A Most Diverse Nation: The Past and Fraught Future of Indonesian National Identity
By: Le Citoyen P C
Tags: Indonesia, Culture, Politics, Identity, Lc Society

Elang Adhyaksa for Le Citoyen

It was a cold morning on the mountaintops of Bromo. In the sandy expanses of Bromo’s valleys sits a lone temple; its majesty set against the green rolling hills that seem to stretch indefinitely. The existence of this temple itself raises questions of its own — notably its location nowhere close to any meaningful permanent settlement, barring those serving the hordes of tourists that make their way to these valleys by the thousands. Any semblance of population near the temple is also predominantly Muslim, further putting into question how this humble temple came about. Just as these thoughts cross the mind, a number of Tenggerese made their way into the temple to offer sacraments.

The Tenggerese are a predominantly Hindu ethnic group native to these mountains, culturally and religiously distinct from the Muslim Javanese that predominate the surrounding lands. They are isolated from the Javanese, by virtue of the mountains, insofar as that their distinct culture was allowed to flourish instead of being simply absorbed into the Javanese cultural fabric. A holdover of Hindu Majapahit culture, the Tenggerese speak an archaic form of Javanese, immune from the influence of Islamic sultanates and other cultural changes undergone by the Javanese of the lowlands. Indeed, without these mountains, the Tenggerese would assimilate, becoming simply another offshoot of Javanese culture, lacking a significant distinction to deserve to be called its own ethnic group. The Tenggerese, perched in their mountains, retained their Hindu culture, even as Islam spread across the lowlands.

The case of the Tenggerese is hardly unique in Indonesia — in fact, it is more the norm than the exception. Indonesia has the distinction of being among the most diverse countries on the planet. Its geography, that of population centres spread thinly across fertile alluvial plains and hillsides, separated from each other by wide seas, impenetrable tropical jungles, and awesome mountain ranges, foster this diversity. Each alluvial plain, isolated from each other, fosters its own culture and dominates its surroundings, expanding until it meets jungle and mountain, where a separate, isolated people reside, itself fostering a culture of its own.

These geographical barriers, however, are not fully impenetrable. Throughout history, civilisations across the Indonesian archipelago have attempted to penetrate through these barriers, forging great maritime empires, bridging different population centres and unifying them under one rule — some more successful than others. The Srivijaya Empire, centred on the alluvial plain of the Musi near today’s Palembang, exploited its naval supremacy to build a maritime empire across the seas between Java, Sumatra, and the Malay Peninsula. The Majapahit, centred in Trowulan near the sheltered waters of modern Surabaya, overcame the seas to expand to nearly all of the Indonesian archipelago and the Malay Peninsula. By way of conquest and trade, these empires spread their custom and culture across the archipelago’s dispersed population centres, introducing a semblance of coherence among the diverse ethnic groups of the archipelago. In the end, however, geography triumphed — no culture was able to spread and dominate to an extent that would allow a homogenisation of the Indonesian archipelago, and as a result Indonesia retained its cultural diversity. This is especially apparent in places where the maritime empires, bound to the coasts, failed to penetrate — the deep jungles and mountains where isolated tribes, such as the Tenggerese, reside.

The history of Indonesian civilisation, in fact, had always centred on the interaction between the state and the various cultures under its rule. The modern Republic of Indonesia is no different. The story of the modern Republic rose from the struggle of native Indonesians against Dutch colonial rule — disparate uprisings and isolated guerrillas synthesising as one movement, united in its cause and idea of nationhood, following the Indonesian National Awakening at the turn of the 20th century. As the archipelago transitioned into independence in the 1950s the Republic had to embark on a nation-building project to unite its diverse people, especially as the common cause Indonesians could previously be counted on to rally behind — Indonesian independence — had been achieved. The Republic became no stranger to regionalist and separatist rebellions thereafter, as it consolidated a national identity to unite the archipelago once more, in the veins of the Srivijaya and Majapahit Empires. The Republic sought to transcend geography itself, in its drive to consolidate a national identity that penetrates jungles and crosses seas. It seeks to consolidate an identity that the Javanese, Sundanese, Papuan, Manadonese, and others alike can identify with, whether they are Muslim, Christian, Hindu, Buddhist, or Confucian. Thus, the Indonesian nationality, along with the national ideology of Pancasila, are born — with all its deliberate ambiguity, designed so that any Indonesian can identify with it and claim as their own.

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None of this is to reject the fact that, despite its diversity, all Indonesians form a single, fraternal Indonesian nation. Surely, it may not directly conform to the Western conception of the nation, defined strictly on ethnic, and often religious, lines, even as some in the West are beginning to embrace multiculturalism. The Indonesian conception of nationhood is far more nuanced, inclusive, and perhaps romantic, centred around a Malay and Austro-Melanesian heritage and a common history of trade relations that stretches millennia, far predating the colonial period. It is a national identity mediated by Bahasa Indonesia as a national language, derived from Malay, which has long been lingua franca of the peoples of the archipelago. Allegations that Indonesia is an ‘artificial state’ is based on a misguided and narrow idea of nationhood, or simply on hideous misinformation.

That said, even with this broad conception of the nation, or perhaps precisely because of it, the consolidation of Indonesian national identity has not always come naturally, as it has for the ethno-states of Europe. Nevertheless, the modern Republic has made significant strides in this regard. Bahasa Indonesia is almost universally spoken by Indonesians, albeit as a second language. Indonesia has built a fairly centralised government, capable of functioning across provincial borders and geographical barriers. Indonesians generally identify with the flag and the national identity, which has coexisted with local identity. All these we take for granted, yet they are all privileges that most other postcolonial states do not enjoy, even those with less cultural and geographical hindrances towards national coherence. This will be crucial going forward, as a nation’s success is intertwined with its ability to foster national coherence — not to mention that coherence prevents an otherwise fractured country from descending into civil conflict.

This relative success, however, has not come automatically. It is the result of seven decades of conscious and consistent nation building, often under authoritarian conditions. Of course, we can, and should, continue the process of nation building, but the brunt of Indonesian identity has been forged in conditions we could not — should not — replicate. Not to mention that the trend in this post-Reformasi era leans towards decentralisation, resulting in less focus on nation building and more on the promotion of regionalism. It is therefore imperative that we defend the foundations of Indonesian nationhood, those very foundations that the Republic has paid in treasure and blood to establish — foundations that come under threat in this post-Reformasi era, where identity politics run rampant. It may be identity politics that will prove to be the modern Republic’s undoing — its failure to halt identity politics may well undo decades of nation building. This, therefore, will be the foremost challenge of our generation: to preserve and further consolidate unity and national identity in the face of democratisation, where freedom of expression is enshrined. A balance must be found between considerations of national unity and freedom of expression, in which neither is excessively sacrificed in the interest of the other. It is how the Republic responds to this seminal task that defines how the Republic shall be recorded in posterity — just as the Majapahit Empire was revered as having united the Indonesian archipelago, our Republic — and by extension, our generation — shall be remembered in how we will preserve the unity of our nation — or how we will fail to do so.

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We ought to come to the realisation that every 17th of August, what we celebrate is simply yet another iteration of the millennia-long state-building experiment on the Indonesian archipelago. The Srivijaya Empire, the Majapahit, and all the other empires of old, have attempted some unification of the archipelago. They each succeeded to a certain extent, until their disintegration, during which a new empire takes its place. The modern Republic has been undoubtedly successful in this regard so far, yet it should be concerned about how long it wants to last, and whether it will leave behind a legacy of unity or of division.

I spoke with a Tenggerese man on my way down from the slopes of Bromo. It never ceases to touch, amaze, and utterly awe me how I was able to speak with this man of significantly different upbringing, background, and religious beliefs, whilst nonetheless connecting with him on a deeper level, by tapping into our common tongue and shared experiences as members of this most diverse nation. I just hope my grandchildren can do the same.