Articles/Essays/Notes
Where is my compassion?
Reflections 14 years after the Asian Tsunami
In 2004 and 2005, in addition to running my consultancy firm, I also moonlighted – quite literally – as a copy editor at The Jakarta Post. This meant my work day averaged 16 hours at that time. I totally didn’t need this additional workload, but it was an opportunity to learn more about Indone...
Escape at 14
A nothing story
I was 14, a quiet boy living in an outer suburb of a small and isolated city called Perth1, in a large and remote state called Western Australia, in a large and isolated continent called Australia....
Indonesian Land Law and Foreign Ownership of Land
Indonesian Land Law is quite different to the laws that apply in most Western or developed countries. Foreigners wishing to use or purchase land for whatever purpose need to be aware of these differences and not assume that legal conventions that apply in their home countries necessarily apply in In...
An Ungrateful Australian
On Tuesday, 17 December 2002, BM wrote: I think, on balance, that if I am to be ruled, I would much rather be ruled by complete fucking moron civilians than by clever army generals, or religious fanatics for that matter. A friend, who had been a lifelong Marxist until the collapse of the Soviet Unio...
Culture Matters in Indonesia
An email exchange with Dennis De Tray, Indonesia country director, World Bank 1997-1999
> The views contained within this article are entirely my own and do not necessarily reflect past or present opinions or policies of any other person or organisation. Culture really matters when doing business, especially in Indonesia. An understanding of the cultures, outlooks, perceptions of the p...
Ethno-Religious Conflict in Maluku
A manufactured war
> "Tragically again, of the approximately 20 Christians who were killed [by Muslims] in the village of Benteng Karang, 15 of them were them were burnt alive. One of them was Mrs Rina Serpiela, a six-month pregnant woman who was killed by having her belly ripped open and the foetus pulled out and bur...
Australia's Place and Influence in Asia
Since the very beginning of a notion called 'Australia' some 200 years ago the European occupiers of this continent have rarely felt at peace with its geography. As a transplanted, predominantly European, society situated within Asia,[1] far from the homelands-of-the-heart in Europe, Australia...
The role of FDI in the development of Singapore
A model development path?
The rapid economic development of the NIEs (Hongkong, Singapore, South Korea, and Taiwan) over the past three decades has necessitated the utilisation of external resources, principally foreign capital.[1] Without such resources, industrialisation and development on the scale undertaken could simply...
The Myth of the Jakarta Lobby
Brian Toohey's article, "Time to rout the Jakarta Lobby", was published in The West Australian on 27 September 1999, just four weeks after the East Timorese autonomy plebiscite. During this period East Timor was in the process of being laid waste by vicious anti-independence militias...
The New Order State and the Tempo Affair
A conflict of values
The sun began to set upon Indonesia's corporatist 'New Order' state starting in the early 1990's. Speculation about the presidential succession was rife, mainly due to President Soeharto's increasing age and frailty, and such speculation was especially destabilising and damaging given Indonesia's hi...
East Asia and the Roots of the Economic Crisis
From a Western perspective
The past two decades or so has witnessed the increasing dominance of neoliberal perspectives within international political, social and economic thinking. This has particularly been the case since the end of the Cold War, which seems to have triggered a decline of alternative social and economic per...
Indonesia's Economic Development
in comparison to South Korea and Taiwan
The rapid pace of economic development in East Asia over the past few decades has awed the world. This is particularly so for the so-called Newly Industrialising Countries (NICs) which include South Korea and Taiwan, together with the city-states of Singapore and Hongkong. Since the 1980's, these st...
Security and Australia's involvement in the world
Australians have always felt uncertain about their place in the world. As a transplanted, predominantly European, society situated within Asia, Australians have always felt a sense of threat from the north. Profound differences with the nations of East Asia exist in nearly every respect:...
The Development of Australian Foreign Policy
It only been these past few decades that Australia has begun to pursue a relatively independent foreign policy, from under the shadows Britain and the US. Australia's unique historical circumstances have led to the development of a certain set of attitudes and characteristics that underlie its...
The Importance and Consequences of Trade in Southeast Asia
until 1870
To trade is human. Like the ability to communicate abstract ideas, trade is one of those activities that differentiates Homo sapiens from the rest of the animal world. And trade is more than just a mere exchange of surplus; its social and political impact is profound binding both families, tribes an...
The development and future of the nation-state
Humanity's political 'state of nature' has characteristically been defined in terms of small, nomadic family groups with little need for complex organisational structures. Continuously moving across the landscape with tenuous attachment to the land upon which they walked, organisational requirements...
Globalisation and the Nation-State
It is frequently alleged that the nation-state in the 1990's is at a precarious moment of history, poised to somehow inevitably disintegrate under the pressure of globalisation. It has been a mere decade since this word 'globalisation' started to infiltrate the everyday language of nations worldwide...
Analysing the end of Suharto's Indonesia
The role of culture in Indonesian politics
The incantations and vocabulary of the new era are rapidly taking hold in Indonesia since the fall of Suharto and his New Order regime. KKN, reformasi and transparansi have replaced UUD'45, Pancasila and pembangunan as catchphrases of the emerging order. As the heavy New Order fog lifts, new possibi...
Globalisasi, Kedaulatan Nasional dan Konflik Masa Depan
Gary Dean (Universitas Gadjah Mada, NIM 96/111909/EK/13500) Yogyakarta, Desember 1997 Selama dasawarsa belakangan ini kata 'globalisasi' secara berangsur-angsur masuk ke dalam bahasa sehari-hari di negara-negara di seluruh dunia. Tetapi, apa sebenarnya artinya kata 'globalisasi' ini? Seperti banyak ...
