hand, Laskar Jihad is based in Java and it is from Java that thousands of Muslim ‘warriors’ have been sent to Maluku to wage ‘holy war’ against the Christians (BBC News 2000). Laskar Jihad has stated explicitly that it ‘is waging war against Christians because of their support for separatist movements in various parts of Indonesia’ (Laskar Jihad Bulletin 1 January 2002). Apart from Maluku, Laskar Jihad militants have also moved into Papua to fight indigenous Christians there (West Papua News Online 2002). Furthermore, a strategic alliance underlies this ‘holy war’. Apparently, in January 2000, the head of Laskar Jihad was approached by military retirees who told him that they approved of his plans to escalate the armed campaign against Christians in Maluku. The explicitly stated purpose was to undermine the reformist government of Abdurrahman Wahid, who was then President (Hefner 2002: 6). ‘Western intelligence has confirmed that at least $9.3 million has been transferred from the Army’s main fighting section to the militant group’ (Huang 2002). This seemingly strange bedfellowship between the military and Islamic radicals may be explained in terms of how alliances and oppositions are currently aligned in Indonesia (see Table 2). A key difference between the groups espousing these four positions is their secularism or religiosity. But this difference is overshadowed by the logic of ideological compatibility with regards to the integrity of Indonesia. This logic shapes the alliances and oppositions that have emerged between different groups. There are thus real or potential alliances between groups who share Position 1, including Suharto-related interests, the military, President Megawati, and Islamic radicals in Java. In particular, the Megawati-military alliance has far-reaching political consequences. For example, Megawati has allowed the military to re-establish a major base in Aceh, thereby showing her preference for military solutions over civilian solutions. (Sukarsono 2002) The military now has multiple alliances—with Megawati, Islamic radicals in Java, as well as Suharto-related interests. This coalition of interests is currently in the ascendance in Indonesian politics and has captured state power.


Table 2: Alliances and oppositions in Indonesia

Positions taken in relation to Indonesia’s integrity as a nation-state Position 1 Position 2 Position 3 Position 4

Those who want to keep Indonesia as a unitary state—i.e. a highly centralised Indonesia

Those who want to make Indonesia part of a large Islamic state encompassing other Islamic areas (Malaysia and the southern Philippines)—i.e. Indonesia as part of an enlarged state

Those who want Indonesia to evolve into a federal state—i.e. a decentralised Indonesia with a high degree of local autonomy

Those who want to establish their own local states—i.e. Indonesia as a region fragmented into separate nation-states

Suharto-related interests—e.g. his family and cronies

Suharto-related interests—i.e. locally based interests that were part of the Suharto patron-client network

The military—Golkar Party, Indonesia Armed Forces

Federalists (i.e. those seeking to transform Indonesia into a reformist state)—e.g. Ryaas Rasyid (who designed the Regional Autonomy Laws), Amien Rais, Speaker of Parliament and his National Mandate Party

Local ‘autonomists’ (i.e. those seeking local autonomy within a federal state)

Secular groups adopting these positions

Reformists—e.g. President Megawati and her Indonesian Democratic Party—Struggle

Reformists, especially NGOs

Secular separatists in Aceh, Maluku, Riau and Papua

Islamic radicals in Java—e.g. Laskar Jihad, Darul Islam

Islamic moderates in Java and the Outer Islands, including mainstream mass organisations and their parties—e.g. former President Abdurrahman Wahid, Nahdlatul Ulama, and Muhammadiyah

Islamic radicals in Aceh

Religious groups adopting these positions

Islamic radicals in Java—e.g. Jemaah Islamiyah

Moderates belonging to other religions in Java and the Outer Islands

Christian militias in Maluku


The sharpest opposition is between this coalition and those in Position 4, the separatists. Of the four separatist movements in Indonesia, three are armed — in Aceh, Maluku and Papua. The military has been given a free hand to suppress separatist movements in these three places. Thousands have died in the ensuing conflict; hundreds of thousands have been displaced (see TAPOL 2002). In December 2001, Megawati said the military should ‘be firm in carrying out their job and not to be worried about accusations of human rights abuses’ (Inside Indonesia 2002). The suppressive capacity of the Indonesian military has been enhanced in the last year by the American-led ‘war on terror’20. In July 2002, the U.S. Senate Appropriations Committee approved lifting restrictions on the Indonesian military’s participation in the Pentagon’s International Military Education and Training programme (IMET).21 The Indonesian military welcomes this move, not just because its soldiers would receive training, but also because, in the words of Megawati’s senior minister for political and security affairs, it would enable ‘the United States to understand the logic of conflicts in Indonesia’ [my emphasis]. This ‘logic’ is none other than the idea of a highly centralised, unitary Indonesia as the only form that the nation-state should take. However, human rights groups are highly critical. According to Munir, founder of Kontras, Indonesia’s most prominent human rights organization, ‘The military badly needs this endorsement from the United States in order to further legitimise its meddling in politics (and) human rights violations’ (Boston Herald 22 July 2002). The Free Aceh Movement has accused the Indonesian military of trying to have their movement ‘branded as a terrorist organisation’ so as to win international support in suppressing it (Voice of America 2002). In contrast, neither Megawati nor the military seems to perceive the advocates of an Islamic Indonesia as a threat. The Vice President, Hamzah Haz, is leader of an Islamic coalition of parties advocating Islamic shariah law as the law of the land. The military is supporting the anti-Christian actions of Laskar Jihad. Even the militant group, Jemaah Islamiyah, advocating a larger Islamic state that encompasses Indonesia, has been left alone. ‘Jakarta’s reluctance to rein in extremists and detain suspected terrorists have sparked concern in Washington and neighboring nations for fears that Indonesia would become a terrorist haven or a base from which to plot new attacks.’ (Harisumarto 2002) There may be two reasons for the Indonesian government’s benign tolerance of Islamism:

20 America’s ‘war on terror’ began in the wake of the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Centre in New York on 11 September 2001 and is now waged worldwide (see BBC News, nd). 21 Existing U.S. legislation prohibits military assistance to Indonesia to punish the military for human rights abuses in East Timor following the 1999 referendum. (See Boston Herald, 22 July 2002)


• the potential of using Islam to rally a Muslim constituency around the idea of a centralised, unitary Indonesia.

• the perception of Islamism as a secondary threat to the greater threat of a fragmented Indonesia, to be dealt with after the separatist movements are quashed.

The underlying logic of these different strategies is the goal of keeping Indonesia as a unitary state. The government’s treatment of the independence movement in Riau is also interesting. This movement is unarmed and therefore not seen as a serious threat by the military. The leaders of this movement told me that it was a conscious decision on their part not to enter into an armed struggle, which they fear would be unending. As a result, negotiations are still possible. A policy of cooptation is used by the government to deal with these separatists — for example, by offering the leaders some decision-making power in the devolution process. In this context, federalism and local autonomy are used as concessions to contain the greater threat of separatism. While those in Position 1 (the unitarists) are also opposed to those in Position 3 (the federalists), this is a milder opposition than the conflict between the unitarists and the armed separatists. The former is marked by compromise, while the latter is marked by violence. Unitarists and federalists co-exist in the Indonesian Parliament, albeit with disagreements. For example, Megawati’s party, the Indonesian Democratic Party-Struggle (PDI-P), accused Amien Rais, the current Speaker of Parliament who supports federalism, of going ‘against his official oath as the people’s representative which requires him to remain loyal to the Pancasila (the state ideology) and the Unitary State of the Republic of Indonesia’ (Asia Times 1999). Meanwhile, Suharto-related interests, both civilian and military, continue to wheel and deal. They are prominent among the advocates of Position 1 (the unitarists) and Position 3 (the federalists). Corruption and violence thus continue to prevail. WILL INDONESIA HOLD? This question requires not just ‘yes’ or ‘no’. The deeper question is ‘what as’. Fundamental questions concerning the nature of Indonesia’s statehood have not been resolved. Those who see Indonesia as a colonising state wish to free themselves of its yoke. Others who see it as a centralised, unitary state, wish to defend it ‘at all costs’, as declared by Megawati’s party, Indonesian Democratic Party-Struggle (PDI-P) (Asia Times 1999). Given that the former is mostly located in the peripheries of the state, while the latter is located at the centre, the likely scenario is that this contradiction will continue as a long-term conflict between centre and periphery. The federalists step into this picture as mediators seeking to effect compromise. While this approach has yielded some success, it is doubted by the unitarists, who fear that federalism would only lead to more separatism. As a result, the


unitarists are reverting to the militaristic ‘security’ approach of Suharto, where military solutions are favoured over negotiations. But whereas Suharto was able to siphon off development resources to fund the military and thereby control it, Megawati is not able to do so. On the contrary, it is the military that has its huge network of enterprises, legal and illegal, all over the archipelago. Therefore, the military is not dependent on the meagre budgetary allocation of a bankrupt and indebted government. What the military needs is to protect and manage its nation-wide estate, which is the resource base enabling it to act as an independent political force. Will Indonesia become more militarised? It does not have to be overtly so. As long as the military is able to find a supportive civilian President, like Megawati, it can be a puppet master behind the scene. It may even be able to tolerate a certain degree of democracy and federalism as a façade. But after East Timor’s secession, what the military will not tolerate letting any other part of Indonesia slip away. The current geopolitical climate of anti-terrorism suits this agenda to the T, allowing the military to re-define separatists as terrorists and to violate human rights with impunity. Historically, while the Indonesian military was able to put down armed rebellions, it was not able to root out separatist movements once and for all, hence the current continuation of such movements. It is thus likely that even if the military were able to suppress current movements, in the long term, these will still remain, ready to surge again when the moment is right. In this scenario, Indonesia will hold together, not as a harmonious, well-integrated nation, but as a fractious, dysfunctional state with permanent conflicts. The military describes itself as the ‘glue’ holding together a fragmented nation. It evidently does not mind that some of those it ‘glues’ together are held against their will or even at the cost of their lives.22 A brighter alternative to this grim scenario is a reformed Indonesia that can live up to its founding vision of being a civic state founded on democracy and social justice. Such a state could conceivably attract its multi-ethnic peoples to remain as citizens. However, this alternative can be realised only by dismantling the structures of corruption and violence that now grip the country. To meet this enormous challenge, the reformist movement needs to be revitalised and expanded into a mass movement with the capacity to reshape the country’s political future. Whether this is achievable is, however, open to question.

22 Lt General Ryamizard Ryacudu, commander of Kostrad, the army’s strategic command which is now leading the fight in Aceh, said, ‘Like it or not, the glue of the nation nowadays is the Indonesian Armed Forces. If people want to dismantle the state, go ahead and abolish the territorial units. If the Trikora military command in Irian Jaya were dissolved, Irian Jaya would be independent tomorrow’ (see Buidardjo 2002).


REFERENCES A Diagnostic Study of Corruption in Indonesia 2002, Jakarta: Partnership for Governance Reform, http://www.partnership.or.id/data/pdf/DiagnosticStudy-eng.pdf Aceh Links (nd), ‘Aceh for beginners or the process of ethnic dilution in Aceh’, http://acehnet.tripod.com/begin.htm Aditjondro, G. 1995, Liberating our colonial mindset, Outline of a lecture presented in the Winter Lecture Series 1995, Melbourne, AIA-CSEAS Monash Asia Institute, http://www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/54b/034.html Ambon Information Website 2002, ‘Population and religious breakdown of Maluku’, http://www.websitesrcg.com/ambon/index.html#Data and Statistics Arifin, M. (nd), Cultural hegemony: proses hegemoni kebudayaan Jawa dalam kehidupan sosial, budaya dan politik Indonesia (suatu perspektif Antropologis), Yogyakarta: Universitas Gadjah Mada, http://fisip-unmul.hypermart.net/hegemoni.html Asia Times 10 December 1999, ‘Federalism debate splits Indonesia’s government’, Southeast Asia, http://www.atimes.com/se-asia/AL10Ae01.html Aslam, A. 1999, ‘World Bank’s guilt on Indonesia corruption’, Inter-Press Service, http://www.50years.org/press/ips021599.html Aspinall, E. 2001, ‘Mother of the nation’, Inside Indonesia, 68, http://www.insideindonesia.org/edit68/mega2.htm BBC News (nd), ‘War on Terror: Where next?’, http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/static/in_depth/world/2001/war_on_terror/what_next/indonesia.stm BBC News 20 June 2000, ‘Who are the Laskar Jihad?’, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/770263.stm Boston Herald 22 July 2002, ‘US move to strengthen military ties with Indonesia gets mixed reaction’, http://www.bostonherald.com/news/international/ap_indon07222002.htm Bourchier, D. 2000, ‘Habibie’s interregnum: reformasi, elections, regionalism and the struggle for power’, in C. Manning and P. van Diermen (eds), Indonesia in transition: social aspects of reformasi and crisis, Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies. Brown, D. 1994, The state and ethnic politics, London: Routledge.


Brown, D. 2002, ‘Why might constructed nationalist and ethnic ideologies come into confrontation with each other?’, in V. Wee (ed), Exploring the new fault lines of Southeast Asia, special issue of The Pacific Review 15, 4, in press. Buidardjo, C. 7 April 2002, ‘Recent development in Indonesia, devolution of power of the region and the role of military’, Tempo , http://www.kaapeli.fi/~comof100/indonesia/carmel_budijardo.html. BusinessWeek Online, 20 May 2002. Cameron-Moore, S. and Monaghan, E. 29 July 2002, ‘Southeast Asia hones counter-terror declaration’, Reuters, http://www.hungnguyen.com/PRNews/news_072902.htm CBSnews.com 18 April 2002, ‘Al Qaeda’s Asian Allies’, http://www.seasite.niu.edu/flin/cbs-indonesia_18-19apr02.html Connor, W. 1995, Ethnonationalism : the quest for understanding, Princeton, Princeton University Press. Cribb, R. (ed). 1990, The Indonesian killings 1965-1966: Studies from Java and Bali, Melbourne: Monash University, Centre of Southeast Asian Studies. Cribb, R. 2000, Historical atlas of Indonesia, London: Curzon. Crouch, H. 1975-76, ‘Generals and business in Indonesia’, Pacific Affairs, 48,4. pp. 519-540. -----. 2000, ‘Why Indonesia won’t fall apart’, The Age, 22 July, http://dwp.bigplanet.com/aiccny/nss-folder/articlestouseinclass/Breakup.doc ----- 2002, ‘Drifting along: Megawati’s Indonesia’, Australian Financial Review, 10 May. Deleuze, G. and Guattari, F. 1988, A thousand plateaus: capitalism and schizophrenia, London: Athlone Press. Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade 2001, Indonesia: facing the challenge, Canberra: Commonwealth of Australia, http://www.dfat.gov.au/publications/indonesia/ind_challenge.pdf Dharmasaputra, K., Wiyana, D and Riyanto, A. S. 2000, ‘The untouchables’, Tempo, 28 August – 3 September. Hadiz, V. 2002, Reorganising power in Indonesia: national and local dynamics, paper presented at the Workshop on ‘Perspectives on Regional Autonomy in a Multi-cultural Indonesia’, organised by the National University of Singapore, 13-15 May.


Harisumarto, S. 2002, ‘Politics of terrorist socials’, The Washington Times, 1 June, http://www.washtimes.com/upi-breaking/01062002-123514-5719r.htm Hefner, R. 2002, ‘Islam in modern Indonesia’, proceedings of a joint conference sponsored by the United States-Indonesia Society and the Asia Foundation, Washington DC, http://www.usindo.org/Briefs/Islam percent20in percentIndonesia.htm Homepage, Alliance of Papuan Students (AMP), http://www.westpapua.org.uk/amp Huang, R. 2002, ‘In the spotlight: Laskar Jihad’, Terrorism Project, Washington DC: Center for Defence Information, http://www.cdi.org/terrorism/laskar-pr.cfm Human Rights Watch 1999, ‘East Timor Alert: Stop Transmigrations’, http://www.hrw.org/press/1999/sep/trans0920.htm Inside Indonesia 2002, ‘BP and the Tangguh test’, 70, http://www.insideindonesia.org/edit70/Tangguh1.htm Inside Indonesia 1997, ‘Head on the block: Forestry Minister Jamaludin’, 42, 4 October http://www.insideindonesia.org/digest/dig42.htm Inside Indonesia 1996, ‘An old pattern - arrest of Muslim 'deviants' before an election’,5, 9 February http://www.insideindonesia.org/digest/dig05.htm International Herald Tribune, 13 August 2002. Khilafah.com 6 July 2002, ‘Hizb ut-Tahrir, Indonesia to launch Shariah campaign in 21 cities’, http://www.khilafah.com/home/category.php?DocumentID=4527&TagID=6) Lane, M. 2002, ‘August 17 and the New Order: nation-building problems’, The Jakarta Post, 13 August. Langenberg, M. van 2000, ‘End of the Jakartan empire?’, Inside Indonesia, 61, http://www.insideindonesia.org/edit61/mvl.htm Laskar Jihad Bulletin 1 January 2002, ‘Sorong’. Lindsey, T. 2001, ‘The criminal state: premanisme and the new Indonesia’, in G. Lloyd and S. Smith (eds), Indonesia today: challenges of history, Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, pp. 283-294. Ministry of Foreign Affairs 2000, ‘Transmigration’, Government of Indonesia, http://www.indonesia-ottawa.org/IHb2000/transmig.htm


Nielsen, M. L. 2002, ‘Questioning Aceh’s inevitability: a story of failed national integration?’, Global Politics Network, http://www.globalpolitics.net/framesets/journalframe.html Nietschmann, B. 1999,Economic development by invasion of indigenous nations, University of California (Berkeley), http://www.cwis.org/fwdp/Eurasia/indbang2.txt Pabotinggi, M. 1995, ‘Indonesia: historicising the New Order’s legitimacy dilemma’, in M. Alagappa (ed), Political legitimacy in Southeast Asia: the quest for moral authority, Stanford, Stanford University Press, pp. 224-256. Programme on Humanitarian Policy and Conflict Research 2001, ‘Kalimantan’, Building human security in Indonesia, Harvard College, http://www.preventconflict.org/portal/main/maps_kalimantan_resources.php Programme on Humanitarian Policy and Conflict Research 2001, ‘Transmigration’, Building human security in Indonesia, Harvard College, http://www.preventconflict.org/portal/main/background_transmigration.php Renoe, C. E. 2002, ‘Institutionalised “corruption”: implications for legal reform in Indonesia and the need to make haste slowly’, Stanford Journal of East Asian Affairs, 2, pp. 102-113. Ricklefs, M. C. 1981, A history of modern Indonesia, London: Macmillan. Robertson-Snape, F. 1999, ‘Corruption, collusion and nepotism in Indonesia’, Third World Quarterly, 20 ,3, pp. 589-602. Rowat, R. 1999, ‘Ambon / Maluku?’, Ambon Information Website, http://www.websitesrcg.com/ambon/documents/Advocat1.htm Schwartz, A. 1994, A nation in waiting: Indonesia in the 1990s, Boulder: Westview Press. Schwarz, A. 2000, ‘Devolving Jakarta’s hold on power’, Asian Wall Street Journal, 10 October. Shalom, S. R. 2001, ‘Exxon-Mobil in Aceh’, ZNet Daily Commentaries, 26 June http://www.zmag.org/sustainers/content/2001-06/26shalom.htm Suara Pembaruan 1998,‘Irja dan DI Aceh Pilot Proyek’ 23 September. Sukarsono, A. 2002, ‘Analysis: Megawati finds comfort with Indonesian military’, Reuter, 23 July http://www.infid.be/megawatimilitary.html Sutherland, H. 1979, The making of a bureaucratic elite: the transformation of the Javanese priyayi, Hong Kong: Heinemann Education Books.


TAPOL 2002, ‘Open letter from TAPOL to Prime Minister Tony Blair’, 11 June http://tapol.gn.apc.org/let020611.htm The Jakarta Post 1998; ‘Armed civilian militia plan comes under fire’ 12 December. The Jakarta Post, 2000, ‘Interview with Ikrar Nusa Bhakti’ 20 May. The United States-Indonesia Society, 2001a, Indonesia Today: current trends, future possibilities, Report of a USINDO Workshop, Washington DC: The United States-Indonesia Society, http://www.usindo.org/pdf/website_version.pdf The United State-Indonesia Society 2002b, Islam in modern Indonesia, proceedings of a joint conference sponsored by The United States-Indonesia Society and The Asia Foundation, Washington DC, http://www.usindo.org/Briefs/Islam percent20in percent20Indonesia.htm Turner, K. 2001, Perceptions of ethnic conflict in Ambon, Indonesia, paper presented at the Symposium on ‘Political fault-lines in Southeast Asia: movements for ethnic autonomy in nation-state structures’, organised by the Southeast Asia Research Centre, City University of Hong Kong, 15-16 October. United Nations Economic and Social Council 2002, ‘Specific groups and individuals: mass exoduses and displaced persons’, Report of the Representative of the Secretary-General on internally displaced persons submitted in accordance with Commission resolution 2001/54, Addendum, Profiles in displacement: Indonesia, United Nations Economic and Social Council Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organisation 2000, ‘UNPO News 2000: South Moluccas under siege’, http://www.unpo.org/news/news2000/SouthMoluccas.htm Voice of America, 11 July 2002. Wee, V 2002,‘Social fragmentation in Indonesia: a crisis from Suharto’s New Order’ The Journal of Comparative Asian Development 1 (2), Fall 2002, in press. Wee, V. (2002). Ethno-nationalism in process: ethnicity, atavism and indigenism in Riau, Hong Kong: City University of Hong Kong, Southeast Asia Research Centre, Working Paper no. 22, 2002, http://www.cityu.edu.hk/searc/WP.html Weissman, R. 1998, The Suharto-US Corporate Connection, 26 May http://lists.essential.org/1998/corp-focus/msg00016.html West Papua Information Kit (nd), ‘An island of contrasts’,


http://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/cline/papua/contrasts.htm West Papua Information Kit (nd), ‘Transmigration’, http://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/cline/papua/core.htm West Papua News Online 2002, ‘Open letter from the West Papua Association-UK to the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office, British Government,’ 19 July http://www.westpapua.net/news/02/07/190702-jihad.htm West Papua Niugini/Irian Jaya Homepage (nd), ‘West Papua Niugini: A Statement’, http://www.converge.org.nz/wpapua/history.html Yayasan Hak (nd), ‘Lt-Gen (ret) Abdullah Mahmud Hendropriyono (Hendro Priyono)’, http://yayasanhak.minihub.org/mot/Hendropriyono.htm

Documents

WP34 02 Wee - City University of Hong Kong · ethnic nation-states vary in their ability to command the loyalty of different ... major ethnic groups and hundreds of minor ones in