Building a new nation, however, requires
more than a shared sense of
grievances against the foreign invader.
By what means was independence
to be achieved? Was independence
or modernization the more
important objective? What kind of
political and economic system should
be adopted once colonial rule had
been overthrown? What national or
cultural concept should be adopted as
the symbol of the new nation, and
which institutions and values should
be preserved from the past?
Questions such as these triggered
lively and sometimes acrimonious
debates among patriotic elements
was the desired end, how could it be achieved? Could the
Westerners be persuaded to leave by nonviolent measures,
or would force be required? If the Western presence
could be beneficial in terms of introducing much-needed
reforms in traditional societies, then a gradualist approach
made sense. On the other hand, if the colonial regime
was primarily an impediment to social and political
change, then the first priority was to bring it to an end.
Another problem was how to adopt modern Western
ideas and institutions while preserving the essential values
that defined the indigenous culture. The vast majority
of patriotic intellectuals were convinced that to survive,
their societies must move with the times and adopt
much of the Western way of life. Yet many were equally
determined that the local culture could not, and should
not, simply become a carbon copy of the West. What was
the national identity, after all, if it did not incorporate
some elements inherited from the traditional way of life?
One of the reasons for using traditional values was to
provide ideological symbols that the common people
could understand. If the desired end was national independence,
then the new political parties needed to enlist
the mass of the population in the common struggle. But
how could peasants, plantation workers, fishermen, and
shepherds be made to understand complicated and unfamiliar
concepts like democracy, industrialization, and
nationhood? The problem was often one of communication,
for most urban intellectuals had little in common
with the teeming population in the countryside. As the
Indonesian intellectual Sutan Sjahrir
lamented, many Westernized intellectuals
had more in common with their
colonial rulers than with the native
population in the rural villages.
World History
