26 - 28 JULY 1999
YOGYAKARTA, INDONESIA
Continuity and Crisis in the Indonesian Economy
This is an exceptionally exciting time in Indonesia, caught in the toils of both sudden political change and mastering the current economic crisis. A link was forged between experiences from Indonesian economic history and today's predicaments and challenges during an international conference hosted by the Department of History at Gadjah Mada University in Yogyakarta in late July 1999. The conference testified to the recent revival of the field of economic history in Indonesia. The revival has been reinforced by intensified international co-operation and increasing contacts between historians and economists within Indonesia.
By J. THOMAS LINDBLAD
The Yogyakarta conference was in fact the second international conference held in Indonesia specifically devoted to Indonesian economic history (the first one took place in Jakarta in 1991). The meeting at Yogyakarta formed the conclusion of a four-year project of co-operation between Dutch and Indonesian economic historians sponsored by the Royal Netherlands Academy of Sciences. Other sponsors of the conference included the Toyota Foundation and the Yayasan Pendidikan Kebangsaan in Jakarta.The three-day conference, from 26 to 28 July, attracted participants from not only Indonesia and the Netherlands but also from Australia and Japan. The keynote address was delivered by Emil Salim, one-time Minister for Environmental Affairs and a former economics professor at the University of Indonesia in Jakarta.
The general theme of the conference was 'Crisis and Continuity: the Indonesian Economy in the Twentieth Century'. This theme was discussed in twelve papers, one half about the late colonial period and the other half concerning the Soekarno and Soeharto periods. The level of analysis included both global approaches and detailed case studies. A few examples may suffice. Cees Fasseur (Leiden) analysed the failure of the Dutch colonial Government to implement an effective industrialization policy before the Pacific War, whereas Arjan Taselaar (PhD from Leiden) invited comparisons with the present day with his description of institutionalized links between private business and the colonial administration. At the level of case studies, Roger Knight (Adelaide) and Arthur van Schaik (Amsterdam) drew attention to the complexities of land and labour arrangements on Java sugar estates, while Y. Uemura (Hiroshima) offered insights into how government interference in local rice markets in 1918-20 actually worked out. Jamie Mackie (formerly ANU, Canberra) urged for a reappraisal of Soekarno's achievements with respect to nation-building in Indonesia. Two Yogyakarta economists, Laksono Trisnantoro and Budhi Soesetyo, introduced a historical dimension into the young field of health economics in Indonesia linking disparities in treatment and quality to political choices. Proceedings based on a selection of all these contributions will be published as one or two special issues of the Yogyakarta history journal Lembaran Sejarah.
At the Yogyakarta conference the conventional setup of individual presentations was supplemented by three separate panel discussions. One concerned a new comprehensive textbook on Indonesian economic history that is being prepared at the present by a team of authors consisting of Thee Kian Wie (Jakarta), Howard Dick (Melbourne), Vincent Houben (Passau), and J. Thomas Lindblad (Leiden). The penultimate manuscript of the book was presented to the conference participants and subjected to a critical examination. The book is scheduled to appear in the year 2000.
A second separate panel inevitably focused on the current Asian crisis. Anne Booth (SOAS, London) placed the decline in income and employment since 1997 in a historical perspective and discussed the agenda for economic reform, whereas Sri Adinigsith (Gadjah Mada) offered an overview of the liberalization in Indonesian banking that preceded the crisis.
The final day of the conference was largely devoted to yet another separate panel containing presentations by so-called 'young' Indonesian research in economic history, i.e. reports on research in progress in preparation of MA or PhD theses. Topics ranged from legal arrangements in the feudal economy of the Central Javanese sultanates in the nineteenth century to labour relations in contemporary North Sumatra or the successive technological upgrading in Indonesian textile manufacturing. Two presentations originated in a larger project on the history of the Jva Sea region between 1870 and 1970 based at the Diponegoro University in Semarang and one individual project explored regional economic development in Besuki in East Java. The three panels during the conference underscored the strong international dimension in current synthesis in Indonesian economic history as well as the immediate link with today's urgent issues. Last but not least, they made clear that a young generation of Indonesian historians, devoted to their country's economic history, is taking shape and prepared to carry on the work of previous generations. *
Dr J. Thomas Lindblad, Department of Southeast Asian Studies, Universiteit Leiden.
E-mail: j.th.lindblad@worldonline.nl