The arena for people's politics

Zaman Bergerak, Radikalisme Rakyat di Jawa 1912-1926 (An Age in Motion: Popular Radicalism in Java, 1912-1926) By Takashi Shiraishi (Translated into Indonesian by Hilmar Farid Setiadi) Grafiti Pers, 1997 504 pp Rp 31,500

JAKARTA (JP): Foreign experts on Indonesia have focused most of their attention on history over politics, anthropology and other social sciences.

Several books written by historians -- both local and foreign -- have looked at Indonesian history from various perspectives. The Indonesian Historiography, edited by Soedjatmoko, shows clearly how varying is this bibliography, from the Dutch colonial point of view to national, Western and even Russian ones.

Works by Japanese scientists are still few compared to those by Dutch, Australian, Americans or French. Almost all studies by Japanese are focused around their occupation of the country during World War II.

Takashi Shiraishi in this book has tried to shift the focus to other fields in studies mostly concentrated on Indonesian modern history of this century. A graduate of Cornell University, home to one of the best Indonesian centers in the U.S., his work shows deconstructive and discursive nuances similar to those of Benedict R'OG Anderson, a Cornell professor.

Unlike other historians who base their works on formal political documents, Shiraishi also expands his research on sources of Indonesian history to the literary field. Zaman Bergerak successfully hurdles the conventional historiography dominant in the writing of the Indonesian nationalist movement.

He has the impressive ability to prove the segmentation of contemporary political bases, Islam, nationalism and communism is nothing but an illusion created by the colonial authority in order to cripple the nature of the people's movement. First introduced as a historical reality by Petrus Blumberger, it has been adopted by many historians.

As a historical work portraying the people's resistance against colonialism, this book does not expose heroic rhetoric, often used by other historians, but focuses more minutely on the dynamics and political competition among the nationalists.

The writer does not place the positions of the Dutch authorities and the nationalists in a black-and-white dichotomy because Indonesian activists did not always stand in a unified position.

In his earlier work, The Disputes Between Tjipto Mangoenkoesoemo and Soetatmo Soeriokoesoemo, Satria vs Pandita, which appeared in Indonesia, the magazine published by the Modern Indonesia Project at Cornell, Shiraishi described the debate between two nationalists about the idea of nationalism as a discursive field in the search for an "imagined community".

The debate can be seen more clearly in Zaman Bergerak, in which Semaoen, Tjipto, Misbach and Mas Marco face Tjokroaminoto, Soerjopranoto, Agus Salim and Samanhoedi.

According to the author,pergerakan, or nationalist movement, has a larger and more complex meaning than merely the reawakening of nationalism. It is a complex and dynamic process which has roots in the people's endeavors to put their ideas into practice, and articulate them in words and deeds.

Shiraishi found these facts in the arenas of the people's movement in which workers, peasants, journalists and members of the upper class played active roles in political parties such as Sarekat Islam, Sarekat Hindia (Nationale Indische Partij), ISDV, Indische Journalist Bond and Partij Communist Hindia.

They used Dutch political terms like vergadering, voordracht, vakboden, partij, communism, democratie and capitalist which had never been used here before. Contemporary political means also included mass gatherings, newspapers, Javanese traditional shows and strikes.

Shiraishi also discusses the dynamics of radical people's movements in Surakarta, Semarang and Yogyakarta, the activities of which were widely reported by Sinar Hindia, Islam Bergerak, Medan Moeslimin, Oetoesan Hindia and Api newspapers. The mass media played a role in supporting the people's thinking.

Hadji Misbach's thoughts about Islam and communism were printed in serials in Medan Moeslimin (Moslem Arena) newspaper. Misbach started writing the lengthy articles after he was exiled by the Dutch to Manokwari, a town in what is now Irian Jaya.

Shiraishi's work is a graphic picture of the Indonesian people's movement during the Dutch colonial period.

-- Wahyu Susilo

The reviewer is a history graduate from 11th March University in Surakarta. He works at the Jakarta office of Solidaritas Perempuan, a non-governmental organization for promotion of women's rights.