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Surviving Sukarno: British Business in Post-Colonial Indonesia, 1950–1967*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 November 2011

NICHOLAS J. WHITE
NICHOLAS J. WHITE*
Affiliation:
Liverpool John Moores University, Department of History, School of Humanities and Social Science, 68 Hope Street, Liverpool L1 9HW, UK Email: [email protected]
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Abstract

Drawing principally upon a rich vein of previously unexploited business records, this paper analyses the experience of British firms in Indonesia between the achievement of independence and the beginnings of the Suharto regime. As in The Netherlands East Indies, British enterprises occupied a significant position in post-colonial Indonesia in plantations, oil extraction, shipping, banking, the import-export trade, and manufacturing. After the nationalization of Dutch businesses from the end of 1957, Britain emerged as the leading investing power in the archipelago alongside the United States. However, during Indonesia's Confrontation with British-backed Malaysia (1963–1966), most UK-owned companies in the islands were subject to a series of torrid (albeit temporary) takeovers by the trade unions and subsequently various government authorities. Most of these investments were returned to British ownership under Suharto after 1967. But, in surviving the Sukarno era, British firms had endured 15 years of increasing inconvenience and insecurity trapped in a power struggle within Indonesia's perplexing plural polity (and particularly between the Communist Party and the military). Indeed, the Konfrontasi takeovers themselves, varying in intensity from region to region and from firm to firm, were indicative of deep fissures within Indonesian administration and politics. The unpredictable and unsettled political economy of post-colonial Indonesia meant that the balance of advantage lay not with transnational enterprise but with the host state and society.

Type
Research Article
Information
Modern Asian Studies , Volume 46 , Issue 5 , September 2012 , pp. 1277 - 1315
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2011

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References

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103 H&CA, 37259, Thwaites to Branches, 26 September 1963.

104 H&CA, 37274, private letter from Johnstone, 11 February 1964.

105 Ibid., Chartered Bank, Medan to Chartered Bank, Jakarta, 23 January 1964; McLeod to Branches, 27 January 1964.

106 H&CA, 37259, Paris to Branches, 13 February 1964.

107 Weinstein. Foreign Policy, pp. 213–215.

108 OA, 1696, ‘Indonesia. Dutch Disputes’, letters to Holt, 17 November and 24 December 1964.

109 UA, Acc 1997/127, 42, SCMOC, 19 February, 20 November and 9 December 1957, 2 January and 22 July 1958, 1 January 1959. Although Unilever enterprises in Indonesia had traditionally been owned and managed by the Dutch wing of the multinational, the conglomerate as a whole was only about one-third Dutch-owned in 1959.

110 Ibid., Cole report, 19 February 1960.

111 OA, 1112, letter to AHC, 19 February 1958; 2385, enclosure in Hobhouse to Holt, 25 October 1958; Holt to Meyerink, 25 November 1958.

112 OA, 1869, ‘Djakarta, 1963’, Holt to Day, 28 September 1963 and reply, 10 October 1963; 1696, ‘Indonesia. Dutch Disputes’, Gleichman to Holt, 17 November 1964; 4007/7, Managers Meeting Minutes, 25 November 1964.

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120 UA, Acc 1997/127, 42, SCMOC, Cole report, 19 February 1960.

121 Ibid., 17 Nov. 1961; 43, SCM, DCM extract, 1 November 1963.

122 OA, 1696, ‘Suez Canal’, letter to Holt, 8 November 1956; 2385, copy of Holt to Meyerink, 14 August 1958.

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127 RGACM, 24863/67, 7 January 1957, RIC.

128 BoE, OV 85/5, note by Tomkins, 2 February 1962.

129 H&CA, 37259, Paris to Strivens, Branches, 21 September 1963.

130 UA, Acc 1997/127, 43, SCMOC, 10 February 1964 and 23 June 1965, Quarles van Ufford report.

131 H&CA, 37259, Paris to Branches, 13 February 1964.

132 H&CA, 37274, McLeod to Gilchrist, 3 October 1963; McLeod to Branches, 27 January and 10 February 1964.

133 Ibid., McLeod to Branches, 7 and 29 April 1964.

134 Pugh. Great Enterprise, p. 188.

135 UA, Acc 1997/127, 43, SCMOC, 23 June 1965, Quarles van Ufford report. On the bewildering reorganizations see Dick. ‘Nation-state’, p. 187; Lindblad. Bridges, pp. 197, 204.

136 Ibid., 44, SCMOC, DCM extracts, 21 July and 17 November 1967.

137 Ibid., 9 February 1967, attached report by Quarles van Ufford.

138 H&CA, 37258, Gilchrist to Michael Stewart, UK Foreign Secretary, 16 April 1968.

139 HSBC, GHO 336, Report on Djakarta Office. Results for Year Ended 31 December 1970.

140 UA, Acc 1997/127, 43, SCMOC, DCM extract, 5 November 1965.

141 HSBC, MB Hist 2166, MCAGB Circular No. 190, 28 January 1966.

142 RGACM, 24863/75, 7 March 1966, ‘Draft report for year ended 31 December 1965’.

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146 Ibid., report on visit to Indonesia by Quarles van Ufford, 17–27 May 1966; 4 November 1966; 44, SCMOC, 9 February 1967, Quarles van Ufford report.

147 RGACM, 24863/75, 7 March 1966, ‘Draft Report for 1965’; 24863/77, 1 April 1968, ‘Draft Report for 1967’.

148 Pugh, Great Enterprise, p. 189.

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150 OA, 862, Board Memorandum, 20 August 1973; Soedarpo Sastrosatomo. (2003). ‘Recollections of My Career’ in Thee. Recollections, p. 158.

151 Booth, Indonesian Economy, p. 319.

152 UA, Acc 1997/127, 43, SCMOC, Quarles van Ufford reports, 4 February and 17–27 May 1966. As early as 1959, Unilever directors had been disturbed by restrictions on Indonesian Chinese trading in rural areas, as well as mass repatriations to mainland China, disrupting both the distributive system and labour supply. Ibid., 42, SCMOC, 23–27 January 1959; Cole report, 19 February 1960; 23 August 1960.

153 Pilger, J. (2001). Globalisation in Indonesia: Spoils of a Massacre, Guardian Weekend, 14 July.

154 Fieldhouse. Unilever, p. 313.

155 Lindblad. Bridges, p. 207.

156 H&CA, 37274, second message from Jakarta to FO, 10 February 1964.

157 HSBC, 1459/2.04, semi-official copies out to Jakarta, Turner to King, 7 May 1958.