FORD FOUNDATION
PUBLISHED BY THE FORD FOUNDATION IN ASSOCIATION WITH EQUINOX PUBLISHING (ASIA) PTE. LTD.
WWW. FORDFOUND. ORG WWW. EQUINOXPUBLISHING. COM
EDITORIAL BOARD Suzanne E. Siskel Mary S. Zurbuchen Philip Yampolsky Mark Hanusz
PRINCIPAL AUTHOR Goenawan Mohamad
INTERVIEWS AND SIDEBARS Sandra Hamid Andreas Harsono Laksmi Pamuntjak
TRANSLATION AND EDITING John H. McGlynn Patrick Kavanagh Irfan Kortschak Nasiruddin Budi Setiyono Linda Owens Paul Dillon
PHOTO RESEARCH Suli Widodowati Untung H. Bimo John Hanusz I Putu Bagus Yogi
©2003 Ford Foundation
ISBN 979-97964-1-5
No part of this work may be used for any purpose without written consent from the Ford Foundation.
All rights reserved.
Women from a Tengger village in East Java, 1990. Introduction: A Time for Celebration ...... 9
————————————————CHAPTER ONE———————————————— No Ivory Tower ...... 35 Sayuti Hasibuan ...... 39 Selo Soemardjan ...... 53 Daoed Joesoef ...... 43 An Evening with the Technocrats ...... 58 Institution-Builder: Sumitro Djojohadikusumo ...... 46 A Palace for the Arts in Ubud ...... 62 Technocrat Number One: Widjojo Nitisastro...... 50
————————————————CHAPTER TWO———————————————— America, America...... 69 Mayling Oey-Gardiner ...... 73 Sukadji Ranuwihardjo ...... 91 The Green Revolution: Indonesia Feeds Itself...... 74 Mely G. Tan...... 95 Sajogyo ...... 77 Sophie Sarwono ...... 97 Public Defenders: The Indonesian Legal Aid Foundation . 80 A Short Hiatus ...... 100 Haryono Suyono ...... 83
————————————————CHAPTER THREE———————————————— Petroleum, Policies, and Protests ...... 103 Syahrir ...... 107 Sartono Kartodirdjo...... 123 Civil Society and State: The Family Planning Campaign . 108 A Public Intellectual: Soedjatmoko...... 124 Ibrahim Alfian...... 113 Rumors, Plots, and Conspiracies: The Ramparts Article ... 126 Juwono Sudarsono ...... 117 Taufik Abdullah ...... 129 Anugerah Pekerti ...... 119 Thee Kian Wie ...... 131 The Professor Who Loved Indonesia ...... 120
————————————————CHAPTER FOUR———————————————— The Mantra of Unity ...... 135 Augustinus Rumansara ...... 137 Laso’ Sombolinggi’ ...... 157 Preserving the Past: Manuscripts and Microfilms ...... 138 Nursyahbani Katjasungkana ...... 159 Erna Witoelar ...... 143 Tony Djogo ...... 165 Charles Suryadi...... 145 Helmi ...... 169 Ninuk Widyantoro ...... 147 Comic Energy: Umar Kayam ...... 170 Zohra Andi Baso ...... 149 Edi Sedyawati...... 174 Nyoman Sutawan ...... 151 Endo Suanda ...... 177 Sandra Moniaga ...... 155
————————————————CHAPTER FIVE———————————————— A Journey, A Nation...... 181 Taboos Overturned: Freedom of Expression ...... 184 Lies Marcoes-Natsir ...... 209 Amna Kusumo...... 187 Irid Agoes ...... 211 Women’s Rights: Reinterpreting Classical Texts ...... 188 Boosting Books: Program Pustaka...... 212 Maria Hartiningsih ...... 191 Lilis N. Husna ...... 213 Sarah Lery Mboeik ...... 193 Dede Oetomo ...... 215 Music of Indonesia: The Smithsonian/MSPI CDs ...... 194 Ratna Riantiarno ...... 217 Rizal Mallarangeng ...... 197 Fred Wibowo ...... 219 Stepanus Djuweng ...... 199 Ribut Susanto ...... 221 Zoemrotin K. Susilo ...... 202 Yayah Khisbiyah ...... 223 Farha Ciciek...... 203
List of Acronyms ...... 228 Sources Consulted...... 230 Index...... 231 Photo Credits ...... 235 Staff and Consultants in Indonesia...... 236 8 INTRODUCTION A TIME FOR CELEBRATION 9
INTRODUCTION A TIME FOR CELEBRATION
he story of the Ford Foundation’s half century in Indonesia resonates with the great motifs of nation- building, development and modernization that T th shaped international relations in the second half of the 20 century. It is also a chronicle of one of the United States’ leading philanthropic organizations as it sought to play an effective and relevant role in a rapidly-changing world. The Foundation’s work in Indonesia and elsewhere is grounded in the culture of American philanthropy, which emerged in the late 1800s from a unique combination of the United States’ industrial expansion, ideals of social reform, and a system of government taxation providing incentives for the charitable giving of private wealth. The Foundation has never functioned as a charity, in the sense of providing direct relief or services to those in need. Instead it is a philanthropy, defined in the dictionary as “an active effort to promote human welfare.” The Foundation works to effect positive change in strategically chosen areas of endeavor. Its mission statement expresses and elaborates this basic purpose through four overarching goals: strengthen democratic values, reduce poverty and injustice, promote international cooperation, and advance human achievement.
Displaying hand-woven ikat textiles in Pontianak, West Kalimantan, 2003. Facilitating the transmisson of traditional arts – including weaving – across generations is a theme of the Foundation’s arts and culture grantmaking. 10 INTRODUCTION
The Ford Foundation was established in 1936 as a local Of those countries where the Foundation initiated philanthropy in the state of Michigan, using gifts of stock in overseas work in the 1950s, there are only two in which it the Ford Motor Company from Henry and Edsel Ford. remains active: India (where the field office opened in 1952) Following the global turmoil and destruction of World War II, and Indonesia (opened in 1953). In Asia today, the Foundation and anticipating additional bequests from Ford family estates, also has offices in China and Vietnam, but over time it has had the Foundation commissioned a study (known as the “Gaither resident Representatives in Bangladesh, Burma, Japan, Malaysia, Report”) to assess new options and directions for its work. In Pakistan, the Philippines, and Thailand. Indonesia was viewed 1950, the Foundation’s trustees made the historic decision to as “a country of unique significance” in early Foundation expand the organization to become a national and an memoranda, because of its rapid and turbulent transition from international foundation. This decision reflected particular colony to independent state and the great need for development concern for the cause of peace: “among all the problems in of its human resources, and because – in the political thinking human relations,” the trustees stated, “the greatest challenge is of that time – Indonesia seemed to have “a reasonable chance the achievement of peace throughout the world.” The Trustees of developing along democratic lines.” It is clear that in the felt that only through improving economic and social conditions early days of the Cold War, the Foundation’s leadership shared in societies around the globe could the causes of war be the concerns of the United States government regarding eliminated, and they mandated that the Foundation’s resources communism in Asia, and that Indonesia was regarded as be managed as a perpetual source of support for programs and contested territory in the confrontation between totalitarian operations. Over time, the Foundation divested itself of all of and open societies. its Ford Motor Company stock, and the Ford family no longer In 1952, the first assessment team to visit Indonesia from was involved with the decisions or policies of the Foundation. the Ford Foundation described Indonesia’s pressing need to train Under the guidance of its first president, Paul Hoffman, competent administrators, increase rice production, improve the Ford Foundation began operations outside of the United basic health, and address education needs that were “tremendous States, focusing on newly independent or emerging societies in scale,” including a need for greater fluency in English. struggling to institute democratic forms of government. Before Indonesia had a population of 75 million people, the sixth largest joining the Foundation, Hoffman had been a principal architect population in the world at that time. It had vast resources of of the Marshall Plan in Europe. He approached the forest, marine and mineral wealth, yet its population suffered development of overseas programs by focusing on the needs of from widespread poverty following the Depression of the 1930s, individual countries, consulting the governments of those the Japanese occupation, and the war for independence in the countries about their own priorities, and establishing overseas 1940s. Only ten per cent of Indonesians were literate; unlike in offices of the Foundation to work “on the ground.” These basic India where mass education was provided to train colonial principles of operations in countries around the world have subjects for public service, Dutch colonial policy severely limited endured to this day. the educational opportunities available to “natives.”
Rice growing on the foothills of Mount Merapi, West Sumatra, 2003. Increasing Indonesia’s rice production was an early priority for the Foundation. A TIME FOR CELEBRATION 11 12 INTRODUCTION A TIME FOR CELEBRATION 13 14 INTRODUCTION
The Indonesian government welcomed the Foundation’s senior staff working in its New York and 12 overseas offices. offer of involvement, and President Sukarno endorsed the Programs in Indonesia are linked to those in other countries proposals for training civil servants and improving the teaching around the world, promoting the cross-fertilization of ideas of English. In an unpublished memoir, one of the early and strategies as well as international collaboration among Representatives in Jakarta, John Bresnan, suggested that “a grantees and staff. private American philanthropy like the Ford Foundation was of some interest [to Sukarno] as an alternative to the US Conditions in Indonesia have vastly changed since 1953: there government,” which had only reluctantly come to support the are now some 212 million people, national literacy rates cause of Indonesian independence during the struggle against approach 90 per cent, and per capita income has grown from the Dutch from 1945-49. A one-room office in Jakarta’s Hotel less than $30 in the early 1960s to around $900 today. Schools, des Indes opened in June 1953, but activities at first progressed health facilities, modern communications, and basic with frustrating slowness. It was only when a former labor infrastructure have spread throughout the archipelago. A organizer named Michael Harris took over the Jakarta office in succession of governments – from Sukarno’s super-nationalist 1955 that the Foundation began to make a mark. Guided Democracy to the authoritarian New Order of Suharto, Over the 50 years of its work in Indonesia, the the brief interludes of B.J. Habibie and Abdurrahman Wahid, Foundation has committed, in today’s dollars, some US$ 420 up to the current administration of President Megawati million in Indonesia in a variety of fields, out of more than $12 Sukarnoputri – have wrestled with enormous problems in billion given in grants and loans in the US and internationally. addressing needs for improved livelihoods, social justice, and The Foundation remains an independent, nonprofit pluralist tolerance. These governments’ policies and their effects, organization, accepting no contributions from governments along with global and local currents of socio-economic change, or any other donors; its trustees set policy and delegate have created the context for the Foundation’s work and the grantmaking and operational authority to the president and array of issues and challenges to which it has sought to respond.
Representative Michael Harris with his secretary, listed only as Miss Cunningham in the photo’s original caption, in the Hotel des Indes office, 1957. The Hotel des Indes, where the Foundation opened its first office in Indonesia in 1953. A TIME FOR CELEBRATION 15
Over the past 50 years, grantmaking programs have social-science training commissioned from the anthropologist changed and evolved in tune with the Foundation’s staff Clifford Geertz. He observed that “Indonesian intellectual life assessments of issues to be addressed and opportunities for making is centralized, over-organized, practical, and strongly influenced an impact. The first decade of activity focused on establishing by economists.” Geertz argued that the social sciences required faculties of economics and teachers’ training colleges, and on stimulation through a decentralized training program based in building English language capacity. Most of the Foundation’s regional institutions, “animated by regional concerns,” and Indonesian grantmaking at that time went toward education; grounded in research methods and analysis. As a result, the the Foundation could point to over 300 teachers and Foundation helped launch the Social Science Research Training administrators who studied outside the country, many of whom Stations program and extended support for the non-economic later attained key positions in government or universities, or as social sciences in other directions as well. policy advisors. The most famous among these – a cohort of Entering the 1980s, the Foundation’s substantial economic “technocrats” trained at leading US institutions like commitment to the social sciences had strengthened its capacity the University of California and Massachusetts Institute of to respond to the need for poverty alleviation strategies for the Technology – became known as the “Berkeley Mafia.” village-based, agriculture-dependent Indonesians who formed Political conflict led to a temporary closing of the office 80 per cent of the population. By 1982 Indonesia had been in late 1965. When it reopened in 1967, the Foundation classified as a “middle income country” by the World Bank, decided to add new emphases to its existing programs through and along with other ASEAN countries had enjoyed a period support for family planning, rice research, basic social sciences, of relative stability and economic growth. Yet this stability was and development planning at the national level. These themes shadowed by tight military control and concerns about basic were the hallmarks of work in the 1970s, along with continuing human rights, and there were growing and glaring inequities support for higher education for Indonesians. The Foundation’s in the distribution of the fruits of development, especially under approach was importantly influenced by a report in 1971 on the domination of Indonesia’s military and business elite.
Taufik Abdullah (Cornell), Alfian (Wisconsin), Harsja Bachtiar (Harvard), Soedradjad Djiwandono (Wisconsin), Mely Tan (UC Berkeley), and Algamar (Wisconsin) in front of UC Berkeley’s Sather Gate at a meeting of Foundation grantees who had been selected for study abroad by the Indonesian Institute of Sciences (Lembaga Ilmu Pengetahuan Indonesia – LIPI), 1966. 16 INTRODUCTION A TIME FOR CELEBRATION 17