Book contents
- The Cambridge World History of Violence
- The Cambridge History of Violence
- The Cambridge World History of Violence
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures and Maps
- Contributors to Volume IV
- Introduction to Volume IV
- Part I Race, Religion and Nationalism
- Part II Intimate and Gendered Violence
- Part III Warfare, Colonialism and Empire in the Modern World
- Part IV The State, Revolution and Social Change
- 17 Change and Continuity in Collective Violence in France, 1780–1880
- 18 Geographies of Genocide: The European Rimlands, 1912–1948
- 19 Concentration Camps
- 20 Violence in Revolutionary China, 1949–1963
- 21 Anti-Communist Violence in Indonesia, 1965–1966
- 22 The Violence of the Cold War
- 23 Quotidian Violence in the French Empire, 1890–1940
- 24 Violence, the State and Revolution in Latin America
- 25 Structural Violence during the Cambodian Genocide, 1975–1979
- 26 The Origins of Modern Terrorism
- Part V Representations and Constructions of Violence
- Index
- References
21 - Anti-Communist Violence in Indonesia, 1965–1966
from Part IV - The State, Revolution and Social Change
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 13 March 2020
- The Cambridge World History of Violence
- The Cambridge History of Violence
- The Cambridge World History of Violence
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures and Maps
- Contributors to Volume IV
- Introduction to Volume IV
- Part I Race, Religion and Nationalism
- Part II Intimate and Gendered Violence
- Part III Warfare, Colonialism and Empire in the Modern World
- Part IV The State, Revolution and Social Change
- 17 Change and Continuity in Collective Violence in France, 1780–1880
- 18 Geographies of Genocide: The European Rimlands, 1912–1948
- 19 Concentration Camps
- 20 Violence in Revolutionary China, 1949–1963
- 21 Anti-Communist Violence in Indonesia, 1965–1966
- 22 The Violence of the Cold War
- 23 Quotidian Violence in the French Empire, 1890–1940
- 24 Violence, the State and Revolution in Latin America
- 25 Structural Violence during the Cambodian Genocide, 1975–1979
- 26 The Origins of Modern Terrorism
- Part V Representations and Constructions of Violence
- Index
- References
Summary
By mid-1966, about half a million adherents of the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) were dead, many more were arbitrarily imprisoned and even more lost civil rights. The biggest communist party outside the communist bloc disappeared almost overnight, as did its affiliated social organisations. It was the worst political violence since Indonesia´s 1945-1949 war of national liberation. How could this happen? The chapter first dismisses two once-popular analytical approaches. Neither behaviourist depictions of rampaging anti-communist crowds, nor statist images of a military conducting pogroms on its own are adequate to the known facts. It then develops a contentious politics approach with multiple collective actors. The cold war looms large; the economy is politicised; institutions are weak, factionalised, and deeply embedded in various social formations. Contention escalates from September 1963, as President Sukarno and the PKI pivot from the gradualist Soviet Union to a militant People´s Republic of China. An emerging legitimation crisis pits a social justice discourse popular among lower classes against a growing middle class religious, law-and-order discourse. When the PKI leadership makes a false move on 1 October 1965, the military mobilises its allies to strike back, with genocidal results.
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- The Cambridge World History of Violence , pp. 427 - 448Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2020
References
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