Indonesian socialism of the 1950s: from ideology to rhetoric

From 1945 until 1965, virtually all Indonesian political parties claimed to follow some version of socialism. What did ‘socialism’ mean in this context, though? In economics, party platforms promoted aspects of redistribution and collective ownership, but the application of such ideologies was limited. In international relations, Indonesia was dedicated to a third way between the capitalist and communist superpowers, meaning ‘socialism’ was not generally invoked for foreign policy. Where many Asian and African Marxist experiments have been characterised by utopian visions, in Indonesia the future was framed in more nativist than socialist terms. In the end, the fact that socialism had such a diverse spectrum of understandings in Indonesian politics allowed different political streams to claim the term for highly different purposes, and eventually President Sukarno claimed the mantle of ‘Indonesian Socialism’ for his personalistic regime from the late 1950s. After ‘socialism’ was rendered virtually meaningless, it was easy for the leaders of an army-backed coup in 1965–1966 to paint it as dangerous in the wake of their anti-Communist campaign. Thus, within a decade ‘socialism’ went from ubiquitous engagement with collectivist economic principles to meaningless rhetorical device to political pariah.