History, Memory, and the "1965 Incident" in Indonesia (original) (raw)
Related papers
Remembering the 1965 Killings in Indonesia
Kritika Kultura, 2019
After more than fifty years, Indonesia remains muted in its acknowledgement of the killings and disappearances of nearly one million suspected leftists in the anti-Communist pogroms of 1965. While the downfall of Indonesian strongman Suharto had opened up a larger space for democracy, the Indonesian state remains reticent in facing accusations of mass human rights violations that have taken place during his rule. Although many former dissidents and political detainees have come forward with their stories in an effort to "straighten history, " they continue to face harassment from right wing groups as well as the state's intelligence apparatus. Nevertheless, with the advent of the Internet, human rights activists as well as historical "revisionists" have begun to use the cyber sphere as way to fill in the "gaps" in terms of Indonesia's narrative concerning the killings of 1965. This paper investigates the dynamics behind the use of this medium in transmitting this dark episode to a younger generation of Indonesians. It looks specifically at Ingat 1965, a website that utilizes "private memory" as a way to "resist" as well as reinvent the narrative, which has so long been dominated by the state. This paper also includes an investigation into how Indonesia is beginning to deal with its past.
Filling in the Gaps: Remembering the 1965 Killings in Indonesia
Kritika Kultura
After more than fifty years, Indonesia remains muted in its acknowledgement of the killings and disappearances of nearly one million suspected leftists in the anti-Communist pogroms of 1965. While the downfall of Indonesian strongman Suharto had opened up a larger space for democracy, the Indonesian state remains reticent in facing accusations of mass human rights violations that have taken place during his rule. Although many former dissidents and political detainees have come forward with their stories in an effort to "straighten history, " they continue to face harassment from right wing groups as well as the state's intelligence apparatus. Nevertheless, with the advent of the Internet, human rights activists as well as historical "revisionists" have begun to use the cyber sphere as way to fill in the "gaps" in terms of Indonesia's narrative concerning the killings of 1965. This paper investigates the dynamics behind the use of this medium in transmitting this dark episode to a younger generation of Indonesians. It looks specifically at Ingat 1965, a website that utilizes "private memory" as a way to "resist" as well as reinvent the narrative, which has so long been dominated by the state. This paper also includes an investigation into how Indonesia is beginning to deal with its past.
Fifteen years after the fall of the Suharto dictatorship in Indonesia, the authoritarian historical narrative about 1965 that was created by the New Order regime has been defended and reaffirmed by the post-New Order ‘democratic’ state. During the New Order, the 1965 narrative was used to justify and legitimize state sponsored violence against the PKI and other left wing nationalists that resulted in at least half a million deaths in the mid 1960s. This same narrative underpinned the political legitimacy of the newly emerging New Order state and articulated a version of national identity and nation building that was the antithesis of the previous era. The survival of the 1965 narrative has facilitated the survival of anti-communist ideology from the New Order. It continues to underpin political legitimacy for those in power as well as provide impunity for acts of political violence and repression that are used to defend their social and political power. Anti-communist ideology continues to support a restricted notion of citizenship and national identity. Restricted notions of citizenship today significantly constrain the freedoms of civil society to engage in open discourse about the possibilities for deepening and strengthening political democracy and its institutions. The ongoing contestation over the 1965 historical narrative indicates that history and versions of ‘the past’ are part of the dynamic of democratic politics in Indonesia. Analysis of the contestation over the 1965 authoritarian historical narrative allows us to examine the changes and continuities in concepts of national identity and citizenship, and in the categories of political ‘inclusion’ and ‘exclusion’ from the New Order authoritarian regime to the reformed democratic state that exists today.
2020
In the early morning of October 1, 1965, six Indonesian generals were slain, their bodies later found in Lubang Buaya (Crocodile Pit). Shortly after, the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) was officially blamed for the murders and the supposed coup attempt, and General Suharto seized power. Over the proceeding months, a wave of violence emerged, and nearly one million Indonesians, including PKI members as well as those deemed disloyal to the state ideology Pancasila, were executed, and hundreds of thousands more were jailed or exiled. Throughout the next 31 years, Suharto’s New Order regime constructed a collective memory of the 1965 Tragedy which portrayed the PKI as the orchestrators of an attempted coup and as a threat to Pancasila. This narrative was reinforced by various lieux de mémoire (sites of memory), with perhaps the most notable example being the 1984 state-sponsored film Pengkhianatan G30S/PKI (The Treason of the 30 September Movement). Recently, the documentary The Act o...
Indonesia 1965, Half a Century Later
Monthly Review, 2019
Andre Vltcheck has described Indonesia as an "archipelago of fear." 1 Much of that fear comes from one event: the mass killings of 1965-66. At least half a million people were killed-more than the U.S. losses in all wars up to that point. Most were beaten to death with logs and bricks, women had their breasts sliced off, and men were castrated. Bodies were piled up on rafts and sent down the river with the Communist Party of Indonesia (PKI) banner waving overhead.
Critical Asian Studies, 41(2), pp. 195-224., 2009
The collapse of authoritarian regimes and the emergence of new democratic spaces hold the promise of an opportunity to redress instances of past violence. Confronting violent pasts is never an easy task, however, especially when different interest groups stand to lose from such a process. This article explores the role of Indonesia’s largest Islamic organization, Nahdlatul Ulama (NU) in the 1965 killings and shifting views about this past within the NU today. It examines the dramatic move in 2000 of young members of the NU to confront this past and to try to improve relations between members of the NU and former leftists. The article focuses on the reasons for the emergence of Syarikat (Masyarakat Santri untuk Advokasi Rakyat, Muslim Community for Social Advocacy), the nongovernmental organization behind this reconciliation effort, and on responses to its work. As Syarikat’s experience shows, combining the dual goals of societal peace and historical revision has not been an easy task. In its efforts to reinterpret the past, Syarikat is trying to accomplish two somewhat antagonistic objectives: (1) rebutting dominant versions of history and raising awareness about the suffering of former political prisoners, and (2) producing a version of the past that senior members of the NU can live with. Its decision to confront one of the most delicate topics in the history of the NU has had a mixed reception and these responses help us measure the extent of the NU’s commitment to reform and tolerance.
The Indonesian Massacres, 1965-1966: Image and Reality
It is now half a century since the mass killings of 1965-66 in Indonesia, and the multiple human rights abuses which persisted over the next decade and more. Attention has been revived towards what could for a long time be described as a "black hole of history". In Indonesia survivors and their families, human rights organizations, lawyers and academics have called for an end to the impunity which for so long has been enjoyed by the perpetrators. There are calls too for the government to act on the damning report on these events which was delivered to the Attorney-General in 2012 by the National Commission on Human Rights Komnas HAM. Two powerful films by the American film-makers Joshua Oppenheimer have attracted widespread attention in Indonesia (in spite of numerous attempts by right-wing groups to block their showing) and abroad. And in November 2015 an International People's Tribunal (IPT 1965) convened in The Hague to hear compelling evidence of the killings -- in which at least 400,000 civilians died -- and other human rights abuses. (I am a member of the panel of judges, which will deliver its findings later in 2016). It seems relevant therefore to post this paper which I wrote for Mark Levene & Penny Roberts, eds., The Massacre in History (1999) on a dark period of modern history which still remains to be fully explored and exposed.