THE HISTORY OF CULTURAL POLICY IN INDONESIA 1900s-2000s
Abstract: This book
investigates how culture, particularly national culture, in Indonesia has been
shaped by the government policies from the Dutch colonial period in 1900s to
the Reformation era in 2000s. It is an attempt to show the relationship between
the state and culture around the process of production, circulation, regulation
and reception of cultural policy through different regimes. Although this book
discusses government policy, the author has realized that the book needs to
overcome contradictions and confusions of cultural discourse by incorporating
people as explanatory element. Many aspect of culturality may be influenced by
the state, but according to Jones, “it is a field that is not stable and easy
to shift that facilitates resistance, and is able to turn against the state,
market and other institutions” (p. 31). Jones employs two postcolonial cultural
policy tools to review the history of cultural policy in Indonesia:
authoritarian cultural policy and command culture. The first means that the
state has assumption if majority of citizen do not have capability to inspirit
a responsible citizenship and need a state’s direction in the choice of their
culture. On the contrary, command culture shows that the cultural idea that is
planned in fact always been placing the state as center in planning, creating
policy and revising cultural practice.
Author: Wildan Sena Utama
Journal Code: jpantropologigg160017
