Reconsidering the ‘Great Debate’ on Indonesian National Culture in 1935-

1942*

I Gusti Agung Ayu Ratih

Jaringan Kerja Budaya

Abstract: This paper examines one of the key, influential intellectual debates among Indonesian
nationalists on the question of culture. The debate, which took place in the pages of the journal
Pudjangga Baru in the mid to late 1930s, has usually been viewed as a debate between
'modernists' and 'traditionalists', between those partial to 'Western' culture and those partial to
'indigenous' culture. Such characterizations of the debate are, I believe, too crude. The few
existing analyses of the debate have missed many of its most interesting aspects. I analyze the
debate in terms of the shared assumptions and blindspots of both sides concerning the very
concepts of culture, nation, and politics. Placing the writers involved in the debate in a historical
context, I also argue that their differing perspectives on 'culture' were connecting to their
differing political agendas for nationalist politics.

Colonialism forces the colonized to always wonder who am I?

---- Frantz Fanon

Introduction

To commemorate the centennial anniversary of the Dutch independence in 1913, the Netherlands East

Indies government planned large-scale, expensive celebrations. It demanded money to defray the costs

not only from Dutch citizens living in the archipelago but also from its colonial subjects. The irony was

thereby doubled: the Dutch held a celebration of their national independence amid a colonized population

and forced that population to help pay for it. One “native” in Java published a pamphlet at that time to

point out the irony. The author, R.M. Suwardi Surjaningrat, wrote the text in Dutch and titled it “If I were

*
Paper presented at the Indonesia International Cultural Studies Conference: “Global-Local Nexus in Cultural
Studies”, Trawas, East Java, February 3-5, 2003.
 2

a Dutchman” (Als ik eens een Neerlander was).1 The text was a brilliant evocation of the predicament of

the colonial subject who kept being reminded that s/he lived in a world of nation-states yet was denied

inclusion into any nation, especially the nation in whose name the colonial state ruled. Although Suwardi

was from a royal family of Central Java, he realized that what he faced in the Dutch was not another

nobility to whom the Javanese nobility was in a relationship of vassalage. He faced a nation, one that had

turned its royal ruler (Queen Wilhemina) at that time, into nothing more than a symbol of its nationhood.

Benedict Anderson, while commenting on Suwardi’s text in his book Imagined Communities, has noted

that colonial states “inevitably brought what were increasingly thought of and written about as European

‘national’ histories in the consciousness of the colonized – not merely via occasional obtuse festivities,

but also through reading-rooms and classrooms.”2 The importance of Suwardi’s text for Anderson is as a

registering of the impact of colonial education about nationalism, the transmission of the generic, or what

Anderson calls the “modal” concept of the nation. Indeed, Suwardi himself wrote in one passage that if he

were a Dutchman he would be concerned that he was, by celebrating national independence, sending an

unintentional signal to the natives: “Their hopes are being encouraged, unconsciously we awaken their

wishes and aspirations for future independence.”3

There is, however, another important question that Anderson does not raise: if Suwardi imagines himself

as a Dutchman and knows that he is not a Dutchman, what does he imagine his “real” national identity to

be? What positive content does he fill in to his already established and institutionalized identity as not-

Dutch? Today we might automatically assume that he thought of himself as Indonesian. But that would be

an anachronistic assumption. At the time, Suwardi was a leader of one of the first political parties in the

1
The leaders of IP originally planned to publish Suwardi’s writing in the daily Tjahaja Timoer in Malang, East Java.
But then they decided to distribute thousands of leaflets throughout Java. See M. Balfas, Dr. Tjipto
Mangoenkoesoemo, pp. 10-11. For complete Dutch and Indonesian text, see Ki Hadjar Dewantara, Dari
Kebangunan Nasional sampai Proklamasi Kemerdekaan, pp. 250-262.
2
Benedict R. O’G. Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origins and Spread of Nationalism (New
York: Verso, 1991), p. 118.
3
Quotes in James Siegel, Fetish, Recognition, Revolution (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1997), p. 28.
 3

East Indies called the Indische Partij that was developing a conception of an “Indies” national identity,4

The party wanted this identity to include all the people in the Netherlands East Indies, regardless of their

race, religion and ethnic group, but it wound up attracting few people outside the mixed race Eurasian

community. 5 Suwardi was also self-consciously Javanese. Although he translated his Dutch-language text

into Melayu, he explicitly addressed a Javanese readership.6 (One may note that the Indische Partij

published two newspapers: one in Dutch and the other in Javanese.) The unresolved questions he and his

contemporaries kept having to wrestle with were: what identity should be the basis for their nationalism?

Should their nationalism be inclusive all the subjects of the colonial state, or just those of one island, or

those of one class, or one religion, or one ethnolinguistic group? Should their nationalism be based on

existing identities or on the creation of an entirely new one?

One of the best places to look for their answers to these questions is the debate of the mid-1930s that has

come to be known as the Culture Debate (Polemik Kebudayaan) and in some cases the “Great Debate.” 7

4
Suwardi founded the Indische Partij along with two other activists, Dr. Douwes Dekker and Dr. Tjipto
Mangoenkusumo. Douwes Dekker was a great nephew of Eduard Douwes Dekker (Multatuli), a Dutch assistant
resident in Lebak, West Java, whose much celebrated novel Max Havelaar (1860) illuminated the inhuman character
of Dutch Cultivation System in Java. He was a journalist for different Dutch newspapers when he began to know
student activists from the medical school STOVIA of the early 20th century. He was involved in the formation of
Boedi Oetomo, one of the first modern organizations established by a group of young Javanese doctors, and his
strong anti-Dutch sentiment had made him close friend to nationalist leaders of the 1920s. Brief life story about
Douwes Dekker is in Ki Hadjar Dewantara, Dari Kebangunan Nasional Sampai Proklamasi Kemerdekaan (Jakarta:
N.V. Pustaka and Penerbit Endang, n.d. foreword 1952), pp. 229-237
Tjipto Mangoenkoesoemo was a graduate of STOVIA who also joined Boedi Oetomo (BO). But, he soon resigned
from the organization because he considered BO as too moderate, apolitical, and merely concerned with Javanese
culture. He was known as a ‘born rebel’, ‘true democrat’, for his outright criticism of Javanese prijaji culture and
his unbending stand against Dutch colonialism. A more comprehensive description of Tjipto’s ideas can be found in
M. Balfas, Dr. Tjipto Mangoenkoesoemo, Demokrat Sedjati (Jakarta: Penerbit Djambatan, 1957) For further
discussion about the first generation of nationalist intelligentsia, see Robert van Niel, The Emergence of the Modern
Indonesian Elite (The Hague, Bandung: W. Van Hoeve, 1955)
5
Even though IP attempted to elicit support from other racial groups, such as the Chinese and the Arabs, the
majority of the supporters had always been the Eurasians. By 1913 IP managed to obtain 7,000 members of whom
5,500 were Eurasians and 1,500 were Indonesians. See Kenji Tsuchiya, Democracy and Leadership, pp. 17-18. For
historical context surrounding the birth of Indische Party and the significant role of its leaders, see Takashi Shiraishi,
An Age in Motion; Abdurrachman Surjomihardjo, Ki Hadjar Dewantara dan Taman Siswa dalam Sejarah Indonesia
Modern (Jakarta: Penerbit Sinar Harapan, 1986), Chapter III; and also, Ruth McVey, The Rise of Indonesian
Communism (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1965), Chapter I.
6
Ibid., p. 35.
7
The various contributions to the debate have been compiled in Achdiat K. Mihardja, Polemik Kebudayaan (Jakarta:
Pustaka Jaya, 1977)
 4

The editor of the literary journal Pudjangga Baru (New Poet), Sutan Takdir Alisjahbana, touched off the

debate in 1935 by writing a broadside against the ideas of Suwardi, who had by that time established a

large network of schools and dropped his aristocratic Javanese name. From 1928 onward, he referred to

himself (and was referred to) as Ki Hadjar Dewantara.

One interesting point about this debate is that it was exclusively about the question of Indonesian culture.

Only twenty years prior when Suwardi/Ki Hadjar wrote “If I Were a Dutchman” the term Indonesia was

rarely used. The first organization to use the term was the Communist Party of Indonesia (PKI) founded

in 1920. This new name for this nation-in-the-making became more frequently and passionately put into

currency over the 1920s.8 The moment that has now been sacralized in nationalist historiography was the

declaration of the Oath of Youth on October 28, 1928 which proclaimed the existence of Indonesia united

by the slogan, “one fatherland, one nation, and one language.”9 However much the Oath of Youth became

fetishized in later years, it does conveniently illustrate a certain consensus that developed in the 1920s:

there was to be only one nationalism in the Netherlands East Indies and it was to be Indonesian

nationalism. The question for these nationalists then became more narrowly: what was this Indonesian

national identity? If there was to be only one nationalism, how was it to negotiate between all of the other

identities?

In this essay, I will compare the agendas of Ki Hajar and Sutan Takdir Alisjahbana for Indonesian

nationalism. The difference between the agendas of the two men has usually been seen as a difference

between tradition and modernity, with Ki Hajar representing the voice of tradition and Alisjahbana
8
For detailed analysis on the character of social movements in Java during the first two decades of this century, see
Takashi Shiraishi, An Age in Motion: Popular Radicalism in Java, 1912-1926 (Ithaca: Cornell University Press,
1990).
9
The pledge was declared in the second Indonesian Youth Congress in Batavia on 26-27 October 1928. The driving
force behind this Congress was an association of student organizations, PPPI, set up by PNI (Indonesian Nationalist
Party) under Soekarno. On the founding and early history of PNI, see John Ingleson, Road to Exile: The Indonesian
Nationalist Movement, 1927-1934 (ASAA Southeast Asia Publication Series, Singapore, 1979). For a descriptive
account of the Congress, see “Kongres Pemuda-Pemuda Indonesia, Lahirnya “Soempah Pemoeda”, 1928”
Verslaggever S.K. Darmokondo, 1928, compiled in Zainoel Ihsan and Pitut Soeharto, eds., Aku Pemuda Kemarin di
Hari Esok (Jakarta: Penerbit Jayasakti, 1981) pp. 139-60.
 5

representing that of modernity. Ki Hajar has been seen as an advocate of Eastern/Oriental/

Asian/indigenous culture while Sutan Takdir has been seen as the champion of Western, European

culture.10 It is unfortunate that the debate has not received more detailed analysis since there were many

complex issues being addressed in it. I think both men were modernizers. The difference between them

was actually over their view of modernity, their belief about what kind of modernity was desirable. As I

will argue below, Ki Hajar, the so-called traditionalist, had a much more nuanced and mature view of

modernity than Sutan Takdir whose black-and-white, rigidly dichotomous view could hardly understand

the very consequences of what he was proposing.

I should note at the outset that this debate between Ki Hajar and Sutan Takdir is not purely of historical

interest. The predominant view of Indonesian nationalism under the New Order was very much in line

with Takdir’s vision, as will become obvious in the discussion below.

Sutan Takdir Alisjahbana: Nationalism as a Mimicry

Sutan Takdir Alisjahbana began his literary career working as an editor for the colonial government

publishing house, Balai Pustaka, which was designed to produce politically suitable literature for the

‘natives’.11 In 1932, Takdir, then a twenty-four year-old graduate of the Kweekschool [Teacher’s Training

College] in Bukittinggi, Sumatra, was responsible for a special literary column entitled Memajukan

Kesusastraan [Advancing Literature] in one of Balai Pustaka’s Malay-language biweekly publications,

Panji Pustaka. It was in this column that Takdir launched a series of articles entitled Menuju

Kesusastraan Baru [Towards a New Literature]. Although the articles basically proposed innovations in

the themes and forms of Malay literary expression, they also expressed his analysis about the changing

nature of the Indonesian society and the role of the artist. Takdir argued that Malay literature was stagnant

10
Claire Holt, Art in Indonesia: Continuities and Change (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1967). See particularly
Part III: Modern Art, pp. 211-254.
11
On the role of Balai Pustaka as an institution whose interest was maintaining Dutch control over the Indies, see
Hilmar Farid Setiadi, “Kolonialisme dan Budaya: Balai Poestaka di Hindia Belanda”, in Prisma 10 (Oktober 1991)
pp. 23-46
 6

because the society producing it was stagnant. Indonesian society was based on the principle of

collectivism, what today post-Orwell might be called group-think, which limited individual originality.

The traditional forms of Malay poetry (pantun and syair) had become fixed and did not allow the writer

room for experimentation. For Takdir, the task of modernizing Malay literature, of making it new, was

paradoxically to imitate already existing models of European literature.

...in the meeting of our people with the West, which in almost everything is more advanced than

we are, the literature of our people will undergo a certain amount of influence. Malay literature,

which up till now has grown of its own accord, is receiving a breath of fresh air from the West. It

is laying aside some of its own criteria, and replacing them with those found in the literature of a

foreign race.12

Takdir’s call for Westernizing Indonesian literature found an enthusiastic response from another

Sumatran writer, Armijn Pane, who was a teacher in a Taman Siswa school in Kediri, East Java. They

began a regular correspondence in September 1932 after Armijn sent his poems to Takdir’s column. Out

of this contact Armijn suggested that they should publish an independent literary medium which was not

subject to the restrictive editorial policy of the colonial government’s cultural bureau. Moreover, Armijn

was particularly aware that Takdir’s affiliation with Balai Pustaka would render him suspect to the

nationalist circle which was trying to sever ties with any colonial institution. Armijn approached well-

respected figures such as Dr. Husein Djajadiningrat and Ki Hadjar Dewantara and sent letters to writers

all over Indonesia to seek contributions and moral support.13

12
Cited in Keith Foulcher, Pujangga Baru: Literature and Nationalism in Indonesia, 1933-1942 (Flinders
University Asian Studies Monograph No. 2, 1980), p. 5. The statement originally appeared in Sutan Takdir
Alisjahbana, “Menuju Kesusastraan Baru VII, Puisi Baru dan Lama”, Panji Pustaka, XI/14, 17 February 1933.
13
For well-documented description about the process of establishing Pujangga Baru, see Keith Foulcher, Pujangga
Baru, especially Part 2. Their main financial support was from a Dutch commercial printer, Kolff & Co. They
agreed to accept the support as long as the printer did not interfere in the editorial matters of the journal. A
prospectus of Pujangga Baru was released in February 1933. Having attracted no more than 140 subscribers after
the prospectus, Kolff & Co. did not perceive that the journal would be a commercial success and decided to cancel
publication with the first issue which came out in July 1933. It is not clear how Pujangga Baru managed to resume
publication, especially in its luxurious format, after the Dutch printer declined further business. It is possible that
they managed to obtain financial support from the Malay sultans in Sumatra and from regular subscribers and
 7

In its first two years, 1933-1934, Pujangga Baru directed its efforts to unify poets and writers from all

over Indonesia who were interested in a ‘new’ form of Indonesian language literature. The chief editors of

the journal, Sutan Takdir Alisjahbana and Armijn Pane, believed that Indonesian writers and poets had to

produce literature which represented the spirit of the ‘new’ age and encourage the people to march toward

the nation’s future ‘greatness’ and ‘glory’. The word ‘new’ as the journal title suggested became the

keyword in all the writings in Pujangga Baru. Partly, it represented the novelty of the idea of nationalism.

On the other hand, it also stressed the role of the youth in leading the nation toward modern age. It was in

the hands of passionate and spiritful ‘youth’ that the ‘new’ literature found its ideal form -- free from old

tradition and provincialism. This belief in the power of youth was presented at its best in Takdir’s

introductory writing Menuju Seni Baru [Toward a New Art]:

Young Indonesia is standing up facing the new era, full of restlessness to create a world according

to its new fantasies and beliefs, which are ebullient in his youthful blood. It senses the power to

renovate and to destroy before building something new, which is in accordance with the seething

current of its soul and era. In this great confusion it will explore its own path, believe in its own

power, without fear.14

Takdir’s passionate piece was complemented with Armijn Pane’s article on Kesusastraan Baru [New

Literature]. Armijn analyzed the era in which they lived as a period of ‘restlessness’ where the colonial

society was torn between western and eastern civilization and between local culture and national culture.

Yet, he argued that in such a ‘dualistic’ society, one could not categorize each individual in a distinctive

group because “Everybody seems to be floating in the air, one can not fly up, nor go down since the

ground on which to land is not yet there.” He further stated that:

advertisers.
14
Pujangga Baru (hereafter PB) Vol. I/1, July 1933, p. 6
 8

No matter what, they are all the same, they all searched for a new path which can express the wave

of their soul and the light of their mind. This new soul and thought which was not known by

earlier generations ... forced them to employ new utterances, new forms, which are compatible and

true to their feeling and thinking.15

This enthusiasm with the newness and youthfulness can be traced back to the spirit of the Oath of Youth

declared at the end of the Second Youth Congress of 1928. Both Takdir and Armijn took part in the

Congress where for the first time several youth organizations from all over the archipelago proclaimed

Indonesia to be a unified country, one people with one language.16 With the proclamation of this oath,

‘young’ Indonesia was ready to take a step further to pursue its grandeur and leave the complicated

political bickerings of the earlier period in the nationalist movement. Since the Pudjangga Baru editors

perceived that the youth’s commitment to overcome ethnic differences came merely as a result of contacts

with Western ideas, the formation of ‘new’ Indonesian culture would depend on nothing else but adoption

of European culture.

Takdir enthusiastically greeted Indonesian nationalism. He saw it as the merciless destroyer of the feudal,

backward culture in which he felt stuck. The nationalist youths like himself had a “bubbling passion” and

“restlessness” that could only be accommodated by a new, more liberating way of life. In reading

Pudjangga Baru, one would come to believe that feudalism in Indonesian society, with its so-called

“traditional” culture, was more objectionable than Dutch colonialism.17 Indeed, Takdir believed that the

Indonesian people had been dominated by foreign powers for centuries because of their ‘static’ nature.

Indonesians were passive, disunited, superstitious and had no interest in the material world. It was the

idea of nationhood derived from Western culture that finally awakened them from their age-old slumber.

To proceed to the future and to be able to compete in the world Indonesians had to become ‘dynamic’ just

15
PB, Vol. I/1, July 1933, p. 11
16
On the declaration of the Oath of Youth and the Second Indonesian Youth Congress, see note 2 above.
17
Bakri Siregar, Sedjarah Sastera Indonesia Modern (Akademi Sastera dan Bahasa “Multatuli”, 1964) p. 98
 9

like the societies that produced colonialism. They had to adopt the values of ‘dynamic’ societies that were

already politically and culturally dominant in the world, such as the United States, Europe and Japan. If in

the past, Indonesians adopted values from Indian and Arab cultures, in the future they would have to learn

from the West. After all, according to Takdir, everything that brought changes for the better -- modern

organization, end of primordial ties, and technology -- came from, or through the West.

Appearing at a time when the nationalist movement faced internal conflicts and suffered from severe

repression during the late 1933, the ideas proposed by Pujangga Baru hardly received an enthusiastic

response. Criticism against its open admiration of the West and its apolitical stance came from both the

conservative Malay linguists and culturalists and a wide sector of the nationalist movement. For the

conservative circle, Pujangga Baru’s attempt to reform Malay language and literature was considered

destructive to the purity of the language. For some of the nationalists, the journal’s association with Balai

Pustaka and Kolff & Co. showed its lack of commitment to the nation’s struggle for independence from

the Dutch. Nevertheless, Pujangga Baru was one of the few mediums in which young artists could freely

express their cultural aspirations.18 In a sense, Pudjangga Baru could become an important journal

because nearly all the other activities that smacked of nationalism in the mid-1930s were destroyed. Many

nationalists begrudgingly supported it since it was a safe medium that could still convey some nationalist

ideas.

In the midst of the political wreckage of the movement, Sutan Takdir proposed what he called a

‘reconstruction’ of Indonesian culture. At the National Education Congress held in Solo in June 1935, he

attacked what he called the anti-intellectualism, anti individualism, anti-egoism, and anti-materialism of

many of his fellow nationalists.19 He advocated precisely the values that most of the Congress participants

were against. He summed up his views in a series of slogans:

18
See Bakri Siregar, Sedjarah Sastera Indonesia Modern, pp. 83-87; also, Keith Foulcher, Pujangga Baru, pp. 14-
15
19
See Achdiat K. Mihardja, Polemik Kebudayaan.
 10

The Indonesian mind has to be sharpened in order to match the Western mind!

The individual has to be enlivened as never before!

Consciousness about self interest has to be awakened!

The Indonesian nation has to be encouraged to accumulate material wealth as much as possible!

In all directions, the Indonesian nation has to be developed!20

Takdir explicitly criticized the educational system developed by Ki Hajar in the Taman Siswa schools. In

his view, the sense of collectivity nurtured in Taman Siswa schools ruined the development of the

individual ‘I’, while the stress on indigenous culture prevented the desire to create something new.21

Following the conference, Takdir elaborated on his criticisms in the pages of his journal. Between 1935-

37, throughout the third and fourth volumes of Pujangga Baru, he published a series of articles titled

Menuju Masyarakat dan Kebudayaan Baru [Toward a New Society and Culture]. It was these that

touched off the “Great Debate.”

What was lacking in the Indonesian society, Takdir argued, was an ‘economic spirit.’ Indonesians had for

so long ignored the physical world, taken pride in being poor and simple, and lost the passion for

conquering nature and enriching themselves. This was the major cause of the nation’s submission to

Dutch colonialism. The task of the national schools, therefore, was to encourage their students to “respect,

pursue, employ and exercise control over material needs.” Instead of challenging the Dutch government,

Indonesian schools should train the students in the sciences by which they could master nature and

produce material wealth.22

20
See “Semboyan yang Tegas” in Achdiat K. Mihardja, Polemik Kebudayaan, p. 42.
21
See “Di Tengah-tengah Perdjoeangan Keboedajaan”, in PB Vol. IV/3-4, September/Oktober 1936), pp.33-7
22
See “Sikap Jang Nyata” in PB III/12, June 1936, and also, “Student Kita” part I, in PB IV/9, March 1937 and part
2 in PB IV/10, April 1937
 11

When Suwardi wrote “If I were a Dutchman” in 1913, he did not propose that he should become a

Dutchman. He did not think that the ending of his status as non-Dutch should be resolved by him

becoming Dutch. But that type of resolution became the essence of Takdir’s strategy in the mid-1930s.

Indonesian nationalists would find their identity in a complete imitation of their Dutch rulers. They would

defeat the Dutch by becoming indistinguishable from them. They would become big businessmen,

engineers, and scientists and in the process render Dutch rule superfluous. Takdir’s passionate rhetoric

about “newness” ended in a cringing submission to already existing European paradigms. Restless

youthful souls searching for their own true identity were to find that it was in front of them all along: in

the possessive individualism of their Dutch masters.

Ki Hadjar: Nationalism as Originality

At the time Takdir was writing his manifestos about a “new” Indonesian culture in 1935, he was only

twenty-seven years old. The key figure he was criticizing, Ki Hajar, was by that time forty-six years old

and had already been involved in political and cultural movements since the 1910s. After writing “If I

were a Dutchman” in 1913, he was exiled, curiously enough, to the Netherlands – as if the Dutch wanted

to give him the opportunity to feel that he was a Dutchman. As a Javanese prijaji who came from the

Yogyakarta lesser royal house of Paku Alaman, he was not someone the colonial state wished to lock up

in prison like other dissidents. He spent only a couple years in the Netherlands before he was shifted for

health reasons back to the Indies to serve out his exile on the island of Banda. He was finally allowed to

return to Java in 1919.

Upon returning, he resumed his work with his old comrades Dekker and Tjipto in the Nationaal Indische

Partij (National Party of the Indies) and sat as the chief editor of the party’s publications (the Dutch

language daily De Expres and the Javanese daily Panggugah, among others). Because of his journalistic

activities, he was again arrested and imprisoned twice for several months. The ongoing repression against

political activities apparently made Suwardi think more intently about a means to fight the colonial
 12

authority that would be less provocative yet able to sustain the continuity of the movement. He joined his

elder brother, Surjopranoto, in establishing and directing the Komite Hidup Merdeka [Free Life

Committee] and the Adidarma Institute, which aimed at providing support to the families of striking

workers. The latter institution was mainly concerned with general education which could equip the

workers and their families with means and skills to sustain their livelihood without being dependent on

the mercy of the colonial government.23 Furthermore, Suwardi also joined a religious study club, the

Pagujuban Selasa Kliwon, which intended to synthesize Javanese philosophy with the modern concept of

democracy. It was through the Pagujuban’s meetings and discussions that the idea of establishing an

elementary educational system came up in 1922.24

The school that the study club founded was called Taman Siswa [Pupil’s Garden]. Born amidst the

growing radicalism of popular movements in Java, this school initially was considered apolitical by both

political figures and the Indies colonial government. Besides, operating without state subsidy, Taman

Siswa was not expected to survive for long. Contrary to expectations, it thrived. Many independent

schools established by other nationalist groups decided to merge into its organization. There were about

52 schools with 6,500 students in Java, Sumatra, Bali and Kalimantan by 1930 under the Taman Siswa

umbrella. Within another eight years, it had grown to about 225 schools with 700 teachers and 17,000

students.

What attracted many people to Taman Siswa was its unique and highly original pedagogy centered on the

idea of freedom, which Ki Hajar did not think was the exclusive monopoly of either Europe or the Indies.

23
For brief account on the establishment of Free Life Committee and the Adidarma Institute and their activities, see
Takashi Shiraishi, An Age in Motion; Abdurrahman Surjomihardjo, Ki Hadjar Dewantara dan Taman Siswa dalam
Sejarah Indonesia Modern; and Ruth McVey, “Taman Siswa and the Indonesian National Awakening” in Indonesia
4 (October 1967), pp. 128-149.
24
Selasa means Tuesday, and Kliwon is the 5th market day according to Javanese calendar. “Religious” here
concerned more with spiritualism and syncretic practice of Javanese animism and Hinduism rather than an
adherence to certain institutionalized Judaic religion. The association was founded by Ki Ageng Soerjomentaram, a
prince of Yogyakarta who renounced his court rank and left the palace for the country to live as a farmer. It
advocated practices to achieve wisdom by freeing oneself from selfishness and egotism and by seeking unity
between God and human being. For brief discussion on the philosophy behind the association, see Kenji Tsuchiya,
Democracy and Leadership: The Rise of the Taman Siswa Movement in Indonesia (Monographs of the Center for
Southeast Asian Studies Kyoto University, 1987)
 13

Ki Hajar rejected the Dutch schooling found in the Indies for being repressive of the child’s natural

tendencies for curiosity and creativity. That type of schooling, he thought, was designed for imposing a

harsh discipline on the children and thereby fostering social attitudes of submissiveness or rebelliousness

towards authority. “Western education” was based, he wrote, on “regering, tucht, and orde,” or

command, discipline, and order.25 In Taman Siswa, the teacher’s role was supposed to be limited to

providing guidance rather than imposing a dogmatic knowledge of the world. Ki Hadjar called it the

“among system.”26 The visual image was of teachers standing behind children, encouraging them forward,

gently directing them on their path, and looking out for any obstacles or dangers. Children should have

the liberty to move according to their natural character and to feel by themselves the growth of

conscience. “Free their spirit, thought, and physical power so that they will become a human being who is

truly free mentally and physically.”

While in exile in the Netherlands, Ki Hajar was exposed to what were then avant garde theories of

education: such as those of Montessori and Frobel in Europe and the Dalton school system in the United

States. He saw that what the colonized in the Indies saw of “the West” was very limited. Those in the

Indies never had a deep understanding of European culture because it had come to Indonesia in mediated

form.27 What the natives learned about the West had already been filtered by the Dutch colonial

institutions. They knew what the Dutch wanted them to know not what they needed to know in order to

nurture their humanity:

Because of the great inferiority complex which we derived from our particular political

experience, we were easily satisfied with anything that made us look a bit Dutch. We had a feeling

of satisfaction or mild delight every time we had the opportunity to be among Europeans, to speak

Dutch even to our own countrymen, to appear in western clothes, to arrange our houses according

25
Ki Hadjar Dewantara, Karja Ki Hadjar Dewantara, p. 13. From a speech of 1930.
26
Among is a Javanese word meaning “to take care of children”.
27
See Pranata SSP., Ki Hadjar Dewantara : Perintis Perdjuangan Kemerdekaan Indonesia (Jakarta: Dinas
Penerbitan Balai Pustaka, 1959), pp. 71-2.
 14

to western style. ... In spite of all this adaptation we have found little that might be considered of

real moral value according to world cultural standards. Outside the small and superficial stratum

of intellectuals, people have all tended to regard as western or European or modern things that

were only the outward appearance, the byproduct, of modern society and which even reflected the

seamy side of the civilized westerner’s life.28

The “West” was not, Ki Hajar understood, some monolithic institution that had to be accepted or rejected

in its entirety. He respected certain aspects of the social institutions and ideas in Europe while detesting

others. It was up to the colonized to determine what they wished to learn from, borrow, and develop and

what they wished to reject and struggle against. Ki Hajar’s coined the “fried rice principle” (prinsip nasi

goreng). Fried rice was an indigenous food and usually the rice was fried with palm oil. But, if margarine,

which came from the Dutch, would make fried rice taste better, there was no reason one should reject the

use of margarine as long as the Indonesians were the one who cooked it and held the “authorship.”29

Ki Hajar’s point is one that the upstart Takdir writing in the 1930s did not appreciate. Takdir as the

perfect product of Dutch colonial schooling: a person who learned the history and the culture of Europe

and developed a wholly uncritical attitude towards it, while at the same time considering everything

native to be debased and backward. Takdir did not see that behind Europe’s rhetoric of possessive

individualism was a system of education that produced uniformity, that de-individualized persons so that

they would be fit to work within bureaucratic machines.

Just as Takdir did not appreciate how Ki Hajar was selecting elements of Western culture to guide Taman

Siswa, he did not appreciate how Ki Hajar was selecting elements of the cultures in Indonesia. From an

early age, the children of Taman Siswa were instructed in indigenous art forms. They would learn dances
28
Ki Hadjar Dewantara, “Some Aspects of National Education and the Taman Siswa Institute of Jogjakarta”
translated by Ruth McVey in , “Taman Siswa and the Indonesian National Awakening”, Indonesia 4. The article
originally appeared in the Indisch Vrouwen Jaarboek and was also issued as a pamphlet by the Taman Siswa in
1935.
29
Ki Hadjar Dewantara, Karja Ki Hadjar Dewantara, p. 103
 15

from Java, Sumatra, Bali, and elsewhere. There was an effort to make the students take pride in the

indigenous culture without reifying it. The teachers were required to use the Indonesian language as the

main medium of instruction along with the use of local languages. Only after they reached intermediate

level would they begin to learn foreign languages, such as Dutch and English, and to study world history.

Ki Hajar was searching for a harmonization of individual and society, where the development of each

person’s own unique talents and character would strengthen the society as a whole instead of fragmenting

it. Taman Siswa schools required that the students and the teachers live in the same building, the paguron,

throughout the school year. Here, Taman Siswa borrowed from existing conceptions of teacher-student

relations in Java. Education meant not only acquisition of knowledge for an immediate practical or

professional end, but also the development of personality and the formation of character. The paguron

was a type of collective designed to nurture “free persons” (manusia merdeka).

Let us for a moment make a comparison with the contemporary western school system. We see a

building which may immediately be recognized as matter-of-fact, anonymous. Crowded in the

morning with children studying or playing, and with a number of teachers pacing or sitting, it is

closed and unoccupied after 1:00pm. A person who is used to a Taman Siswa schoolhouse

immediately feels the similarity between such a western school building and an office, a shop, a

factory, a cafe, or the like. ... How unimpressive an ordinary morning school schedule looks

compared to the continuous presence together of pupils and teachers even till late in the

evening. ... These factors make living in a paguron for learning purposes at the same time a

morally beneficial experience in every respect. Most importantly, the personality of the teacher

frequently makes all rules of order unnecessary, so that the students have ample opportunity to

develop their personalities without mechanical prohibitions or obedience to written rules.30

This collective life in Taman Siswa schools, one should note, was not meant to suppress individuality.

Exactly the opposite. It was meant, as Ki Hajar wrote in the quote above, to give the students “ample

30
Ki Hadjar Dewantara, “Some Aspects of National Education and the Taman Siswa Institute of Jogjakarta”, p. 159
 16

opportunities to develop their personalities.” The collective living arrangement was meant to guide that

development in a constructive way. Ki Hajar wanted schools to encourage kepribadian, meaning

individuality, while making the students cognizant that they had to live peaceably with others who were

also pursuing their individuality. Consider the following two principles that Ki Hajar articulated in 1928:

An independent person is a person whose life, both physically and mentally, does not

depend on other persons but is based on his/her own power.

The aim of teaching and education that is useful for collective life is that which frees the

person as a member of a unity (society).

In living independently, a person has to always remember that s/he lives with others, and

belongs to the entire human community, and these others also have a right to demand their

freedom.31

From the very start of his leadership of Taman Siswa, Ki Hajar was accused of being a revivalist of feudal

Javanese culture. The accusations of Takdir against Ki Hajar were actually quite old and, I believe, most

unfair.32 From reading Takdir’s writings, it seems he had little understanding of the justifications Ki Hajar

had for his unique pedagogy. Takdir would have been content with simply replicating the pedagogy of the

Dutch schools in Indonesia, such as those he attended. In drawing upon Javanese dances, for instance, Ki

Hajar was not re-instituting the Javanese feudal culture since he was, like any modernist, tearing those

dances out of the context of the royal court. Gamelan music, though patronized by the Javanese

aristocracy, is still music that can be appreciated in very different contexts. The dance and music formally

used to pay tribute to a king can become, once removed from that context, treated as pure aesthetics or as

31
Ki Hadjar Dewantara, Karja Ki Hadjar Dewantara, vol. 1, pp. 3-4.
32
His close friend, Tjipto, criticized him on this score. See M. Balfas, Dr. Tjipto Mangoenkoesoemo, particularly
Chapter 5 and 6. Suwardi’s criticisms against Tjipto’s ideas were elaborated in his paper on the role of local
languages in indigenous education. See, “Bagaimana kedudukan bahasa-bahasa pribumi (djuga bahasa Tionghoa
dan Arab) di satu pihak dan bahasa Belanda di lain pihak, dalam pengadjaran?” in Ki Hadjar Dewantara, Karja Ki
Hadjar Dewantara, Bagian II A: Kebudajaan (Yogyakarta: Madjelis Luhur Persatuan Taman Siswa, 1967). The
paper was originally presented at the Congress for Colonial Education I in The Hague, on 28 August 1916.
 17

“folk” art. This aestheticization of art forms no doubt is problematic maneuver but it is certainly not, as

Takdir and others charged, a simple matter of reviving Javanese feudal culture.

Rather than being Java-centric, Ki Hajar was what can be called region-centric. He was not a romantic

nationalist who pretended as if an Indonesian national culture already existed, as if everyone living in the

archipelago felt that there was a cultural unity among them. Indonesia was a political entity that had to

build a culture of its own. And it had to build it by working from what he called the “peaks of regional

culture.” Each region would promote its own artistry and these artists would then learn from each other

and over time create new forms.

Ki Hadjar Dewantara, in his response to Takdir, his contribution to the “Great Debate,” did not argue

against Western rationality and science; rather, he argued that Takdir was not being realistic. Takdir was

asking Indonesians to take a momentous leap into the future and leave all traditional customs behind

whereas Dewantara wished for a more gradual movement towards the future. He was aware of the fact

Indonesian society was in the process of changing. But Dewantara also noticed that the majority of the

Indonesians still lived the same way and practiced the old customs. Radical changes imposed by

intellectual subjectivity would only disrupt their natural order. For Dewantara, Takdir’s ideas represented

a kind of eccentricity detached from the reality of Indonesian people’s life. Takdir’s proposal hardly

provided a practical solution to the problems identified by Dewantara: a society suffering from an

inferiority complex, lacking accesses to quality education, and politically and economically subordinate.33

In responding to Takdir, Ki Hajar was being diplomatic. His position in other writings was clearly that

ideas such as Takdir’s were not only impractical, they were undesirable.

Conclusion

33
See “Pembaharuan Adab”, in Achdiat K. Mihardja, Polemik Kebudayaan, pp. 115-118
 18

If Ki Hajar emphasized the teaching of indigenous cultural forms in national schools, Takdir viewed them

“antiques” that belonged to the era of “pre-Indonesia.” For Takdir, the culture that developed prior to the

emergence of nationalism in the late nineteenth to early twentieth centuries had no relevance to modern

Indonesians. The national awakening, he asserted, emerged solely out of contacts with European

civilization, particularly through studying in the Dutch colonial educational system. To advance

Indonesian culture, the “inlanders” had to learn more from the cultural achievements of Europe than from

those of the Indies. Takdir’s ideas were little different from those of the Dutch rulers of the ethical period:

Indonesian people were backward needed Dutch tutelage for modernizing.

Takdir’s position was locked in an internal contradiction. In the name of Indonesian nationalism, he

advocated Calvinist values – hard work, self-discipline, scientific knowledge, acquisitiveness – and the

creation of a native bourgeoisie. But in the process of advocating the Protestant spirit of capitalism, he

lost track of the meaning of Indonesia as a collectivity. The Indonesia that was imagined into existence in

the 1920s by mass movements became reified in Takdir’s writings as a something that could be achieved

without mass movements. The nation became nothing more than a random collection of individuals all

hoping to use the nation for getting rich.

Although Takdir became lionized during Suharto’s New Order as a great intellectual of the nationalist

movement, his voice in the 1930s was that of an immature graduate of Dutch schools who had no

standing in the movement. He was the editor of a journal that was not financed by mass subscriptions, did

not have a large circulation, and did not have a critical position on Dutch colonialism. He had little

personal experience in the strategic questions of the movement and had no institutional weight behind his

ideas.

Ki Hajar’s views are far more interesting than Takdir’s because they emerge out of a rich experience both

with the mass movements in the Indies and the intellectual currents in Europe. Ki Hajar combined deep
 19

roots in his society and a cosmopolitan awareness. His ideas on harmonizing individuality with collective

life, on educating children without harsh discipline and violence, on respecting local culture, on building

a national culture were very well-developed. They are ideas that have remained unfulfilled in the post-

colonial era.