Anarchism in Indonesia

indonesia / philippines / australia | anarchist movement | interview Thursday January 29, 2015 09:52 by Sean Matthews

Indonesia is a country of outstanding beauty and contrasting geography but beneath the glossy tourist broachers is a country ruled for decades by a brutal military dictatorship that suppressed internal opposition and independence movements resulting in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people with the assistance of regional powers such as Australia and the US.

Indonesia is a country of outstanding beauty and contrasting geography but beneath the glossy tourist broachers is a country ruled for decades by a brutal military dictatorship that suppressed internal opposition and independence movements resulting in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people with the assistance of regional powers such as Australia and the US.

The fall of President Suharto in 1999 during a period of growing social unrest over increasing cost of living and inflation ushered in a veil of ‘democratic reforms’; in the midst of an IMF shock doctrine of privatization and de-regulation of labour laws.

If anyone has watched the documentary ‘The Act of Killing’ which highlighted the systematic extermination campaign of suspected ‘communists’ by state sponsored paramilitary death squads such as Pancasila after 1965 with the assistance of the CIA (who provided intelligence) is still a mafia state with a culture of impunity.

Today, the ultra nationalist Pancasila which has over three million acts as an proto state militia with close links to senior politicians and government figures and is used as an instrument of fear and intimidation against dissenters particularly the left and counter culture movement.

While traveling through Bali, I caught up with two anarchists. In the attached interview they talk about the anarchist & punk scene, gender violence, politics and social context in Indonesia, land struggles and the struggle for abortion rights.

http://www.wsm.ie/c/anarchism-central-java-indonesia-in...n2015

This English language page has more details on some of the things talked about in the interview http://selamatkanbumi.com/en/