In the decade before the 1911 publication of a selection of her letters unleashed a century of Kartini image-making, there was a “real” Kartini. A few Dutch men and women maintained a correspondence with her; even fewer had met her in person. And even while this “historical Kartini” was writing long private letters projecting images of herself as a “modern girl”, she was already being imagined by others in the colonial capital and abroad. Her name was beginning to circulate in contemporary media in the Netherlands and its East Indies colony to conjure up a new vision of an imperial mission.

In exploring the ways in which Kartini was variously imagined by Europeans in the few years of her adult public life, this Chapter reads back from the extant correspondence and archival record to examine the discursive contexts that first framed the now century-old image of Kartini.

It focuses on elucidating the contemporary (in Kartini's lifetime) Dutch “cultural imaginary” in terms of the ways in which, it is here argued, an awareness of Kartini was being processed, as well as the ways in which Kartini attempted to present herself.

The notion of a “cultural imaginary”, Dawson (1994) argues, is a useful way of giving recognition to the

In brief, the concept alerts us to the importance of taking account of the variety of intertwined influences and cultural institutions that need to be adduced in constructing historical explanations. Here, it suggests that any attempt to unravel the contemporary Dutch reception of “the idea of Kartini” needs to be located in recognition of the complex set of interrelated politico-cultural perceptions, practices and policies present at a particular moment in Dutch cultural, political, social and imperial history. In this, the Chapter argues, the contemporary “imagined Kartini” performed a highly pertinent function. Her “discovery” fed into a range of interrelated discourses and sensibilities that implicated new dimensions in the Netherlands’ imperialist project. For their advocates, seeking political and popular support in both metropolitan and colonial circuits of influence, Kartini provided a useful emblem.

Introduction

Every year on 21 April, Kartini's birthday, Indonesia celebrates Hari Kartini (Kartini Day). A day of civic celebration, it is marked by ceremonies, especially in schools and government institutions; and by reflections in the mass media on the state of women's social participation, challenges and achievements. This annual event has come to be focused, in often contradictory ways, on the “place of women” in modern Indonesia. Kartini's literary writings have been “mined” to give multiple and even contradictory characterizations of her voice, and hence of her historical significance.

This Chapter tracks the evolution of the trope of “Kartini” as a national heroine. “Kartini” has become a concept that organizes the idea of “Indonesian women”, a signifier that is deployed politically, and culturally, as part of a system of meaning-making. Her life and ideas have emerged as a “floating signifier” in Indonesian political, social and cultural discourse. While the term may appear to have a fixed referent in a historical personage, “Kartini” is given different meanings in different times, and is neither static nor solid. It shifts and slides in the process of making meanings that express contesting political discourses. In particular, this Chapter addresses the varying, shifting “Kartinis” associated with official and dissident gender politics in post-independence Indonesia in the following contexts: Sukarno's Old Order, Suharto's New Order, the contested space of Reformasi, and the contemporary post-Reformasi multimedia environment of jaman now (the “now” generation). In this Chapter, I use “Kartini” to refer to instances of the floating signifier, while references to the historical Kartini are unmarked (i.e. Kartini).

Knowing Different “Kartinis”

Kartini has become a historical figure because of the publication of her letters, written over four years of her short life (see Introduction to this volume). Hence we know her mainly as a literary figure.

Her bupati father allowed her to attend the local Dutch-language primary school, and this enabled her to interact in a colonial social milieu where she developed friendships with Dutch people, including many who visited her home. She corresponded with several of them, and we know her through her letters, in particular those she wrote to Rosa Abendanon-Mandri, the wife of a colonial official, and her earlier correspondence with Stella Zeehandelaar, a Dutch feminist whom she’d never met.

Introduction

In studies on Kartini, observations have been made about the ironies and contradictions presented by the liberal, modern and feminist persona in her letters. Goenawan Mohammad for instance points out how Kartini would negotiate on “what to say and what is not to be said” (2005, p. vi) in her letters to Stella Zeehandelaar, noting that while she denounced women's suffering in arranged and polygamous marriages as well as their lack of access to education, she was also remarkably reticent when it came to divulging the truth about her own polygamous family background. Despite their shared passion in gender reforms, Zeehandelaar never knew that Kartini was the daughter of a selir, a secondary wife named Ngasirah. Kartini, who readily identified herself as a member of the priyayi, had omitted the fact that the “mama” she spoke of in relation to “Madura royalty” (Kartini 2005, p. 30; Kartini 2014, p. 75) was in fact her stepmother, Raden Ayu Moerjam, also the consort wife (or padmi) to the bupati of Jepara, Kartini's father. What I find interesting here, however, is not so much Kartini's attempt to hide her polygamous family background from Zeehandelaar, but rather the way in which her pride as a member of the priyayi class comes to the fore. Kartini's silence in fact smacks of complicity that is implicitly class-related. As a member of the privileged class, Kartini—despite her resistance against native patriarchy—had little to say about the lower-class women who occupied the ideological and material fringes of her world, including the selir and peasant women (Gouda 1995; Hawkins 2007).1 As Manderson states, Kartini's “contrary portrait of women imprisoned, literally and metaphorically, seems peculiarly bound by class and region” (1983, p. 2).

This Chapter examines how Kartini's silence about the Other woman— represented by the selir and female peasant in Kartini's own lifetime, and the lower-class women in the postcolonial context—problematizes the popular narrative of her feminist progressiveness in Indonesian history. Of significance here is the manner in which Kartini's class consciousness has been maintained and reproduced by entrenched attitudes and viewpoints towards women who occupy the bottom rung of the social ladder in post-independence Indonesia.

This volume offers the first book-length study of the circulation and appropriation of Raden Ajeng Kartini (1879–1904, henceforth Kartini), a young Javanese woman whose influential writings emerged during the colonial Dutch East Indies, and who is now recognized as an iconic feminist and nationalist figure in Indonesia and, after Anne Frank, the most well-known Dutch-language author in the world. Spanning across the twentieth and early twenty-first centuries in both Asian and Western contexts, this volume maps and interprets how varying state, social and cultural actors and institutions have appropriated her thoughts to articulate their views on the position of women, race, class, civil rights, nationalism and other subjects in (post)colonial and global Indonesia, Europe and North America.

The world has known Kartini since the publication of a selection of her famous letters in 1911 titled Door duisternis tot licht (Through darkness into light) (Kartini 1911). Before that, she was mainly known in Dutch colonial circles, as can be glimpsed from almost one hundred newspaper articles during her lifetime and in response to her death in 1904.1 Since 1911, she has been translated into numerous languages, including Arabic, Sundanese, Javanese, Japanese, Russian and French, but most influentially into English as Letters of a Javanese Princess in 1920 (Kartini 1920) and into Indonesian as Habis gelap terbitlah terang (When darkness ends, light appears) for the first time in 1922 (Kartini 1922, 1938). Between 1911 and Indonesian independence in 1945, Indonesian and Dutch newspapers devoted thousands of articles to her and to the “Kartini schools” named after her. Since then, hundreds of books, theses and scholarly articles analysing her life and letters have been produced (Delpher). In the 1960s, she was taken up by the UNESCO Collection of Representative Works, with a foreword for the English edition by Eleanor Roosevelt and by Orientalist Louis Massignon for the French edition (Kartini 1960, 1964; see also Bijl in this volume, Chapter 3). In Indonesia, President Sukarno established Kartini's birthdate, 21 April, as Kartini Day (Hari Kartini) in 1946 and made her a national hero in 1964, while under the New Order of President Suharto, Kartini Day was transformed into an annual event that is still celebrated across the archipelago (Sears 1996; Rutherford's Chapter 5 in this volume; Robinson's Chapter 6 in this volume).

Introduction

In her book on the invention of human rights in the course of the eighteenth century, Lynn Hunt offers an analysis of the type of person that is considered “human” in European modernity. She discusses the crucial relationship between autonomy, empathy and human rights by stating that “[t]o have human rights, people had to be perceived as separate individuals who were capable of exercising independent moral judgment” and as “able to empathize with others” (Hunt 2007, p. 29). However, Hunt writes, not everybody was deemed to have such a moral autonomy and deep inner life: children, slaves, servants, the propertyless, women and, we can add, colonized peoples were seen as lacking the right qualities to be deemed (fully) human. Kartini was well aware of the privileges of being identified as human. Her connections with Dutch feminists and socialists were complex, for whereas these two groups primarily fought their battles in terms of gender and class, race

was a different category altogether as it was largely unacknowledged by the international women's movement of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries (Rupp 1997). Unfazed by this extra challenge, Kartini engaged proactively with international discourses on humanity, human equality, human inequality and rights by constructing in her letters an empathetic, wilful inner life that made her part of what was at the time considered “humanity” (Bijl 2017). On 20 May 1901, she wrote to her socialist-feminist pen pal, Stella Zeehandelaar, in her characteristically ambiguous tone which hovers somewhere between admiration, irony and anger:

Hunt's emphasis on empathy, autonomy and human rights was perfectly captured by Kartini when six months later on 20 November 1901 she wrote to Mrs Abendanon-Mandri: “I learned three things from the Europeans. Love, pity, and the concept of right—I want to live according to them” (Kartini 1987, p. 98; Kartini 2014, p. 226).

The economic, political, strategic and cultural dynamism in Southeast Asia has gained added relevance in recent years with the spectacular rise of giant economies in East and South Asia. This has drawn greater attention to the region and to the enhanced role it now plays in international relations and global economics.

The sustained effort made by Southeast Asian nations since 1967 towards a peaceful and gradual integration of their economies has had indubitable success, and perhaps as a consequence of this, most of these countries are undergoing deep political and social changes domestically and are constructing innovative solutions to meet new international challenges. Big Power tensions continue to be played out in the neighbourhood despite the tradition of neutrality exercised by the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).

The Trends in Southeast Asia series acts as a platform for serious analyses by selected authors who are experts in their fields. It is aimed at encouraging policymakers and scholars to contemplate the diversity and dynamism of this exciting region.

THE EDITORS

Series Chairman:

Series Editor:

Editorial Committee:

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

• • International relations scholarship and the popular media tend to portray China as a great power with hegemonic designs for Southeast Asia. Moreover, studies on Chinese influence in Southeast Asia predominantly focus on the Chinese state. This paper argues that Chinese non-state actors and their daily encounters with local communities in Southeast Asia deserve equal attention as these interactions evidently produce friction at both the society-to-state and state-to-state levels.

• • The influence of Chinese non-state actors in Southeast Asia can be illustrated with three examples, namely, Chinese tourism operations in Thailand, Chinese market demand and agricultural transformations in Myanmar, and Chinese gangs within the casino economy in Cambodia.

• • Thailand has recently become a top tourist destination for Chinese nationals. This has cultural implications as those involved in the tourism industry need to have Chinese language skills. The economic implications include increased competition and decreased accountability as Chinese tour companies have set up in Thailand using Thai locals as nominees. Bilateral relations also soured after a boat carrying Chinese tourists capsized in Thailand.

• • As global prices of corn rose in 2011 and 2012, areas in Myanmar close to the Chinese border have increased corn cultivation to meet Chinese demands for that crop. This has led to deforestation in these areas.

• • Chinese gangsters fleeing their government's crackdown in China have settled down to operate in the casino economy in Cambodia. Consequentially, there has been a rise in crime rate involving online scams and deteriorating public security. Despite the Chinese government encouraging the Cambodian government to enforce a ban on online gambling, the actions of non-state actors from China continue to be associated with the Chinese state as a whole and there is rising resentment towards the Chinese in Cambodia.

• • The COVID-19 pandemic has temporarily halted cross-border trade between China and mainland Southeast Asia. This has negatively affected local farmers who are dependent on the Chinese market.

INTRODUCTION

There is a tremendous amount of anxiety in Southeast Asia over the rising power of the People's Republic of China (PRC). Over the past four decades, the formerly dirt-poor communist country has become the world's second largest economy. The colossal size of the Chinese economy plus its massive population looms over Southeast Asian countries across its southern border. Many in the region are not sure what intentions the Chinese state and society have towards them. Indeed, there is a tremendous amount of debate within Southeast Asia about what the rise of China will mean for the region. In one way or another, such uncertainty or debates originate from a lack of consensus on what kind of great power China is. Is it the celestial kingdom of the past that wants to reassert its tributary relations with Southeast Asia? Or is it going to model itself after the Western colonial powers which used to control the region, plunder resources and enslave people? Or will the PRC repeat its revolutionary past, export communist ideologies and support internal insurgencies once again? Or will contemporary China be something totally different?

This paper takes on these questions and proposes that we understand China as an unconventional great power and that its influence in Southeast Asia will therefore be different from other historical or contemporary counterparts. Departing from conventional international relations approaches that tend to overwhelmingly focus on how the Chinese state or state-related actors exert influence, this paper instead focuses on how Chinese non-state actors have substantial impact on state-society relations in Southeast Asia, which in turn affect state-to-state relations as well. This exclusive focus on non-state actors is to compliment the large body of literature that has already examined the issue from the state angle, and to look at the complex nature of diverse non-state actors coming from China that have deep implications for Southeast Asia.

This paper first presents the foundation for conceptualizing China as an unconventional great power and the need to look at diverse actors, particularly non-state ones, in their presence and influence in Southeast Asia. It then illustrates with three examples—Chinese tourism in Thailand, agricultural transformations in Myanmar, and casino economies in Cambodia. In all three cases, non-state actors from China have left substantial imprints on local economies as well as state-society relations and these ultimately have repercussions for bilateral relations at the state level as well.

In post-reformasi Indonesia, we have not seen much progress in the attention given to minority rights, to groups holding “alternative” beliefs, or to small sects. Various cases of violence against and expulsions of minority sects—such as the Shias in Sampang, Madura (East Java) and the Ahmadis in Lombok—attest to this. Also lacking has been any protection for or rehabilitation of victims of violence and expulsions. And to the further detriment of some of these groups, rights that they had been accorded in the past have now been reduced. A case in point is that of the Ahmadiyah. Under the Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono administration (2004–9), three joint ministerial decrees were passed that limit the activities of the sect. Two bills—the Religious Harmony Bill and the Penal Code Bill—that had reached the draft stage are no longer being actively discussed in parliament. From what is known about them so far though, should the laws be passed the situation would potentially be more discriminatory towards these groups than the status quo.

In the case of economic rights for the poor and marginalized groups and for the victims of political violence under the New Order government (1966–98), whilst there has been little in the way of substantive progress, discussions about them in the public sphere at least have been robust. And some inroads have been made, with the introduction of new laws such as the Special Autonomy Law for Aceh and Papua—the two regions subject to the greatest repression during the New Order—providing affected groups some form of rights. With the passing of a new Village Law (Undang-undang Desa, UU No 6/2014), economic distribution to indigenous communities and villages affected by the decentralization exercise witnessed significant improvements. Conversely, the Constitutional Court's 2017 decision has not received adequate follow-up by the government of President Joko Widodo (Jokowi). The decision ordered that groups falling under the categories of “Aliran Kepercayaan” or “Aliran Kebatinan” (local beliefs) be accorded recognition similar to that received by the six “official religions” (Islam, Protestant Christianity, Roman Catholic Christianity, Hinduism, Buddhism, and Confucianism). The government remains hesitant in listening to mainstream Muslim voices calling for improvements on this aspect, but has instead allowed counter narrative voices to be dominant in the public sphere.

It is never easy to define Shiism as a collective category. There are the Zaidiyyahs, Isma’ilis, and the Imamis (Twelvers). The Shias in Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Indo-Pakistan and Southeast Asia differ significantly. With all the diversity within Shiism itself, I will have to go back to the basic definition of Shiism. Fundamentally, the Shias believe in the succession of Ali ibn Abi Thalib after the demise of Prophet Muhammad and in ‘Adl, or Divine Justice:

On the principle of divine justice, in Asha’arism (Sunnism) there is “an emphasis upon the will of God, whatever God wills is just, precisely because it is willed by God; and intelligence (‘Aql) is in a sense subordinated to this will and to the voluntarism which characterizes this form of theology’”. Nasr further stated that rationality played a crucial role in Shiism and that this distinctive belief helps to define the Shias:

Sunnis and Shias agree on three basic principles: divine unity (monotheism), nubuwwah or prophecy and Ma’ad or resurrection. Thus, the basic differences between Sunnis and Shias are historical and philosophical.

There are also other significant differences that put adherents from both schools in a difficult situation.

The main goal of religious reformism is to make a religion relevant to its sociocultural context so that it may continue to provide meaning to the lives of its practitioners. Another goal is to strengthen religious presence in the civic and political lives of its members. It also implies a creative re-evaluation of past traditions, which can lead to fresh interpretations. But reform is not simply appropriating new ideas or practices. It is also about having the moral courage to exert the necessary intellectual endeavour to correct the aberrations or misleading thought and practices of the present.

The inhibited reformist voices in contemporary Malay/Muslim religious discourse in Singapore warrant special attention. While the Malay/Muslim community lives in a modern cosmopolitan city state, it would be naïve to assume their religious ideas are also marked by openness and liberality. As in many other societies, there is a challenge to nurturing a progressive and reformist religious discourse. Voices for reform are intermittent and at times timid, but at other times they are more confident and determined.

The persistency of religious traditionalism and revivalism means that there is very little space for reformist ideas to gain ground within the local community. Apart from some inherent weaknesses in reformist agendas, the moral sanctions and pressure from conservative traditionalists has meant that reformists have always been in a defensive mode. In many Muslim societies today, reformist ideas are received in a guarded way and are deemed as unnecessarily disruptive as they affect the harmonious “balance” of the people's religious lives and convictions. Indeed, openness to exogenous ideas is immediately equated to the erosion of Muslims’ authenticity and identity.

In Singapore we are not faced with ultra conservatives who vehemently oppose reformists groups and deem them wayward, secular or Westernized. Opponents, however, do see reform as unnecessary or even as approaching heresy, since the religious formulations and commandments of the past are considered to be complete, final and absolutely creedal. For the modern-day religious revivalists, religious reformism is seen as a modernist project that will sap the authenticity of the religion, and it is often seen as a fatal compromise to liberal/ secular (Western) ideas.

Since the 9/11 attacks there has been a proliferation of strategic studies and publications on terrorism and radicalism in the region, given their potent social, economic and political ramifications. However, critical studies on the phenomenon of the non-violent resurgence of Islam among the Malays remains wanting, despite its dominance and impact. Those studies that do exist tend to disproportionately focus on its emergence and manifestations within a generally positive evaluative perspective. This chapter focuses critically on the major fixations and agenda promoted and embedded in resurgence discourse, and analyses how they are sustained and reinforced. It argues that the phenomenon has become so dominant that it negates, marginalizes and silences competing Malay thought and perspectives that are vital to the development and well-being of the community and the larger society. Instead of identifying relevant problems and providing muchneeded solutions grounded in an enlightened concept of religion and other philosophies that could facilitate Malays’ adaptation to change, resurgence discourse impedes this process and exacerbates the challenges. While special attention is given to the case of Singapore, the issues and problems discussed here are no less relevant to but intertwined with the country's predominantly Malay/Muslim neighbours.

Religious resurgence has become so prevalent today that there has been a strong tendency amongst both Muslims and non-Muslims to misleadingly conflate manifestations of the phenomenon with the teachings and values of Islam itself. So influential has the phenomenon been that it has profusely penetrated not only religious thought and practice at the individual or community level but has also expanded to the public sphere, where proponents articulate their views and demands on a thousand points, leaving hardly any domain untouched. Its overwhelming imprints are evident in the innumerable and diverse issues that encompass identity issues; the sense of morality; perceptions of customs, traditions and social norms; the expanding range of dietary taboos and restrictions; gender relations; and intra-community issues, issues relating to relations with non-Muslims. Perceptions and discourse on popular culture involving music, dress, lifestyles, dance, film, literary forms and expressions also bear its unmistakable imprints.

In the 1960s, Peter L. Berger argued that religion would face serious challenges dealing with modernity. He believed that when confronted with the wave of modernity, religion would steadily but surely decline and be marginalized from public life. He also maintained that the more rational human beings became, the narrower and smaller would be the roles that religion would play in the public sphere.

However, Berger's projection is not in line with contemporary trends. Religion has moved in the opposite direction. There has been a vociferous resurgence of religion in the public sphere. Religious resurgence has emerged in various dimensions and manifestations in many parts of the world. Diana L. Eck observed this phenomenon in the context of the United States. In Europe, religious resurgence not only saw the rise of the Christian right but also of Islamophobia—anti-Muslim sentiments. Geertz Wilders, a former Dutch member of parliament, produced a film, Fitna, that offended many Muslims. Wilders’ movie can be read as part of the anxiety over the Islamic religious resurgence emerging in the Netherlands.

In the same vein, Tariq Ramadan depicted Muslim dynamics in Europe and projected the future of Islam in that continent. His primary concerns were what it means to be a Muslim in Europe and how do European Muslims play their part within the continent's social and political context. He also noted, amongst others, the dynamics of religious resurgence that have implications on Muslim public life.

In short, religious resurgence has become a global phenomenon, and Indonesia has also been feeling its impact. The wave of resurgence and rising religious consciousness has become more visible in recent years. Religious consciousness has come to colour the lives of Indonesians more so than in the past. It is interesting however to see the impact of this rising religious consciousness, especially in the context of political contestation and identity assertion. Generally, this chapter argues that the direction of Muslims’ religious consciousness in Indonesia will manifest and affect the political, economic, ideological and civilizational orientation of the masses.

Political Orientation

When religious resurgence in Muslim circles gets stronger, it becomes more politically appealing. Accordingly, it invites certain political agencies to attempt to utilize religion as a political tool. In this context, politics operates in the name of religion that is a condition of faith.