THE INDONESIAN ELECTIONS
OF 1955
HERBERT FEITH
INTERIM REPORTS SERIES
MODERN INDONESIA PROJECT
Southeast Asia Program
Cornell University
Ithaca, New York
Second Printing, 1971
Price—$3.50THE INDONESIAN ELECTIONS
OF 1955
Herbert Feith
INTERIM REPORTS SERIES
Modern Indonesia Project
Southeast Asia Program
Cornell University
Ithaca, New York
1957
Second Printing 1971© 1957 by Herbert Feithi
PREFACE
Among the most important political events in recent Indonesian
history have been the elections held in the autumn of 1955. They
have been Important not only because of their more accurate measure
ftient of party strength and their endowment of parliament with a
more representative quality. To the social scientist desirous of
knowing more about the nature of post-revolutionary Indonesian
society they provide a mountain of source materials. However,
these data are susceptible to fruitful analysis only where the
social scientist has rather special qualifications. By virtue of
a considerable previous residence in and knowledge of Indonesia, a
full command of the Indonesian language, and a training in politi-
cal science Herbert Feith is well qualified to undertake this
study. His stay in Indonesia was optimally suited to his research;
for he was there during the elections, for three years before, and
for nine months afterwards. Moreover, he was able to do consider-
able travelling within the country just prior to and during the
election period.
This Interim Report incorporates some of Mr. Feith’s provi-
sional findings and tentative interpretations. At present he is
working on a more substantial and definitive monograph which we
hope will be completed and published in 1959.
Mr. Feith is a graduate of the University of Melbourne from
which in 1954 he earned an M.A. (with First Class Honors) in
Political Science. Currently he holds a fellowship at Cornell
University.
Ithaca, N. Y.
June 6, 1957
George McT. Kahin
DirectorIll
TABLE OF CONTENTS
page
PREFACE	i
FOREWORD	V
PART I, INTRODUCTORY	1
PART II, CAMPAIGNING A	7
PART III, CAMPAIGNING B	21
PART IV, THE BALLOT	39
PART V, ANALYSIS	57V
FOREWORD
The material on which this Interim Report is based was collected
while I .was employed by the Indonesian Ministry of Information be-
tween 1951 and 1953 and between 1954 and 1956. I wish here to tex-
press my great gratitude to the Ministry for the opportunities with
which it provided me throughout those four years for the study of
social and political problems.
I was particularly fortunate in the opportunities I had to
study elections. The Ministry made it possible for me to make
studies of the Minahasa and Jogjakarta elections of 1951, and in
1955 I was able to travel extensively in Java and Sumatra observing
preparations for the national elections and also the campaigning,
polling, and the post-elections situation.
Apart from personal observation my main source of information
for this study has been Indonesia’s very free Djakarta and regional
press. In this regard I also received most valuable assistance
from members and officers of the Central Electoral Committee, from
the Economic and Social Research Institute of the Djakarta School
of Economics and the Social Research Institute of the Law Faculty
of.the University of Indonesia. A number of party leaders and
journalists were particularly helpful to me. In addition several
personal friends living or travelling outside the capital atth&time of the
elections were so good as to take one of my questionnaires and
then give me the benefit of what they had observed. Finally I
wish to record my gratitude to the Cornell Modern Indonesia Project
which has supported me financially in the period since my return
from Indonesia to Australia, thus enabling me to analyze the
material I had collected and write this presentation of it.
In this short monograph, which will be followed by a more
comprehensive study, a number of problems of method have been
evaded. My concern has been to state a thesis rather than to docu-
ment it. Thus I have frequently not adduced evidence where to do
so would have involved a discussion of details and of the reliabil-
ity of particular sources of information.
Melbourne, Australia
March 1957
Herbert FeithPART I
INTRODUCTORY
. The Indonesian elections of September and December 1955 are
strikingly interesting as an experiment in democracy. They were
the country’s first nation-wide elections, preceded by little in the
way of provincial or municipal elections. Elections for the pre-war
Volksraad (People's Council), held on the basis of an extremely
narrow franchise, had provided next to no democratic experience.
Yet the suffrage was accorded universally to all persons over 18
years of age and all others who had attained adulthood through
marriage. .In the absence of established electoral machinery the
organization of the poll became the joint responsibility of the
regular civil administration and multi-party committees. Balloting
was entrusted to multi-party committees at the village and lower-
than-village levels, often consisting in part of illiterates.
Long-awaited and frequently postponed, these elections were
prepared for by one government and carried through by another of
very different political colour which had only just come into
office. The political stakes were high, yet no cabinet or party
could predict their outcome with even a moderate degree of accuracy.
Socially too much was unpredictable, As Roeslan Abdulgani said
on the eve of the elections, "It is necessary for the social pyra-
mid to be cut through vertically....The effects (of this) cannot
be foreseen, but whatever those effects might be the risks must be
taken." (1)
At the same time the elections are of great interest for what
they show of the mechanics and the underlying determinants of
politics in Indonesia and for the wealth of opportunities for
social analysis which they provide. The main concerns of this
Interim Report are with these aspects. It attempts to outline the
changes which electioneering brought about in the workings of
Indonesian politics and suggests hypotheses which may throw light
on the election results.
Election history in Indonesia goes back to the early days of
the national revolution. Plans for the holding of nation-wide
elections were announced as early as October 5,. 1945, and in 1946
elections were held in the Javanese residencies of Kediri and
Surakarta. (2) In 1948 the Republic's Badan Pekerdja (Working
Parliament) passed a law establishing a system of indirect elections
based on proportional representation and giving the franchise to
(1)	Roeslan Abdulgani, "The Political Party System of Indonesia
on the Eve: of the Elections," a paper read before the Djakarta
"Mata-hari Club" September 21, 1955.
(2)	See Satu Tahun Badan Pembaharuan Susunan Komite Nasional Pusat,
Jogjakarta, 1947. Also Mr. Subagio Reksodipuro, Pemilihan
Umum, 1951.	~~
12
all citizens over the age of 18.
After the U.N. Security Council debate which followed the second
Dutch attack on the Republic in December 1948, it seemed for a
time that full sovereignty would come to Indonesia via U.N.-super-
vised elections. But this proposed arrangement was by-passed with
the establishment of the ’’New Course,” the series of direct .Indo-
nesian-Dutch negotiations which led to the decisive Round Table
Conference at the Hague, on the basis of which Indonesia became
fully sovereign on December 27, 1949.
For some time early in 1950 it was expected that the necessary
reconstitution of the federal Republic of the United States of
Indonesia which had been established under the Hague Agreement
would be effected by an elected Constituent Assembly. But again
the slow electoral method was by-passed. For it was clear very soon
after the inauguration of the R.U.S.I., that in the atmosphere of
the triumphant nationalism of the day the federal structure, built
upon the artificial states and territories which the Dutch had es-,
tablished as part of their strategy against the revolutionary
Republic, could not last.
From 1950 onwards nation-wide elections were frequently promised
by successive government, but the priority which had to be given
to other more urgent government business, and the pressure against
elections exerted by a number of parties and a considerable group
of members of the temporary parliament, combined to prevent effec-
tive action. (3)
Elections were held in 1951 and early 1952 in Minahasa, Sangir-
Talaud and the Municipality of Makassar in Sulawesi and in the
Special Territory of Jogjakarta, and from these elections, conducted
on the basis of a variety of electoral systems, government authori-
ties acquired considerable experience in the problems of electoral
technique. But plans for nation-wide elections went ahead very
slowly.
Elections legislation had for eighteen months been the object
of what one Indonesian newspaper called a game of pingpong between
cabinet and parliament, when on October 17, 1952 an event occurred
which made elections an issue of primary political importance.
On this date a large group of high army officers, supported
by an array-organized political demonstration, unsuccessfully applied
pressure on the President to dissolve the temporary parliament.
Thus there came to a head a long struggle for power between sections
of the army leadership and the President. An emergency situation
prevailed for a short time, with a real danger that division in
the army would be pressed to the point of civil warfare, This
danger was averted but political tension remained very high.
(3) See "Problems of Elections," Indonesian Affairs (Ministry of
Information) April-May 1952.3
The crisis intensified opposition to the existing temporary
parliament which had for some time been a key target for the incho-
ate general feeling of disappointment with the fruits of the new
independence, and specifically for dissatisfaction with the in-
stability of the post-revolutionary political situation and the
paucity of achievements of the three short-lived cabinets of the
new period.
The cabinet of the day, a P.N.I.-Masjumi-Socialist coalition
headed by the P.N.I. Nationalist Wilopo, was virtually hamstrung
by the tumultuous parliamentary and extra-parliamentary conflict
which continued for months after October 17th. But both sides in
this conflict, those who condemned the October 17th actions and
those who supported them, were challenged to declare their support
for early elections. The cabinet pursued a double policy to meet
the situation. Firstly it attempted to do everything possible to
bring about a compromise solution of the army issues. Secondly
it pressed strongly for early elections as a long-term solution.
Thus in November 1952 the Wilopo cabinet, strongly supported by
politically vocal opinion, introduced a new elections bill, which
in amended form became law four and a half months later. (4)
The new law provided for direct elections. Experience in
the Jogjakarta elections, and the Indian elections of 1951-52,
had combined to persuade the Wilopo cabinet to reverse the policy
of parlier governments for elections on the indirect system.
Furthermore the elections were to be double elections. For a
number of complicated political and constitutional reasons the
earlier idea that a Working Parliament should be chosen by and
from an elected Constituent Assembly was abandoned in favor of
the holding of elections for two separate bodies, Parliament as
well as a Constituent Assembly.
The system of proportional representation was adopted with
next to no opposition. The law divided the country into 16 elec-
toral districts, one of them being West Irian. Each area was
allotted seats on the basis of the number of its citizen-residents,
with provision however for each area to have the right to minimum
representation, six seats in the Constituent Assembly and three in
Parliament. Within each electoral district seats would be distrib-
uted to parties and other candidate bodies in proportion to the
number of votes they had received. Remaining votes could be pooled
either between different parties within an electoral district (if
these had previously given notice of a vote-pooling agreement
between them) or amalgamated by one party at the national level.
(4) For discussion of the October 17th Affair in its relation to
elections, and of the parliamentary struggle from which the
amended electoral law was born, see the present writer’s article
’’Towards Elections in Indonesia,’’ Pacific Affairs, September
1954, and his forthcoming Political Developments in Indonesia
in the period of the Wilopo Cabinet, (Monograph Series, Cornell
Modern Indonesia Project, Circa December 1957).4
The electoral machinery would be the joint responsibility of
the Ministers of Justice and the Interior, but wide powers were
given to the multi-party Central Electoral Committee (Panitia
Pemilihan Indonesia) which was entrusted with the executive task of
organizing and regulating the election. Multi-party electoral
committees would function also at the level of the local district,
the kabupaten (regency) and the ketjamatan (sub-district). But at
the kabupaten and ketjamatan levels there would be a link with the
pamong pradja (civil serivce) corps, the general administration
functioning as part of the Ministry of the Interior, inasmuch as
the bupati or regency head would be the chairman of the Kabupaten
Electoral Committee and the tjamat or sub-district head the chair-
man of the Ketjamatan Ballot Committee. Below the ketjamatan level
there would be Village Committees for the Registration of Voters
under the chairmanship of the village head and, later, Polling
Station Committees. These too would where possible be multi-party
in composition.
Parties , organizations , .’’.voters ’ associations, " and individuals
would be eligible as candidates but each candidate list had to
be supported by the signatures of registered voters, 200 signatures
for ;.the..first candidate of a list and 25 for every other candidate.
There were no limitations on the right of members of electoral
committees to be candidates. Each candidate body would submit an
election symbol. The illiterate person would vote by piercing
the square of the symbol of his choice on the ballot paper. The
literate person would be free to do this, or, alternatively, to
vote for an individual within a candidate list by writing the
individual’s name on the paper.
Balloting would proceed at a public polling meeting. Both at
the pollicy stage and the counting stage which followed immediately
upon it, members of the public would have the right to lodge verbal
protests against action of the Polling Station Committee. Decisions
on such protests would have to be taken immediately by the Committee
Observation by the public and the multi-party character of the
committees would, it was calculated, forestall malpractices at the
polls. (5)
The electoral system established under the 1953 law has been
criticized as democratically perfectionist, over-complicated and
consequently both slow and expensive. Such criticism has a good
deal to commend it. But in a number of respects, particularly in
its provisions for electoral machinery and for balloting it repre-
sents a carefully considered adaptation of electoral techniques
to the requirements of Indonesian conditions.
(5) See Boyd R. Compton, ’’The Indonesian Electoral Law," Far Eastern
Survey, April-May 1954.· Also Rustam Sutan Palindih, Ondang-
Undang dan peraturan-Peraturan Pemilihan Umum, 1954. The
Indonesian Ministry of Information has published an English
text of the election law.5
Even after the electoral bill had become law a number of
political obstacles stood in the way of the speedy implementation
of the elections. The attempt of the Wilopo cabinet to establish
a Central Electoral Committee floundered because of disagreement
between its major coalition partners on its composition. Only in
December,1953 a Central Electoral Committee was installed. This
was a body which gave no representation to any of the parties which
were in opposition against the P.N.I.-led cabinet of Mr. Ali
Sastroamidjojo. The opposition was able to adduce a good deal of
evidence for its charge that the Ali cabinet was purposely delaying
the holding of elections until such time as the parties in it had
established a stronger electoral position for themselves.
The registration of voters was begun in May,1954 and completed
in November, by which time 43,104,464 persons had been registered
as eligible to vote. In December,1954 the parties were able to
submit their candidate lists, and in April,1955 the Central Elec-
toral Committee announced September 29, and December 15, 1955 as
the dates on which the parliamentary and Constituent Assembly
elections would be held. For some time it appeared doubtful whether
it would be possible to adhere to these dates. Particularly was
this the case after the ”27th June 1955 Affair” which ushered in
a new military-political crisis and brought about the downfall of
the Ali Sastroamidjojo cabinet. But the Ali cabinet's successor,
the cabinet of Mr. Burhanuddin Harahap of the Masjumi succeeded in
holding the elections on the dates planned.
In 1955, as in 1952, elections were regarded by the newspaper-
reading public as a way out of a highly unsatisfactory general
political situation. This situation was seen in terms of recurring
cabinet crises, army challenges to government authority, corrup-
tion, political nepotism, party bickering, and above all the im-
potence of governments in the face of the enormous tasks facing
it in every direction. Thus a very great deal was expected of the
elections.PART II
CAMPAIGNING A
The fact of elections is of fundamental importance to the
party system of any country. The holding of a first election
necessarily involves enormous changes in the functioning of parties,
putting an end to ;the situation where party activities are deter-
mined almost exclusively by the requirements of capital city poli-
tics. The changes were particularly great in Indonesia because
universal suffrage was there introduced from the first, and be-
cause the inadequacy of mass communications and the barriers
created by the village’s social structure compelled the parties
to organize extensively at the village level.
A fuller examination of the functioning of Indonesian parties
in the period before electioneering would begin with the formation
of Boe.di Qetomo (High Endeavour) in 1908, and of Sarekat Islam
(Islamic Association) in 1912, and would concentrate attention
particularly on the political organizations of the period of Japan-
ese occupation. In this discussion however we must limit our-
selves to the period which began with the proclamation of Indonesia's
independence on August 17, 1945.
The contrast is sharp between the functioning of the party
system between 1945 and 1953 on the one hand and its functioning in
the campaign period on the other. It is of course impossible to
say precisely when the campaign began, but two dates may be mentioned
as pinpointing the beginning of certain aspects of campaigning.
April 4, 1953, the day on which the electoral bill became law may
be regarded as inaugurating a "first stage of campaigning." From
this time onwards—perhaps indeed from the time of the "October 17
Affair" of 1952 which provided the motive force which ensured
the passage of the bill—it was thought highly probable that elections
would indeed be held in the not too distant future. Party leaders
could no longer afford to base their actions on cynicism towards
the government’s election promises. May 31, 1954 may be regarded
as ushering in a "second stage of campaigning"; on this day the
parties' ballotpaper symbols were endorsed by the Central Electoral
Committee, opening the way for campaigning in terms of these.
As we look at Indonesian parties in the pre-electioneering
period between 1945 and early 1953, an obvious division suggests
itself as before and after the final establishment of Indonesian
sovereignty on December 27, 1949. In the 1945-49 period parties
not only wrestled for political power within the Republic. They
also fought—politically, and their offshoots militarily—for the
survival of the Republic itself. Concerned to rally the peasantry
to active support of the; Republican cause, they worked to extend
their influence in the villages. There was little competition be-
tween them there; the tendency was rather for large areas to become
spheres of influence of particular parties. Consequently there
was little attempt made to establish formal organizational machinery
78
at the level of the village. Effective party membership remained
a category largely unknown at the village level despite the vigorous
activity of the Marxist parties there and despite the developed
organizational structure Which the Masjumi (the largest Islamic
party;) had in Java from the time of the Japanese occupation. But
it is undeniable that the impact of political parties was felt
at this level.
In the 1950-53 period on the other hand, when victory over the
Dutch had been achieved and political parties gave their undivided
attention to the internal struggle for power, there was a decline
in their activities at the village level. Concerned to use their
resources so as to achieve maximum success at the national level,
they concentrated on expanding their influence among the most
powerful social groups. So party competition existed in cities,
in the larger residency and kabupaten (regency) towns, on planta-
tions and mines, and in areas where there were large numbers of
revolutionary veterans. It rarely existed in kawedanaan (district)
or ketjamatan (sub-district) townships, much less in villages.
One important function of regional party activity at this period
was bluff. By holding congresses in Djakarta to which a large
number of branches sent delegates, a party could appear to be
powerful, and if the semblance was accepted it became tantamount to
reality. In addition such party activity had an important impact
on Djakarta politics in relation to certain major issues such as
those centering on the "October 17th Affair," On issues like these
the parties saw to it that Djakarta was inundated with petitions
and demands from their branches, and from inter-party conferences
and ad hoc committees from every part of the country.
But while the Djakarta level of political struggle was primary
as the raison d’etre of the regional activity of the parties, there
is no doubt that they were also concerned in considerable measure
with regional power. Certain parties were able to consolidate
their influence within the pamong pradja corps (the hierarchical
general administration) and other government agencies, and party
struggle within the very small group of the politically powerful
was frequently intense over appointments and transfers of governors,
residents, bupatis, heads of regional departments of trade, educa-
tion, information, religion, and others. When legislative councils
were established at the provincial and kabupaten levels in parts of
Java and Sumatra on the basis of the controversial Government Regu-
lation No. 39 of 1950, the existence of previously established
branches of parties and organizations was made the basis of repre-
sentation. In this way parties were rewarded for having branches
in existence, regardless of whether these were in any way active.
Although the legislative councils and the executive councils elected
by them, had few prerogatives, they provided positions of prominence
for party leaders qua party leaders. The fact that it was widely
thought that nation-wide elections would be held in the near future
as promised, was also already a factor lending point to regional9
party activity. (6)
All of this activity however proceeded at a level far above
the village. The villager knew next to nothing of it. He was
relevant to it only very incidentally, and it affected him less
than had party activity in the period of revolution. The parties'
branches were unreal units except for their leadership. With
financial arrangements haphazard and subscriptions rarely insisted
on, the regional leaders of most parties enrolled members princi-
pally in order to increase their representation at party con-
gresses. Even so it was only in a few areas where political life
was relatively highly developed that membership reached into
the villages on any significant scale. In most cases the members
enrolled for the purposes of party statistics were townsmen, many
of aristocratic origin and most with some Western education, who,
in conformity with a conception important in nationalist thinking,
believed they were demonstrating political awareness and under-
standing (kesadaran, keinsjafan) by joining a party. (7)
As might be expected, the Communist Party stood out from this
general pattern of party structure and activity—as did the smaller
national-communist Partai Murba to a lesser extent. Recovering
from its defeat in the 1948 Madiun Affair, and from the condition
of factional division which characterized it in 1949 and 1950, the
P.K.I. (Partai Komunis Indonesia) was small but disciplined and
effective^ Its membership structure—until the rapid expansion
of membership which was begun in March 1952—was similar to that
of European Communist parties and quite unlike that of other
Indonesian parties. To a certain extent the P.K.I. was totali-
tarian and bund-like, as was the Partai Murba in lesser degree.
These parties were little concerned with the politics of bupati-
ships or other government positions. Their activities were con-
centrated on the proletariat in cities and towns and on plantations,
on youth and veterans' groups and on certain rebel and dacoit
bands. In many of these areas they competed strongly against
one another. In addition the P.K.I. made a new start with its
work among the peasants which had largely stopped after the crushing
of the Madiun revolt.
The Masjumi too diverged from the general pattern sketched
above, though less strikingly than the P.K.I. Unlike other parties
it had been provided by Japanese occupation policy with an organiza-
(6) For general discussions of the dynamics of party politics at
this period see Robert C. Bone, "The Future of Indonesian
Political Parties," Far Eastern Survey, February 1954, and the
present writer's forthcoming Political Developments in Indo-
nesia in the period of the Wilopo Cabinet.
(7) This pattern was modified only slightly in the areas where
elections were held for regional legislative councils during
this period, i.e., in Minahasa, Sangir-Talaud, the Special
Territory of Jogjakarta and the Municipality of Makassar.10
tion extending into the villages in many areas. Unlike them too
it was indirect in structure, being a federation of Moslem organiza-
tions of various types, including the large Muhammidijah and Nahdatul
Ulama, both long-established organizations which had continued to
exist in the Japanese period. While Masjumi membership did not
involve anything like;the bund-type obligations, the branches of the
party were frequently characterized by ties of community which did
not exist in the majority of parties. (8)
How then did the partiee conKi to function in the period of
election campaigning? This question we shall examine in terms of
the appeals used by the parties in campaigning, in terms of the
methods employed by them and in terms of the social groups
through which they functioned.
The parties* campaign appeals cannot be understood except
against the background of the issues being fought out at the
Djakarta or national level of political activity, which we may take
as defined by the reporting in Djakarta's daily press. Most of
these issues related to the pattern of cabinet politics. They were
issues between the supporters and opponenets of the Wilopo cabinet
(April 3, 1952 - June 3, 1953) the cabinet of Mr. Ali Satroamidjojo
of the P.N.I. (August 1, 1953 - July 24, 1955) which held office for
almost two years of the campaign period, resigning eleven weeks be-
fore the parliamentary elections, and the cabinet of Mr. Burhanuddin
Harahap of the Masjumi (August 12, 1955 - March 3, 1956) which actual
ly implemented the holding of the double elections.
But by the time of the passing of the electoral bill in April
1953 the Wilopo cabinet, based on a coalition of the Masjumi and
P.N.I. (Indonesian Nationalist Party) was already disintegrating;
and the next two cabinets were coalitions centering on one of these
two major parties, with the other leading the opposition. Thus the
central fact determining issues at 'ihe Djakarta or national level
of campaigning was opposition between the Masjumi and the P.N.I,
The Nahdatul Ulama and P.S.I.I. were minor factors as far as deter-
mination of campaign issues was concerned, despite the fact that
together they held five portfolios in the cabinet of Ali and four
in that of Burhanuddin, and the same may be said of the P.S.I.
Socialists and the two Christian parties which were represented in
the Wilopo and Burhanuddin governments, and of the minor nationalist
parties which held portfolios in all of the three cabinets.
But the Communist Party did in one sense constitute a third
main party determining elections appeals—despite its association
with the P.N.I., its support of the Ali cabinet and its strong
opposition to that of Burhanuddin. The debate was thus partly
(8) For a full discussion of the concepts of bund and community as
categorizations of different types of political parties see
Maurice Duverger, Political Parties, Their Organization and
Activity in the Modern State, 1954, Methuen, London, pp. 124 ff.11
three sided.
One of the central issues between the Masjumi and the P.N.I.
concerned the role of Islam in the State. President Sjekarno
first brought this issue to the forefront of Djakarta's political
stage in January 1953 when he issued a warning that secessions
would follow any attempt to establish Indonesia as an Islamic
State. This statement and subsequent ones made in its defense
drew fire from many Moslem spokesmen, but particularly from the
radical chariman of the Masjumi of West Java, Kiai Hadji Isa
Anshary. The mass rally speeches which Isa Anshary made frequently
in the course of the campaign were fiery denunciations of leaders
of non-Moslem political parties as munafik (hypocritical Moslems)
and kafir (unbelievers).
The Masjumi leadership denied that the party's advocacy of a
"state based on Islam" brought it into conflict in any way with
the Pantja Sila, the prevailing Five Principles of State. P.N.I.
leaders were equally insistent that their strong support for the
Pantja Sila did not reflect a luke-warm attitude to Islam. But
the accusations were made repeatedly by both sides. The P.N.I,
pointed to the extremism of Isa Anshary, who in considerable
measure was involving his party in opposition to nationalist sym-
bols. The Masjumi on the other hand organized huge rallies in
protest against statements by spokesmen of the P.N.I. and the
small Permai (Persatuan Rakjat Marhaen Indonesia, Proletarian
Peop1e's Union) which were declared to be insults to Islam.
The Nahdatul Ulama and P.S.I.I., which in the period of the
W.ilopo cabinet had given a measure of support to the Masjumi
viewpoint on these issues between nationalism and Islam, were
silent in the period of Ali, merely affirming their specifically
Moslem political and constitutitonal demands and the compatibility
of these with nationalism. On the other side the Socialists, and
particularly the Christian parties, dissociated themselves from
the Masjumi. The Communists gave strong support to the P.N.I.
Also of great importance were the issues raised by the economic
policies and fortunes of the Ali Sastroamidjojo administration,
and subsequently of that of Burhanuddin Harahap. The politicies
of Mr. Iskaq Tjokroadisoerjo, the P.N.I. Minister of Economic
Affairs in the Ali cabinet, particularly his "special licenses"
for imports, were strongly attacked by the Masjumi and the
Socialists as wasteful and politically discriminatory. The
cabinet's defense stressed what Iskaq's policies were doing for
national Indonesian enterprise. But it soon became clear that
the increased pace of "Indonesianization"—in transport services
and certain categories of exporting, as well as importing—was
having adverse effects on the economy generally, The evidence of
factory and estate closings, of the shortages of many categories of
imports and of the inflation which proceeded increasingly rapidly
in 1954 and had reached; serious proportions by the first half of
1955, made it difficult for the governmeht to present a convincing
case. Its campaigning difficulties were heightened by the attention12
which the opposition drew to corrumption and to the increased impor-
tation of luxuries, particularly the conspicuous luxury cars.
The Communist Party solved the dialectic problems with which
this situation presented it by emphasizing the poverty and bad live-
lihood of the people but linking this with the continued hold of
imperialism over the Indonesian economy rather than with the policies
of the Ali government, which, it maintained, was more progressive
than any of its predecessors.
While the Ali cabinet had considerable difficulty in defending
its economic policies, the Burhanuddin Harahap cabinet found this
relatively easy. With drastic import restrictions, administrative
reorganization and a determined drive against corruption, this
cabinet succeeded in initiating a sharp fall in prices, particularly
of textiles, which affected every part of the country. The gold
price, commonly accepted index of the value of money, fell by 12.9%
between June 30th and September 26th. The P.N.I. and Communist
opposition was subsequently able to point to shortages of salt and
rises in the prices of rice and oil occurring in the last weeks
before September 29th, but the government parties retained their
campaign appeal advantage on the basis of Burhanuddin's earlier
successes.
Opposition campaigning against the Ali government contained
many charges against political appointments and dismissals. The
lack of representation for opposition parties on the multi-party
Central Electoral Committee was the cause of particularly strong
protest. Frequently too there were accusations that the government
was intentionally delaying the holding of the elections. The
government’s dependence on Communist parliamentary support—particu-
larly after the reshuffle of the cabinet in November 1954—was
another object of heavy opposition criticism. The rapid growth of
the P.K.I. was laid at the door of the government, and particularly
of the P.N.I.
The government parties made anti-colonialism a major part of
their campaign armory. They lauded the cabinet’s firmness against
the remnants of colonial power in Indonesia and its active efforts
to achieve the return of West Irian. When President ;Soekarno
warned of the attempts of foreign powers to overthrow the cabinet,
cxearly implying that opposition leaders were involved in these
attempts, the cabinet’s supporters gained a powerful argument.
They had one of probably even greater effectiveness with the suc-
cessful holding of the Bandung Asian-African Conference in April
1955 five months before the parliamentary election.
The role of the Communist Party in relation to the Ali cabinet
and the parties represented in it created a special situation as
far as election issues were concerned. There was tension between
this cabinet and the Communists at a number of points—on labor
policy, on the Communist-supported proposals for the arming of
veterans’ groups to combat the Darul Islam, and for a People's
Congress for the Security of the Elections and on the designation13
of the P.K.I.'s election symbol as the "symbol of the P.K.I. and
non-party people." But both sides had an interest in minimizing
the significance of these issues, and so neither attacked the other
publicly—at least at the Djakarta level. Instead both independently
attacked the Masjumi-Socialist opposition.
This situation was of major advantage to the P.K.I. in that
the attitude of the government parties to it implied that it was
all but fully accepted as part of the nationalist political frame-
work. This helped to delete the stigma of the Madiun Affair of
1948 and gave the party an important advantage in its debate with
the Masjumi.
For indeed most of the issues between the Communists and the
Masjumi related to the attempt of each of thefee to brand the other
as extremist, alien and inimical to the shared central core of
nationalist attitudes. Thus the Communists were vociferous in
support of all the attempts of the government parties to depict
the opposition as disloyal. In addition they were the forerunners
of the campaign to associate the Masjumi with the Darul Islam on
the one hand and with foreign plantation and mining interests on
the other. After the P.K.I.'s decision of November 1954 to "accept
the Pantja Sila as the political basis of the Republic while suggest-
ing improvements," its leaders contrasted this acceptance with
various Masjumi leaders’ criticism of these Principles of State.
The Masjumi for its part tried hard to establish the idea of
a dividing line between the Communists and all other parties. Its
speakers spoke of the subservience of the P.K.I. to Moscow; they
frequently recalled the Communists' role in the Madiun Affair and
attempted to institute a Day of National Mourning to mark the
anniversary of its outbreak. Again they stressed the anti-religious
nature of Communism, using to good effect Chou En-lai's statement
at the Bandung Conference, "We Communists are atheists." The Isa
Anshary section of the party, powerful particularly in West Java,
established an Anti-Communist Front, and this same section denounced
the Communists as kafir (unbelievers), with some leaders going as
far as to urge refusal to them of Moslem burial rites.
But in all this the Masjumi labored under disadvantages which
arose directly from its being in the opposition for the greater
part of the campaign period and from the P.K.I. being a government-
supporting party for that time. This situation meant that there
was a risk of back-firing involved in any Masjumi attempt to
isolate the Comjnunists or brand them as extremists. The fact was
that, in terms of cabinet politics, the Masjumi was largely isolated
for the two years of Ali Sastroamidjojo administration. It had to
take great care lest its attacks on the Ali cabinet on the one
hand and the Communists on the other should result in a strengthening
of ties between these two, and thus intensify its own isolation.
These difficulties were accentuated by the Masjumi's disunity, in
particular by the unwillingness of the Isa Anshary group to accept
the appeals emphasis laid down by the party's majority leadership.
But in one sense this disunity was itself a product of the Masjumi's14
opposition situation—in the sense that this situation produced a
radicalism which could not be accommodated in the party's election
strategy, oriented as this had to be towards overcoming its
isolation.
The tri-polar issues situation of the Ali cabinet was thus
advantageous to the P.K.I. and disadvantageous to the Masjumi. For
the parties of the Ali cabinet it was highly advantageous. For
traditional respect for government is still strong in Indonesia;
the distinction between a particular cabinet and the government
in general is as yet barely understood despite the efforts of
the opposition parties at the time of the Ali cabinet; and there
is no established tradition as regards the foci and limiting
points of legitimate political struggle. Thus these coalition
parties were able, because of being in office, to establish the
concept that their political standpoint represented the course of
the "golden mean" between the Masjumi and the P.K.I. The importance
of this can be deduced from the fact that so very much of the
campaigning of all parties was intended to convey a picture of the
campaigning party as moderate and of its opponents as extremists.
Rightly or wrongly, the Indonesian voter was expected to favor the
parties he believed to be middle-of-the-road; and the evidence is
considerable that large numbers of voters were favorably impressed
by this type of appeal.
With the establishment of the Burhanuddin Harahap cabinet the
appeal advantages of occupancy of government office began to accrue
to the Masjumi again. But in the seven weeks before the elections
it was scarcely possible to destroy the widely accepted conception
that the parties of the eariler Ali cabinet were the parties of
the middle course. Further evidence of the electoral importance
of occupancy of government power was provided by the phenomenon
which occurred in many parts of the country, of P.N.I. local
leaders denying vigorously that the Ali cabinet had fallen.
But these Djakarta and national level issues and issue rela
tionships are an inadequate guide to the pattern of the parties'
appeals in the villages. (9) In the first place certain appeals
of the parties were rarely referred to at the Djakarta level.
Cabinet politics was often the motive here.
(9) The Djakarta-village dichotomy does of course involve great
over-simplification. The types of appeals emphasis used in
villages in different parts of Indonesia were presumably as
wide in range as the types of social and political structure
of villages. Again at the various midway levels which repre-
sent links between the Djakarta elite and the village mass
a variety of types of appeals were stressed in campaigning.15
So for instance the land policy appeal of the Communist Party
was relatively little emphasized in the party’s widely read
Djakarta daily Harian Rakjat—because the P.K.I. leadership was
careful to antagonize the parties of the Ali cabinet as little
as possible. Yet this was of central importance to Communist
electioneering in a number of large and important areas. The
Communist Party and its front organization Barisan Tani Indonesia
(Indonesian Peasant Front) championed the cause of squatters and
would-be squatters in all estate areas and many non-estate areas,
including most parts of Java adjacent to government forest land.
The party made sweeping general promises of land distribution in
many areas, and in some of these promised land to all who voted
for it. The result was the development of acute social tensions in
a number of village areas, particularly in Java as election day
approached. (10) But of all this the party’s Djakarta press said
little. In the same way it gave little indication of the wide-
spread use of the simplest Communist appeal: ’’The P.N.I. is the
party of the priai (the aristocrats), the Masjumi and N.U. are the
parties of the santri (the strictly religious), but the P.K.I. is
the party of the people.”
In other cases appeals were not put forward at the Djakarta
level because of the operativeness there of a type of political
morality which is not effective at the level of the village. Be-
cause at the Djakarta level the need was felt to give recognition
to the Uchuwah Islamijah (Islamic unity) ideal, there was very
little indication there of the important role which denominational
religious argument played in the appeals of the conservative Moslem
parties, particularly Nahdatul Ulama and Perti. In actual practice
very much of the campaigning of these groups was anti-Masjumi,
attempting to demonstrate that the Masjumi and its affiliate member
bodies were not upholding Islam but changing and deforming it.
The conservative Moslem parties pointed to the casualness of the
Masjumi groups towards questions of mazhab (the four schools of
interpretation of apostolic tradition), to their use of Indonesian
in a number of types of prayer and their tolerance towards the
(10) This appears to have been the only important case of the use
of carpet-bagging promises in the campaign—apart from the
promises of Heaven made by village spokesmen for several
religious parties. In the P.K.I. Programme adopted by the
party’s 5th Congress in March 1954 the demand was made for
the seizure of all land of foreign and Indonesian landlords
and the distribution of all of it (except technically modern
plantations which would become state enterprises). The party’s
Election Manifesto issued at the same time stressed that these
actions would be taken by the People’s Democratic Government
for which the P.K.I. was fighting the election. In June 1955
this Election Manifesto was modified and a National Coalition
Government accepted as the party’s election goal. But this
does not appear to have lessened to any marked degree the
intensity with which the party’s village representatives in a
number of areas demanded and promised land distribution.16
wearing of Western clothes in prayer. On the other hand they
attacked the Masjumi for its puritan opposition to "Indonesian"
religious practices, traditional practices of animist and Hindu
origin, like incense burning, certain funeral rites and the holding
of selamatans (feasts for the appeasement; of spirits).
There were in fact a great number of cases where the appeals
of Djakarta level politics, restrained by the political morality
effective there, were greatly changed by being enunciated by the
sledge-hammer method at the village level. There were village
campaigners of both the Masjumi and the Nahdatul Ulama who claimed
that only a vote for their party would allow a man to enter Heaven,
and that not to vote for this party meant going to Hell. Similarly
many of the P.N.I's local propagandists made outright the claim
that theirs was the party of "Pak ’Karno" (President Soekarno).
What was anti-imperialism at the Djakarta level was frequently
xenophobia and anti-white feeling in campaigning within the village
Again there were cases where the change from Djakarta cam-
paigning to campaigning in the villages in one or another part of
the country was brought about by the campaign conditions in a
particular area. Thus the "middle way" appeal which the P.N.I. and
Nahdatul Ulama developed on the basis of their government position
in the period of the Ali cabinet, grew in areas of intense cam-
paigning into an emphasis on these two parties (separately) as the
guarantors of order and security. The new argument, propounded
particularly towards the end of the campaign, ran as follows:
"If the Masjumi wins there will be violence, and if the P.K.I.
wins there will be violence too....If you want to see to it that
there is no trouble at election time, vote P.N.I. (or N.U.)."
Not infrequently, too, the issues between parties were given a
particular twist by the social situation in one part of the
country. In many parts of Central and East Java for instance the
issues between the Nahdatul Ulama and the Masjumi on the one hand
and the P.N.I. and P.K.I. on the other were the ones which tradi-
tionally divide ;the strictly Moslem santri from the nominally
Moslem priai and abangan, issues such as the permissibility of
gambling and various types of popular theatre.
Regional grievances and feelings of ethnic solidarity were
given occasional expression in campaigning. Masjumi propagandists
in Sumatra sometimes attacked the P.N.I. as a party of the Javanese
and P.N.I. men in certain parts of Java described the Masjumi as
a Sumatran party in a similar way. The excessive influence of
Javanese in national government and Djakarta’s neglect of outlying
areas (and not so outlying ones) were campaign themes of many small
regional parties and associations and of the Socialist Party.
But when one considers the power of regional and ethnic feeling
demostrated in other ways at this time one is struck by the
sparseness with which appeals of this type were used in campaigning
Even more striking was the absence, virtually complete, as far17
as the writer knows, of anti-Chinese appeals. (11) These features
remain unexplained. But one may conclude from them that in certain
matters campaigning was deeply influenced, at every level including
that of the village, by the nationalist ideology in terms of which
the whole election was present by government publicity.
But a great deal of campaigning concerned itself not with
issue-type appeals at all but with the things which a party said
about itself, particularly about i.ts history, its leaders and its
ballot-paper symbol. Every major party placed great emphasis on
its nationalist record, where possible on the contributions it had
made to the pre-war anti-colon-ikl movement and certainly to its
work in the struggle between 1945 and 1949. Nation-wide anniversary
celebrations became the order of the day for the P.K.I., P.N.I.,
and P,S.I.I., each one in this way emphasizing its claim of con-
tinuity with the now-famous pre-war party of similar name. The
Nahdatul Ulama proclaimed its merits in pre-war anti-colonial
activity pointing to its opposition to various aspects of Dutch
religious policy. The Masjumi, unable to lay claim to a history
going back before 1952, and choosing 1945 in order to dissociate
itself from the Masjumi of the Japanese occupation, concentrated
on its role in the Revolution. A favorite Masjumi slogan said that
in tough situations (during the Revolution) it had always been
the Masjumi which had come to give leadership.
In appeals concerning individual party leaders the emphasis
was also frequently on their record as nationalists. But other
attributes were also stressed, in particular honesty, expertise,
the firm and radical approach, and the quality of being a bapak
(literally, father) who is disegani (held in awe) and has a mysti-
cal understanding of the people from above, or, in some Communist
appeals, the quality of being a saudara (brother) and kawan
(friend) who understands the people from their own level.
The choice of leaders in terms of whom the parties cam-
paigned followed closely the composition of the candidate lists
for each electoral district. So for instance the parties which
placed a single leader at the top of all their, candidate lists,
notably the P.K.I., Masjumi, and P.S.I., also campaigned with a con-
centration of attention on the personal attributes of these single
leaders. The other parties usually headed their lists by candidates
expected to have strong appeal in particular electoral districts,
and so campaigned in terms of these. And in particular areas of an
electoral district, and among the different social, ethnic and clan
groups in it, the parties campaigned in terms of the attibutes of
the individual representatives of these whom they had included in
their lists, usually in lower positions. The relatively easy pro-
(11) There had been no important outbreaks of mass anti-Chinese
feeling since the end of the period of armed revolution. But
there were to be such outbreaks in several parts of the
country in the first half of 1956.18
cedure of nomination and the great length which lists were permitted
to have encouraged the candidature of many persons who could not
possibly be elected but whose names could be useful to the parties
in their campaigning among particular groups of voters. (12) In
addition campaigning at the village level was in large part in terms
of village personalities.
If appeals in terms of a party’s history and leadership were
made at all levels of campaigning, symbol appeals were propounded
particularly in campaigning at the level of the village. In
choosing their ballot-paper symbols the parties naturally considered
popular legend and belief, and then, realizing the great importance
of symbols as means of creating effective ties to the party, they
each elaborated allegorical interpretations of them, attractive in
terms of a national or regional cultural pattern. So P.N.I. cam-
paigners spoke about the attributes of the banteng, the Indonesian
wild buffalo, long a nationalist symbol, which was the P.N.I. sym-
bol in the elections. The Indonesian people, they said, are like
the banteng, patient and slow to be roused to anger, but invincibly
fierce once angered. Nahdatul Ulama campaigners had a variety of
interpretations of their complicated symbol, the globe, encircled
by a knotted rope, with nine stars around its perimeter. The rope
was Islam, the nine stars the wali songo, the ’’nine representatives”
who introduced Islam to Java. Again the P.S.I., whose symbol in
East and Central Java was a five-point star, made use of the
Javanese superstition that dreaming of a falling star brings luck. (13)
Party programmes as such were very little discussed in the
campaign, a fact which became strikingly clear before the elections
for the Constituent Assembly. The proposal to institute a second
house of parliament to represent the regions was discussed in the
Djakarta and regional press, but even at the Djakarta level there
was little public controversy over the particular constitutional
(12)	In every electoral district parties were allowed to nominate
twice as many candidates as there were members to be elected,
provided only that this number did not exceed the number of
members to be elected by more than 20. Candidates were not
required to pay a deposit, and the number of supporting sig-
natures required for a candidate was relatively small, 200
if he headed a list and 25 is he did not.
(13)	See Siasat September 28, 1955. On the other hand it was not
uncommon for one party to attack another by reference to
negative aspects of its symbol. In certain parts of Java
the Masjumi was open to attack on the grounds of a supersti-
tion that a crescent moon and star, the Masjumi Symbol, is a
bad omen. See Suluh Indonesia, August 26, 1955. The Nahdatul
Ulama and the P.S.t.I./whosesymbols contained Arabic writing,
suffered at the hand of Masjumi propagandists who said that
Arabic script is holy and to pierce it desecration.19
proposals of the various Islamic parties or of those of the All-
Indonesian Conference of Religious Scholars held at Medan in April
1953. Similarly little attention was paid before the parliamentary
elections to the Communist Party's theoretically and tactically
important decision of June 1955 to campaign for the formation after
the election not of a people's democratic government but of a
national coalition government.
The pattern of party appeals in the country at large was
then very different from the issues on which Djakarta political
debate centers. Djakarta issues and alignments being highly
complicated, and changing with cabinet changes, it was not
practicable for the parties to place great stress on these in their
village campaigning. The leaders of a number of parties like the
lfasjumi and P.S.I. which attempted to base more of theix· village
electioneering on appeals related to national politics than did
their rivals, came to the conclusion after the elections that
this had not served their interests. Generally speaking cam-
paigning for or against the government of the day was less
important than campaigning in terms of one's own party only.21
PART III
CAMPAIGNING B
But the significance of appeals, whether of the issue type or
not, can be estimated only in relation to the methods employed in
their propagation. Here it is less relevant to look at the pic-
ture in term· of the contrast between campaigning at the Djakarta
level and campaigning at the level of the village. For as far as
the organizing of a mass vote is concerned, the activity of the
parties at the level of the Djakarta elite was important only
incidentally, only inasmuch as it guided and strengthened their
campaigning at the lower levels.
; A tremendous variety of campaign methods and techniques were
used—in different combinations by different parties and in differ-
ent areas. Meetings were organized at all levels, in city squares
and village meeting places, with speakers from Djakarta or local
party leaders, public meetings and members’ meetings, women’s
meetings and youth meetings, lecture meetings, film meetings,
anniversary and carnival meetings, meetings for religious festi-
val days and meetings where popular theatre was the attraction.
Then there was the ubiquitous display of the parties' ballot-paper
symbols. These symbols, some of them with party slogans above
them, others with only the name of the party and others again
without even this, were displayed in city streets and village paths,
on private houses and public buildings, on buses and trees,
cinema slides, calendars and village lanterns. In addition small
cards bearing the symbol of a party were distributed in large
numbers by party activists. In the case of most parties all this
was related to a drive for expansion of membership. With some of
them it was associated with an emphasis on the distribution of the
party’s daily paper and pamphlet material. Some attempted to gain
favor by sponsoring one or other type of social welfare activity.
In the later stages of the campaign most of the parties organized
training and instruction in the mechanics of voting and how one
located their symbol on the ballot-paper. Finally as election day
approached the tendency in many areas was for the parties to
concentrate on house-to-house campaigning.
Certain of these methods were used with similar emphasis by
all parties, or all major parties. (14) But in the case of others
one could detect significant difference of stress. Thus, while
mass rallies were held by all major parties in provincial capitals
and residency and kabupaten towns, it was in most parts of the
country the Masjumi which~placed greatest emphasis on these. This
(14) We are here regarding the P.N.I., Masj-umi, Nahdatul Ulama,
and P.K.I. as the major parties, although before the elections
there was no agreement that these were the leading parties,
and certainly no general expectation that these four would
stand out so clearly above all others on the basis of the
election results.22
party stood out from the others In devoting considerable sums of
money to the purchase of film units, amplifiers and tape-recorders
and to the making of an elections film. The Communist Party also
held a great many mass meetings at this level, but with it, as with
the P.N.I. and more particularly the Nahdatul Ulama, the emphasis
was on meetings at the kawedanaan (district) and ketjamatan (sub-
district) levels and lower. A significant change between methods
of campaigning for the parliamentary elections of September and
the Constituent Assembly elections of December was the big decline
in the number of mass meetings held at the level of the kabupaten
and higher—a decline which created an exaggerated impression in
Djakarta of the lower intensity of campaigning for these second
elections. Even before the 29th of September and increasingly after-
wards Djakarta political leaders believed that they had overestimated
the campaign effectiveness of the large mass meeting. There was
something very deceptive, they realized, about the ease with which
very large numbers of villagers could be persuaded to walk long
distances to hear political speeches. In so many cases attendance
at mass meetings was neither an index of a party’s strength in an
area—the villagers so often came for curiosity, for the ramai
(bright, noisy) fair-like atmosphere, or just to be there with the
Others from the village--nor a particularly effective channel for
augmenting its strength. (15) The mass meeting technique, so
effective in the 1950-53 period of political bluffing directed
towards Djakarta, was tried for electioneering and found of only
limited usefulness. Smaller meetings especially at the ketjamatan
and village levels were reckoned much more effective. At these
levels meetings and speeches could more readily be followed up
organizationally. And here too the parties could more easily
associate themselves in the village voters' minds with men and sym-
bols of authority already recognized by them.
A similar trend is noticeable in the matter of ballot-paper
symbols. All parties had large numbers of these made and distrib-
uted. But there were important differences between them, both as
regards the emphasis which different parties placed on symbol ad-
vertisement in relation .to other ways of employing electoral
resources and as regards where and how the symbols were advertised.
The Communist Party was tremendously active in the displaying
of its symbol, establishing an early overall lead over the other
parties in this technique and then maintaining this throughout the.
campaign. Furthermore, while its billboards were to be found in
very large numbers in every city and town, it did not by any means
neglect village areas. Very many of its billboards were pieces of
sheet iron of one size and marked identically-factory-produced
clearly. Yet the party was second to none in the imaginative use
it made of everything from children's kites to the decor of village
theatre for the advertising of its symbol. The Masjumi quickly
(15) The fact that the leaders of the Socialist Party so grossly
overestimated their election prospects is partly explained by
this deceptive phenomenon.23
accepted the P.K.I’s challenge and adopted very similar techniques.
It was apparently able to afford a comparable outlay of money for
symbol advertisement, but demonstrated less ingenuity in this than
the Communist Party. The P.N.I. devoted far less of its resources
to the display of its symbol, and the Nahdatul Ulama less still
(although the averall number of the N.U.’s symbol boards was
larger than commonly thought by city dwellers, who saw relatively
few of them). But, along with the other major parties, both P.N.I.
and N.U. distributed very large numbers of small cards bearing the
party's symbol. Those other parties like the P.S.I. (Indonesian
Socialist Party), the P.R.N. (National People's Party), the Labour
Party, the P.I.R, (Greater Indonesia Union) of Hazairin and the
P.I.R. of Wongsonegoro, parties which wielded significant power
before the elections but lost it through them, all displayed large
numbers of symbol posters in the cities and the bigger towns.
But none of them, with the exception of the P.S.I. in certain
areas, had posters in village areas.
• All of the major parties came in the course of campaigning to
realize the importance of very large membership. The membership
card, it appeared, even if acquired without initial payment or
dues obligations, created effective ties. When a villager’s support
for a party had once been gained, with whatever degree of volun-
tariness, it was made much more secure by the issuing of a member’s
card. It was unusual for oaths to be sworn on acquiring member-
ship, but the effect of obtaining a card was very similar. (16)
It was in fact fairly easy to enroll large numbers of members,
thanks in part to the nationalist conception that membership of a
party was a necessary part of keinsjafan and kesadaran (political
awareness). So, as the campaign developed it became more and more
unusual for a man of any influence or claims to enlightenment in
a small town or village to belong to no party. There was moreover
an increasing awareness of the exclusive character of party member-
ship. The phenomenon of one person having membership of more than
one party, not unusual before 1954, became ever rarer as the cam-
paign gained force.
Thus almost every party worked to enroll large numbers of
members. Certain of the total membership claims of the parties
appear to have been exaggerated. (17) But one may accept as
fairly reliable the figures supplied by kabupaten level party
functionaries, and these suggest that the number of enrolled members
(16)	£n interesting aspect of this was the tendency observed in
parts of West and Central Java where voters had been influenced
to change their party membership. In these circumstances they
returned their earlier membership cards to their old party
via the functionaries of the new one.
(17)	E.g. the claim of the P.N.I. Party Council in its Report to
the 7th Congress of the Party (December 15-22, 1954) that in
the 221 branches (out of a total 366) which had submitted
statistics, the party had 5,204,321 members.24
of the three major non-Conununist parties was in many areas more than
half as large as the number of votes attracted by these parties
there.
The Communist Party too realized the importance of the member-
ship card. So to its two previously existing categories of member-
ship, full and candidate membership, it added a third, that of the
anggauta-pentjinta, the supporter-member or, literally, lover-member
Its total membership, 7910 early in 1952 and 165,206 in March 1954,
had risen to 1,000,000 by February 1956. (18) The Socialist Party
continued in its policy of restricting membership, but, after the
elections, the leaders of this party too came to the belief that
this was bad tactics.
Believing that membership was in itself of importance in
strengthening loyalties to the party, and finding that there
was usually little reluctance to become a party member, the parties
came, as the campaign developed, to place less and less emphasis on
working through front organizations. .Earlier in the campaign a
strong tendency had existed for the nationalist and Moslem parties
to imitate the emphasis of the Communists (and to a lesser extent
the Partai Murba and the P.S.I.) on working through nominally in-
dependent trade unions, peasant associations, and special veterans’,
women’s and youth organizations. But they subsequently saw that
Such indirect methods were, for them at least, unnecessary and
could confuse their followers. Thus in the later stages of cam-
paigning the association of these organizations with theii- respec-
tive parties was readily admitted, and by this fact they ceased to
be front organizations in the real sense and became, in fact if not
in profession, sections of the party.
Few parties devoted any large part of theix* resources to
printed publicity material. There was indeed a sizeable increase
in the circulation of party and party-supported dailies, particular-
ly those published in Djakarta, partly because such papers were
distributed free of charge in certain areas. (19) But, largely
because of Indonesia’s acute shortage of newsprint, circulation
figures remained low. On September 1, 1955 the combined circula-
tion of all dailies in Indonesia was only 821,560. (20) Paper
stickers were also not used in large quantities. This was not
only because of the newsprint shortage but also because paper
(18)	See Bintang Merah, February-March 1954 and April-May 1954.
Also Harian Rakjat February 22, 1956.
(19)	Also several new party papers were established, in particular
the P.N.I.'s Djakarta-published Suluh Indonesia begun in
October 1953 and the N.U.’s Duta Masjarakat, also a Djakarta
paper, published since January 1954.
(20)	Ministry of Information, Press and Graphics Section. Cf.
Almanak Pers Indonesia, 1954-55, Lembaga Pers dan Pendapat
flmum (Press arid Public Opinion institute).25
stickers were less suitable than cloth banners or billboards of
wood or tin in view of the great length of the campaign and the
need to campaign for a second election two and a half months after
the first. Pamphlets and brochures for mass sale and distribution
were printed only by the Masjumi and P.K.I., but all of the major
parties and several of the smaller ones printed brochures for in-
ternal party use providing mainly organizational instructions.
Compared with the other major parties the Nahdatul Ulama made con-
spicuously little campaign use of the daily press or other printed
material. The Socialist Party made much use of the press, on
which it had long had strong influence, but in most cases the news-
papers sympathetic to it refrained from making direct appeals for
a P.S.I. vote.
Social welfare activities are another of the campaigning
methods which the P.K. I. employed to much greater effect than other
parties. In the case of the Communist Party these activities were
aimed of course not only at augmenting the party’s electoral strength
but also a building more permanent mass support. The long-term
character of the P.K,I.’s social welfare activities marks them off
from those of other parties, embarked upon largely in imitation of
it. Under the slogan calling for ’’small but effective actions" the
party’s village activists, disguised and undisguised, took the lead
not only to press local political demands such as the lowering of
land rents and usury rates and the improvement of a village’s
water allocation, but also in non-political activities such as
organizing the sharing of agricultural tools, arranging mutual
assistance for the holding of feasts, building new water channels,
and helping the victims of fires and floods. On the other hand,
activists were not encouraged to be active in cooperatives as the
party workers of other parties were.
It is difficult to make any estimate of the extent to which
the other major parties strengthened their campaigning by social
welfare activities, inasmuch as the village representatives of
these parties were usually village leaders who as such were ex-
pected to give leadership in welfare activities. But it is certain
that the stunt-like social welfare activities carried out by a num-
ber of the smaller parties in the last weeks of the campaign, for
instance the Socialist Party’s bridge-building and k'ampong-cleaning
ventures in villages on the outskirts of cities, were virtually
ineffective.
In the last months and especially the last weeks of campaign-
ing the major parties concentrated on how-to-vote instruction or
training in all the areas where they had succeeded in establishing
village-level organization. (21) And in villages where they had
functioning branches and did not have a position of actual or vir-
tual monopoly they wound up their campaigning with personal visits
(21) Training by the holding of mock elections was one method fre-
quently used—except in areas where this type of how-to-vote
training was given extensively by the local branches of the
Ministry of Information.?e
to those who were thought to be undecided, wavering or able to be
persuaded or intimidated into changing their minds. This technique
was extensively practised particularly in areas where the pressure
of government authority was heavy (and little offset by the com-
petition of religious or kinship or other types of authority) and
in areas where campaigning was intense and bewildering.
One general fact which emerges from this discussion of methods
is the tremendous importance of village-level organization. The
holding of meetings at levels at which the villager felt involved,
the advertising of ballot-paper symbols, membership expansion, the
effective use of publicity matter, social welfare activities, how-
to-vote training and house-to-house canvassing—all of these re-
quired organization at the grassroots level, thus mostly at the
level of the village. The parties which were unable to establish
an extensive network of village-level organization, and hoped in-
stead to contact the villager through mass: media, were quite unsuc-
cessful—even where they had considerable financial resources and
the advantages of occupancy of government power.
While mass media might have been effective in areas where
voting decisions were made by individuals, they were virtually use-
less as regards village communities where the normal pattern was
for voters' choices to be determined by a series of collective
decisions.
The point may appear to be no more than a tautology: the
parties which were strong at the village level were strong at the
village level. But it does have substantive meaning: effective
electioneering methods in Indonesia are those effected at the village
level; there are no short cuts. For all the important inroads
made on the small and traditionally closed village community by the
development of a market economy, of mass communications and of a
variety of other "opening," detraditionalizing and "enlarging" ..
forces, the village is still the level at which political action
of the electoral type is determined.
This raises the further question of what resources were
necessary for a party to establish its organizational machinery at
the level of the village. One may begin by looking at the financial
resources of the parties and the ways in which these were deployed.
Impossible as it is to know the size of the., parties' budgets, cer-
tain general observations may nevertheless be attempted. Thus one
may say that the Ρ,Ν.Ι. and P.K.I. clearly spent very large sums
of money, the Masjumi a fairly large sum and the Nahdatul Ulama a
much smaller one.
As to the sources of the parties’ finances, it is a fact that
ministerially sanctioned corruption for party campaign funds came
to be practiced on large scale in the period of the Ali Sastroamidjojo
cabinet. Of this the P.N.I., as the party holding the Finance
and Economic Affairs portfolios as well as the Prime Ministership27
in this cabinet, was the main beneficiary. (22) The P.N.I. had an
important additional source of money in the contributions made to
it by city business interests, Indonesian and Chinese.
The origins of Communist Party funds have been much debated.
Whether or not one takes at face value the party’s figures for
contributions made to it by rank and file members and sympathizers,
there can be no doubt that dues and small contributions played an
important role in its financing. (23) But in view of the party’s
clearly very large outlay of money one must assume that it received
much bigger sums from other sources, from individual Chinese
businessmen resident in Indonesia, and very possibly also from over-
seas Communist governments through their consular and business
representatives in Djakarta.
Masjumi funds also came in significant part from party dues
and in addition the party obtained the sanction of religious
authority for the use of zakat (alms obligatory in Islam) foi- its
election financing. But while dues and the small contributions of
its rank and file members were clearly important in the case of
the Masjumi as well as the P.K.I., it is probable that the greatest
part of the party’s funds came in large donations from the land-
owners, rubber growers and batik manufacturers who supported the
party. A large part of Nahdatul Ulama funds would appear to have
been contributed by a similar group of donors.
In the case of the smaller parties dues were mostly of little
significance. Some were financed by a small number of donors,
often the party’s central leaders themselves. Others relied chiefly
on funds obtained through connections with government at one or
another level.
It is quite as difficult to estimate the proportions in
which the various parties allocated their funds to different as-
pects of campaigning. Evidence of certain types of expenditure,
heavy particularly in the case of the Masjumi and P.K.I., could
be seen by the casual observer. Both the Masjumi and the P.K.I.
must have spent extremely large sums on their symbol billboards,
as the wholesale price of the sheet-iron tablets they most fre-
quently used was approximately fourteen rupiahs ($1.25) per piece.
Both needed finance for their leaders’ travel. The Masjumi clearly
spent a great deal of money in equipping itself, fairly elaborately,
for mass rallies and film evenings, and the P.K.I. in holding its
carnival-like anniversary celebrations and "people’s feasts." Both
(22)	Public evidence of this practice was provided by a number of
court cases held later, particularly the trials of the former
Justice Minister Mr. Djody Gondokusumo of the P.R.N. (National
People's Party) and of the head of the East Java Department
of Industries, Darmansjah, a. P.N.I. man.
(23)	See the speech of Bachtaruddin, Risalah Parlementer (Parlia-
mentary Proceedings) October 31, 1955.28
of these parties spent significant sums on the printing of pamphlets,
as did all of the major parties on the printing of symbol cards and
of voting papers for training ballots.
In addition all of the parties needed considerable financial
resources for the general task of establishing organizational
machinery—for conferences and training courses, office maintenance,
the salaries of paid workers, and so on. There were striking
differences however between the size of the allocations made by
different parties for these organizational requirements, and here
one faces what are perhaps the greatest difficulties of assessment.
One can say with some confidence that the Nahdatul Ulama must have
operated on a very meagre organizational budget, and the P.K.I.,
with its large-scale use of full-time paid organizers, on a very
large one. But one can only guess at the sums involved. This
difficulty is even more acute in the case of the P.N.I. which in
many areas directly paid influential persons, tjamats (sub-district
heads), lurahs (village heads), mandors (estate or factory foremen)
and djagos (Village bullies), to use their influence in its favor.(24)
On the basis of knowledge as general as this one can draw no
significant conclusions about the role of money in securing a large
vote. Perhaps the only observation to be made when one has con-
sidered the poverty of the Nahdatul Ulama whose success was perhaps
the biggest surprise of the elections, is- that financial resources
were less important than social resources, and were used effectively
only where they were used in relation to social resources.
Social resources, the basis for a party’s power in terms of
pre-existing patterns of social and political relations in and
around the village, were indeed the most important requirement for
a party to establish its organizational machinery at the level of
the village. Such machinery could be established only by parties
which had become associated on a more than local level with one
or other social group powerful in the village. In fact one of the
most interesting aspects of the 1955 elections is that in them one
can see something of the highly complicated process by which associ-
ations were established between parties and social groups.
Before 1953, as has been noted, the impact of the party
system on village Indonesia was small, and the amount of competition
between parties inside villages smaller still. The Masjumi had
skeleton organization in a considerable number of villages, and in
some areas part of this was being transformed into Nahdatul Ulama
(24) For instance in parts of Central Java the party acquired much
of its membership by paying a certain sum to a tjamat in ex-
change for the undertaking that he would see to it that a
given number of members were enrolled in his ketjamatan. The
buying of. influence was practiced particularly in the last
stages of the campaign. Other parties certainly used this
technique, but it would appear that none could afford its use
on as large a scale as the P.N.I.29
organization from 1952 onwards. The P.K.I. had established itself
in villages in many plantation and mining areas and had gained a
foothold in a number of other village areas in Java. But party
political activity was still principally confined to cities and
towns. A large majority of Indonesia's 43,000 villages were a
vacuum as far as party politics was concerned.
Early campaigning may be characterized as the race for a
foothold in these villages, for a foothold involving allegiance
of as many as possible of their influential people. Here the first
step was to secure the support of those whose authority was accepted
by the village prominents. Thus the parties struggled with one
another for influence with the bupatis, the wedanas and the tjamats
(notably in Java where pamong pradja power has particularly strong
social roots), with the local military commanders and the heads of
the local offices of Religion, Information and Mass Education.
In the same way they sought the active support of all those
persons outside the government machine, townsmen and villagers,
whose influence extended over areas of many villages: Islamic
kiais and 0lamas, mystic and occult teachers of various kinds,
heads of clans and old guerrilla leaders. Where the influence of
such men was thought extensive the parties frequently offered them
places on their candidate lists in exchange for support. Sometimes
too they had financial inducements to offer, or inducements in
terms of their powers of disposal through regional government.
Through these powerful persons the attempt was then made to
win whole villages to the party, or at least to gain the support
of enough persons of influence to make it difficult for a second
party to establish itself in a particular village. Where a party
was first into a village it usually strove to establish its powex·
there on the basis of the existing system of authority. Thus the
chairmanship of a new branch of the party—whether the P.N.I., the
Masjumi, the Nahdatul Ulama or even the P.K.I.—would go to the
village head or leading adat (customary law) authority, or clan
head, or to the leading religious functionary of the village, with
perhaps a party activist or potential activist as vice-chairman or
secretary of the branch. Every attempt would be made to obtain the
support of all the prominent (terkemuka).. people of the village and
then to use the traditions of village unity to the advantage of the
party which had established itself there first. (25)
(25) For the sake of simplicity the following discussion assumes
that the village is the autonomous social and political unit
in all parts of Indonesia. In fact there is a great variety
of patterns in this matter. Ter Haar distinguishes three main
types of territorial organization, the village, the regional
community and the community of villages. For further dis-
cussion of this and of territorial organization in relation
to kinship organization see B. Ter Haar, Adat Law in Indonesia,
1948, pp. 49 ff.	—--------------------30
One of the effects of this first stage of the expansion of
the parties into the villages was to distribute the strength of
different parties on the basis largely of socially accidental fac-
tors. Each party had naturally tended to concentrate on villages
where it expected easy success. But with its organizational re-
sources limited and unevenly distributed, it was often forced to
neglect villages where it had potential strength, at least until
after another party had established itself there.
When a second party established its organization in a village
alongside that of the first, one may say that a second stage of
party expansion had been reached. This stage was never reached in
thousands of villages in out-of-the-way and tradition-bound areas
which had been little affected by the development of a market econ-
omy or by the rapid social and political changes of the period
since 1942. In other villages, more exposed to detraditionalizing
forces, it was reached very early, well before the 1953 date which
we have been regarding as the point of inauguration of the campaign.
But wherever the new stage was reached this fact was of the greatest
importance, for it meant that a sort of formal recognition, sanc-
tioned by nationalist ideology, had been given to village disunity.
Latent conflicts and tensions—whether between the lurah's followers
and the kiai’s, between the upholders of adat and kinship regular,
tions and their militantly Moslem adversaries, between land-owners
and money-lenders on the one hand and those dependent on them on
the other, between one clan or extended family and another, or be-
tween future rival candidates for the lurahship—could now be
channelled politically, and in their political form permitted an
open existence.
In this second stage one sees tendency towards rationaliza-
tion of village party allegiances, towards an elimination of party
strength of a socially accidental kind and towards greater corre-
spondence between parties and the village power groups whose inter-
ests they defended (on a more than local level). Broadly speaking
one may say that the extent of this elimination of political rela-
tions of a socially accidental kind varied with the extent of de-
traditionalization and with the closely related factor of the
development of communications. Where villages had remained in
large measure closed communities, campaigning divisions were unable
to force an entry into them, and the same was the case where
villages, though openly socially divided, were particularly iso-
lated and difficult of access. Such villages became one-party
villages or virtually so, having either remained loyal to the party
which first sent its organizers to them or, alternatively, turned
en bloc from this party to another. On the other hand where the
closeB community character of a village had been impaired by eco-
nomic and social disturbance of one or other kind, the way was
open for the development of a bi-party or multi-party system giving
expression in greater or lesser measure to existing differences of
social interest within the village. The tendency for association
of parties with social groups, and with centres of social power,
can therefore be seen in sharpest outline in areas where the forces31
of detraditionalization have been most effective. (26)
But it should not be supposed that it was only in these areas
that social resources were necessary for a party to establish vil-
lage-level organization. This necessity existed in all types of
areas, even where the continuing compactness of the village unit
made socially accidental factors important in the way in which
party strengths were distributed. An association with existing
power groups within particular communities was everywhere a neces-
sary condition for a party to establish its organizational machinery
in villages on any large scale.
To gain a foothold in villages which were easy of access and
relatively "open" was not so difficult. Parties with financial
and organizational resources could and did achieve this, even where
they were lacking in significant social resources. But they were
rarely able to maintain their strength in such villages in the face
of the virtually inevitable competition from other parties which
had established their appeal for particular power groups. In iso-
lated and relatively "closed" villages on the Other hand it was
very difficult for parties like this to effect even the initial
establishment of party organization, not only for reasons of trans-
port and communications but also because of the disinclination of
such village communities to invite antagonism with power groups
outside themselves. Usually only a party associated with authority
already recognized in a particular area—be it governmental,
religious, clan or nationalist-revolutionary authority—could enter
villages of this type. Without social resources a party could or-
ganize in solitary villages; it could not establish campaigning
strength in a larger village area. (27)
In this connection it may be useful to look at the associa-
tions between parties and social groups which evolved as campaigning
gained force in Javanese and Minangkabau village society.
In many village areas of East and Central Java, areas not too
sheltered from economic and social change, there did develop a
definite system of associations linking the four major pa:-?ties to
existing social forces. One may usefully regard as basic to this
pattern the cleavage which exists in Javanese village society, and
very often: .in a single village, between the santris, the serious
Moslems, and the abangan, nominal Moslems whose religious ideas
(26)	This contrast was very clear in a number of areas of East
Sumatra where *?’new kampongs" (villages) of estate workers and
other recent settlers exist close to "old kampongs" whose
social organization remains strongly tied to kinship regula-
tion. Campaigning divisions were felt much more strongly in
the former than the latter.
(27)	Cf. Sudjatmoko, The Role of Political Parties in Indonesia,
paper delivered before Rangoon ^’Conference on South-East
Asia," October 1955.I Μ
and practices are substantially those of the Hindu-Javanese reli-
gious system prevailing before Islam came to Java. This cleavage
is by no means purely religious however. The religious differences
between the two groups correspond to marked differences in social
attitudes and economic roles. Although Java had long had its Moslem
religious functionaries and their more pious followers, and its
areas of relatively deep Islamic cultural penetration, the santri
group with its present degree of self-consciousness is a product of
the economic and social change of the late nineteenth and twentieth
centuries. It corresponds to the rise in the last hundred years
of a village yeomanry (and a small Indonesian town merchant class)
and to the growing impact on Indonesia of the Islamic reform move-
ments gaining prominence in Cairo at the turn of the century. (28)
Abangan religious and social attitudes are substantially a reasser-
tion of the communalistic values of village java as it was before
the Dutch culture system began to upset its economic balance. Like
the term santri, the term abangan covers town as well as village
dwellers, but the only nominally Moslem persons of aristocratic
origin are known as priais and not considered abangan.
It most parts of the Javanese village community in this decade
one is either self-consciously santri or self-consciously abangan.
Self-conscious santris could clearly be expected to supporT“a
specifically Moslem political party and self-conscious abangan not
to. The emerging party pattern tended therefore to be one where
the P.N.I. and P.K.I. competed for abangan support and the Nahdatul
Ulama and Masjurni for support from the santris.
Both the Masjumi and N.U. sought to base their organization on
the religious leaders of the village, the kiai or guru ngadji (reli-
gious teacher) if there was one, the hadji (returned Mecca pilgrim)
if there was one, the officials of the mosque if one of these exist-
ed in the village, or the religious functionary of the village coun-
cil. As the religious leadership of a village was usually united
in terms of common recognition of the authority of a more widely
influential kiai or ulama (scholar) outside it, there was rarely
effective competition between these two parties inside a single vil-
lage. The division between religious leaders supporting the Masjumi
and those supporting the N.U. corresponded largely to the penetration
of the modern Islam of the Muhammadijah. In most of East and Cen-
tral Java the tendency existed for the Masjumi to be given greater
support in villages close to the urban centers, but probably as
important as this was the pattern of influence of the rival schools
of Moslem leadership, theological and non-theological, such as the
conservative one of Tebu Ireng (Djombang) and the more modern ones
at Gontor (Ponorogo) and Bangil (Pasuruan), all in East Java.
The P.N.I. and P.K.I, sought their support mainly among those
with influence over the abangan community. Here three main power
groups stand out. The non-Islamic parties could appeal to the
lurah or village head and his subordinate functionaries, the pamong
desa, in most areas a group of distant aristocratic origins and
relatively large ex officio land holdings. They could appeal also
(28) See Clifford Geertz, Jr., ’’Religious Belief and Economic .
Behaviour in a Central Javanese Town: Some Preliminary Con-
siderations,” Economic Development and Cultural Change,
Vol. IV, No. 27 January 1956, pp. 134-158.33
to the dukuns, the group of men to whom occult powers were attrib-
uted, the teachers of mysticism, healers, soothsayers and invulnera-
bility dealers, and to the partly associated group of those who
practiced the traditional Javanese arts, the actors and dancers,
dalangs (narrators in the wajang puppet theater) and teachers of
pentjak (bodily self-defense). Thirdly they could solicit the
support of the largely new social group of unaccommodated youth,
whose social function is as yet barely defined but who have fre-
quently a common occupation as members of the village guard. This
group may be said to include the inadequately employed ex-guerrillas
the former high school students who failed to get a certificate,
some village schoolteachers and various others with some Western-
type education who are rebels against village traditions. Though
not all of the members of the group are actually young, all are
considered young.
As the campaign developed the lurahs and their subordinate
officers most frequently became active representatives of the P.N.I.
Their aristocratic pretensions, their wealth and their dependence
on the favor of the largely P.N.I-dominated pamong pradja combined
to attract them to this party. In some areas, however, Fhe lurahs
supported one of the Moslem parties. In others, particularly where
the Communist hold on the mass of the villagers promised to be
strong, they allied themselves with this party. Frequently the
lurah and pamong desa group in a particular village was politically
divided. One of the many types of local factors which were im-
portant in this connection was lurah politics, the maneuverings.for
position in preparation for the next lurah election to be held
when the present lurah died.
The much less powerful group of dukuns and that of the tradi-
tional artists, appear to have been divided between the P.N.I. and
P.K.I., both parties making strong efforts to win their support.
It appears that with them, as with the ordinary villagers in many
areas, the line between P.N.I. and Communist supporters corresponded
to the one between the richer and the poorer, the lenders and the
borrowers. On the other hand the unaccommodated youth appears to
have been strongly attracted to the Communist Party, despite the
fact that the P.N.I. and numerous minor parties also tried actively
to draw the group to themselves. 4
In the Minangkabau area of Central Sumatra, where the social
forces at play are very different, there evolved a very different
pattern of links between these and political parties. As basic
here we may take the religious cleavage between the kaum muda, the
younger generation, or modern Moslem, and the kaum tua,the more
conservative older generation. This division was given organiza-
tional expression more than 25 years ago as a division between the
modern but orthodox and anti-mystical Muhammadijah and the conserva-
tive perti (Pergerakan Tarbijah Islamijah,"Islamic Educational
Association)" theologically a Sumatran variant of the Nahdatul
Ulama; and it has played a role of tremendous importance ever since.
Thus in a great number of Minangkabau villages one finds an estab-
lished denominational-type, division. The kaum tua with their own34
emphasis in apostolic tradition (strict adherence to the sjafe’i
school or mazhab), their own devotional practice and their religious
schools, form a self-consciously separate group alongside the kaum
muda, with their own legal concepts (laying only slight emphasis
on mazhab-regulations), their devotional principles^and their schools.
It is not surprising, in view of the social importance of this
division,, that it came to have expression in the division between
the Masjumi and the Perti political party in terms of political
parties” 5n the other hand it is not at all easy to explain why
these two became the only parties of major importance in the
Minangkabau village community.
The social background of the Muhammadijah-Perti division which
is so strongly reflected in the pattern of party strengths which
developed through campaigning, is very complex. Like the Nahdatul
Ulama in Java, the Perti political party was able to establish
its machinery more easily in the remoter rural areas than in villages
under strong urban influences. As in Java also the influence of
rival theological schools was of great importance in determining
the relative strengths of the two groups. But the picture was
additionally complicated by the roles played in relation to this
division by social groups whose Javanese equivalents did not gener-
ally support any specifically Moslem party.
The Minangkabau village heads (wali negeri or penghulu kepala)
occupy a position much less powerful than that of the Javanese
lurahs. But men elected as wali negeri are almost invariably mem-
bers of the very powerful group of ninik-mamak, the heads of clans,
sub-clans and extended families. The ninik-mamak derive their
authority from Minangkabau adat (customary law) with its heavy stress
on kinship regulation. Inasmuch as Islam has been a threat to the
matrilineal Minangkabau adat system, they have therefore always
opposed it. But as the militant reformed Islam of the Muhammadijah
is a greater threat to them than the more compromising conservative
Islam of Perti, the ninik-mamak have tended to throw their weight
on the side of Perti^ On the other hand the factor of clan feeling
frequently counteracts such tendencies. Inter-clan competition
being strong, a ninik-mamak would often lend his support to the
party in which persons of his clan were relatively most prominent,
Islam having secured a firmer footing among the Minangkabaus
than among the Javanese, the mystic-occult group is here more defi-
nitely Moslem—although its Islam is mainly of the heterodox sufi
variety. The leaders of the Minangkabau tharikahs, sufi mystic
brotherhoods, had long been under attack from the; Muhammadijah and
so tended to support Perti. But a large group of them gave elec-
toral support to the small West Sumatra-centered tharikah party
P.P.T.I. (Partai Politik Tharikat Islam).
As for the group of unaccommodated young men, so important in
the Javanese village community, this is so much smaller in the
Minangkabau area that it can scarcely be regarded as an independent
factor in village politics. One may explain this in terms of the
slower pace in West Sumatra of the economic changes which have
made the Javanese village increasingly incapable of providing employ-35
ment for its inhabitants, in terms of the relatively small degree
of social dislocation wrought in this area by post-1942 political
developments, and again in terms of the strong pressure which exists
for young Minangkabau men ;to leave their home area to trade or
study in other parts of Indonesia.
Comparing the Javanese and Minangkabau patterns, two of a great
many patterns which evolved, one sees an interesting contrast in
the relation of parties to pre-existing social groups. In Minang-
kabau village society the extension of party-organization effected
what could be called a politicization of an existing, principally
religious, division. Persons whose denominational loyalty was to
Muhammadijah became supporters of Masjumi,” and others whose religious
allegiance was to Perti became supporters of the Perti political
party. In Javanese society on the other hand, the development of
a party system at the village level may be said to have brought new
entities into being, in the sense that the new delineation between
parties did not parallel any consciously felt division in the pre-
existing social situation.
In fact the difference between the two areas was not as great
as might appear from this summary. The establishment of parties at
the village level did have the effect in both areas of changing the
relationship of the existing social forces to one another. So for
instance there were important Minangkabau social groups which had
not previously been actively associated with either the Muhammidijah
or the Perti religious organization but were obliged by campaigning
to choose between the Masjumi and the Perti party. Village-level
party organization necessarily involved a recasting of the relation-
ships of existing village forces to one another, if only because
there was nowhere complete correspondence between social groups
and political parties.
In certain areas of an advanced degree of detraditionalization
however the change was a greater one, one which changed the divi-
sion of social power in the village. Javanese village society may
again serve as an illustration. In those areas of East and
Central Java where the village’s capacity to supply the needs of
its inhabitants has been undermined by the impact of the market
economy, and where in addition there have been severe social and
political disturbances in the life of the present generation, there
are substantial groups which no longer fit into the old village
pattern in terms of economic function, social status or political
outlook. These groups, the unaccommodated youth, had for some time
been in latent or open conflict with the old hierarchy or hier-
archies of the village. Through campaigning they acquired a legiti-
mation of this conflict. It was justified as part of the demo-
cratic process of elections whose desirability and importance was
so strongly emphasized by the national leadership. The very fact
of recognition of divisions in the village weakened the power
position of the established village authorities, and in some vil-
lages, such as one in Banjuwangi (East Java) on which a research
report has been made, it enabled unprecedentedly strong public
attacks to be made on these authorities in the context of village
politics. The belief was widespread in the campaign period that36
campaigning was weakening the position of the lurahs. (29)
At the same time campaigning created new social roles and new
social status for members of the unaccommodated group. Wherever
more than one party established its position in a village, the or-
ganization of campaigning, as distinct from the soliciting of support
from the prominent persons of the village, assumed great importance.
Usually the men of the young, madju (progressive) group of the
Village, those with Western-type education, accommodated and un-
accommodated, would establish their superior capacity to tackle
this new type of organizational task (as well as the task of ex-
plaining the meaning and importance of elections). Thus the men
of this group would become the secretaries and other active execu-
tive functionaries of the party branches established in the village.
The significant fact here is that such positions came to be occu-
pied not only by those who are being called the accommodated youth,
those with Western-type education for whom a place had been found
in the frequently flexible system of village authority. Members
of the group of unaccommodated youth too could frequently gain
social status in this way through one or another party. and inasmuch
as this was the case an important change was being wrought in the
status pattern of the village. One could go as far as to argue
that the elections are comparable with the Revolution itself in
that they produced a shift in the village status balance from those
whose authority was traditional and local to those who had or
claimed authority as modern, progressive and nationally-conscious
persons.
A final important aspect of campaigning is that it created new
collectivist entities at the village level. In a number of vil-
lage areas, again particularly where detraditionalization had
reached an advanced stage, party branches acquired the character-
istics of living communities. Thus gotong-rojong (communal labor
for mutual assistance) was frequently done by the members of a
party as such. With their women’s youth, and scout organizations
at or near the village level, parties came to fulfill important
social functions in the village, functions which the village it-
self was no longer capable of fulfilling.
This development is particularly clear in the case of the
Communist Party, which had succeeded in establishing itself as a
more than political party even before the campaign period on plan-
tations, and in the kampong or slum areas of certain cities, notab-
ly Surabaja. Focussing much of its attention on the group of the
(29) The evidence here is from unpublished data collected by the
village research teams of the Institute for Economic and
Social Research of the Djakarta School of Economics. In the
Banjuwangi village in question a "shadow" village council was
in existence. It was believed that, if the elections showed
that a majority of villagers supported a party antagonistic
to the lurah, he could feel obliged to resign.37
unaccommodated youth of socially disturbed village areas, the P.K. I.
was able in the course of campaigning, to mould very many of the
members of this group into a new collectivist entity of a political
kind. The social unit.which resulted from this was closely asso-
ciated with the village guard organization, and in large measure
it superseded the traditional young men’s organizations and insti-
tutions of the village. (30)
In the case of other parties this tendency was operative only
in much smaller measure. But there can be no doubt that by the
time of the elections parties were real units in a social sense in
villages in most parts of the country, and not what they had seemed
when campaigning began, the artificial products of an elaborate
stunt entertained by Jthe politicians of Djakarta. Thus it is
probable that election campaigning accelerated the process to which
Professor Wertheim has drawn attention, of the growth of powerful
new collective bodies whose effect is to distribute social prestige
on a new basis superseding both the traditional and the individual-
istic. (31)
There can be no doubt then that the long period of active cam-
paigning to which a large number of Indonesia's village areas were
subjected had important effects on the social structure of the
communities concerned. However strongly one emphasizes the import-
ance to parties of associations with previously existing social
groups and centers of social power, it should in no way be thought
that campaigning was merely the political rubberstamping of a pre-
viously existing pattern of authority. Significant social resources
were a necessary condition for a party to establish itself at the
village level. But so also was organization, except perhaps where
only One party existed in a village. And this organization produced
a recasting of the earlier social pattern.
(30)	For an analysis of the role of traditional young men's organi-
zations see. "Indonesische Jeugdorganizaties" in H. Th. Fischer,
Kinderantaal en Kinderleven in Indonesie, 1950.
(31)	Wertheim writes."The development towards greater individualism
in the first phase of the present century is...being overtaken
by a new movement with greater emphasis on collective action.
The old traditional agrarian communities are losing their in-
fluence, but through newly formed collective bodies such as
peasant unions and (insofar as labor on the plantations is in-
volved) trade unions, new leaders come to the fore. Their
social prestige is often still of a traditional character being
based on the 'charismatic' tie between leader and group, a tie
resting on an irrational belief in the leader's well-nigh
supernatural capacities. But their power and social influence
will ultimately depend upon the cohesion and the social sig-
nificance of the collective body they represent." "Changes in
Indonesia's Social Stratification," Pacific Affairs, March
1953. See also W. F. Wertheim, Effects of Western Civilization
on Indonesian Society, 1950.	“	—■	1	——39
PART IV
THE BALLOT
On September 29, 1955 or shortly thereafter more than 39 million
Indonesians went to the polls. 37,875,299 or 87.65% of the
43,104,464 who had been registered as voters a year earlier cast
valid votes. Because of communications and administrative difficul-
ties and the special problems existing in areas of security dis-
turbances, it proved impossible to conduct the ballot on the same
day in all parts of the country, as had been planned. (32) in 26
kabupatens it was possible for voting to be begun on September 29th
but completed for the whole kabupaten only later, and in 8 others
a start could be made only after September 29th. (33) But voting
was held on September 29th in at least 85% of the country's approxi-
mately 93,532 polling stations, and it had been completed at all of
them by November 29th.
Polling was conducted by the multi-party Polling Station
Committees (Panitia Penjelenggara Pemungutan Suara) of between five
and eleven members who had been nominated and in some measure
trained for their task by the Ketjamatan Ballot Committees (Panitia
Pemungutan Suara). But, whereas the Ketjamatan Ballot Committees
were partially linked to the general civil administration inasmuch
as they were chaired by the head of the ketjamatan or sub-district,
the tjamat, there was no such link in the case of the Polling Sta-
tion Committees. The chairmanship of these was sometimes in the
hands of the village head or a member of his council, but this was
not always the case. However at the stations in almost every area
at least two of the members of every Polling Station Committee
were literate.
To assist the Polling Station Committees to maintain security
at the booths, groups of three to five polling guards or auxiliary
policemen (Pembantu Keamanan pemungutan Suara) were appointed for
each polling station, usually from the existing village guard group
and sometimes on a multi-party basis. Responsibility for the
appointment of these groups was in the hands of the Kabupaten
Security Coordinating Body (Koordinasi Keamanan Kabupaten)icons is t-
ing of the bupati (regent, Kabupaten head) and the kabupaten-level
heads of the army, police, and public prosecutor’s office. The
powers of the auxiliary policemen at the polls were limited as they
(32)	See Berita Negara March 1, 1956 and the Speech of the Chairman
of the Central Electoral Committee (Panitia pemilihan Indonesia)
at the Public Meeting to Announce the Results of the Parlia-
mentary Elections, March 1, 1956.
(33)	See Keterangan Pemerintah tentang Program Kabinet Burhanuddin
Harahap October 7, 1955 for lists of these kabupatens. Tn “
BaTT^EETe elections were uniformly postponed for two days
after September 29th because of the ooincidence of the Hindu
festival of Oalungan.40
were not permitted to be armed, except with truncheons, and not
allowed to enter the actual voting complex, except when called in
by the chairman of the Polling Station Committee.
Voting was held in a variety of places, usually either in
existing public buildings such as schools or in cheap bamboo struc-
tures built in public places especially for the elections, but
sometimes also in the homes of prominent villagers. On an average
there were two to three polling stations per village. According
to the instructions of the Central Electoral Committee there was
to be one for between 300 and 1000 voters. In practice more 1000
voters had to be allocated to one station in some areas, although
the average number was 460. Many voters from remote villages in
sparsely populated parts of the archipelago had five miles or so
to walk to their polling station, and others had to sail to a
neighboring island still further away. But there is no indication
that any stayed away from the poll for this reason. (34)
The voting proceedings started at eight o’clock in the morning
with the reading of a set of instructions by the chairman of the
Polling Station Committee and a public demonstration to the effect
that the ballot box was empty. Thereafter voting began. A voter
would go up to the two members of the committee seated at the
entrance to the voting complex. Usually he would present to them
the letter of notification which had been sent to him several
days earlier telling him where to vote, although he was not
legally obliged to produce this. The committee members would
check his name on their register and allow him in.
Not long after this would come his turn to go to the chair-
man’s table. There he would receive a folded ballot paper, signed
on the outside by the chairman and two other members seated at
his table. With this he would go alone into one of a number of
separate but open-backed voter’s cubicles where he would mark
his paper. This was done either by piercing one of the symbols
on it, or, in a much smaller number of cases, by the write-in
method, that is by copying the name of an individual candidate
from tixe candidate lists appended on the walls of the cubicle.
After folding his paper the voter would then take it to the ballot
box, show it to the committee member on duty there to indicate that
the three requisite signatures were on it, drop it into the box and
leave the complex.
(34) See Rustan Sutan Palindih, Undang-Undang dan Peraturan-Peraturan
PemilihanUmum, 1954, and the Instructions No. .1 to 13 of the "
Central Electoral Committee. English-language accounts of the
technical and organizational regulations for the elections are
given in Boyd R. Compton, ’’The Indonesian Election Law,” Far
Eastern Survey, April-May 1954, in Robert C. Bone, ’’The Organ-
ization of the Indonesian Elections,” American Political
Science Review, December 1955, and in Irene Tinker and Mil
Walker, HThe First General Elections in India and Indonesia,"
Far Eastern Survey, July 1956.41
In many cases however he did not then return home, but in-
stead waited to watch the counting of the votes. This was done
publicly by the Polling Station Committee after two o'clock in the
afternoon or whenever polling had been completed, at many stations
late at night. After the results of the counting had been announced
the votes were carried to the Ketjamatan Ballot Committee who sent
them to the Electoral District Committee (Panitia Pemilihan). There
the counting was checked and the result finally announced one, two
or three months later at a public meeting.
How well did this system function? The effective organization
of the poll was made extremely difficult by the fact that the com-
pletion of preparations for it had to be done in a last-minute
rush. When the Burhanuddin Harahap cabinet assumed office on
August 12, 1955 it immediately face the question whether it could
or would hold the parliamentary elections on the date set down by
the Ali Sastroamidjojo cabinet four months earlier, September 29th.
After strong pressure had been applied, both by the opposition
parties P.N.I. and P.K.I. and by several of the government parties
like the Nahdatul Ulama which had sat also in the cabinet of Ali,
it was decided that this date should be adhered to, except in the
case of certain kabupatens where it was technically impossible.
But this decision was announced only on September 8th.
In the three weeks that remained, a tremendous lot of work had
to be done. Ballot papers, candidate lists and a variety of other
papers had to be transported long distances to get from the Electoral
District Committees to the ketjamatans from where they would be
carried to the polling stations on election eve. In many areas
membership of the Polling Station Committees had still to be final-
ized, and in almost all of them training had yet to be given to
the appointed members. The copying out of separate registers of
voters for each polling station, the delivery to the voters of
their letters of notification, and the erection of the cubicles,
fences and sometimes roofs which went to make a polling station—
all these had to be done with very great speed. The task was com-
plicated by last-minute new technical regulations, some of them
made by the Central Electoral Committee after the appointment to
it, on September 26th, of five new members from parties hitherto
unrepresented on it.
Nevertheless there were no major blemishes in the organization
of the poll. The very complicated and technically worded regula-
tions of the Central Electoral Committee were rarely followed to
the letter. In fact a great number of adaptions and modifications
of them were made. But local improvisation appears to have been
very· faithful to the spirit of the central instructions. In some
places particularly in cities, confusion arose over the distribution
of letters of notification. At some polling stations voting went
very slowly because of lack of training among the members of the
Polling Station Committee. Again there were stations where the
counting of the votes was inaccurate. But it was possible to hold
the ballot os September 29th in all places where the government
had decided to hold it, and such organizational shortcomings as42
affected it were of minor importance. This is a remarkable achieve-
ment when one considers that the whole electoral machinery func-
tioned on the basis of a new administrative principle, that of coop-
eration between multi-party committees and their pamong pradja
chairman, and that the Polling Station Committees themselves were
multi-party bodies, often composed partly.of .illiterates, with only
a very indirect link with the general administration. In the words
of Irene Tinker and Mil Walker ’’Indonesia dared to gamble its
whole electoral process on the intelligence of the illiterate
villager and...the gamble paid off." (35)
The success of the organization of the elections was matched
by the effectiveness of the security arrangements made for it. In
parts of the country such as East-Priangan (West Java), Atjeh and
the insecure areas of South Sulawesi, where there was reason to ex-
pect special Darul Islam efforts to wreck the elections, elaborate
provisions were made to forestall these and allow voting to go on
in as free as possible an atmosphere. The result was on the whole
suprisingly good. The Achinese rebels under Teungku Daud Beureuh
made no attempt to dislocate polling in their area,. . (Sections of
them did on the other hand employ methods of intimidation to
strengthen the Masjumi vote.) The West Java Darul Islam group
under Kartosuwirjo issued severe threats against persons voting.
But, apart from several cases of the burning down of polling sta-
tions and houses, no important acts of terror were reported from
their area at election time. Later in October and November they
intensified their activities, in what security authorities con-
sidered raids of reprisal against villagers who had voted, or
voted ’’wrongly." The South Sulawesi group under Kahar Muzakar on
the other hand had significant success in an active policy of
disruption of the elections. Five men, soldiers and polling
station functionaries, were killed by them on September 29th,
several others were kidnapped and there were a number of burnings
of polling stations and thefts of ballot papers and boxes in the
kabupatens of Makassar, Pare-Pare and Donggala. Thus the electoral
district of South and South-East Sulawesi was the one of lowest
electoral participation, with only 71.4% of the registered voters
casting a vote in the parliamentary elections. (36) Unsatisfactory
as it is, this picture represents a formidable security achieve-
ment. Outside the distrubed areas the elections went off in a
strikingly ordered atmosphere with no significant incidents.
A much more complicated aspect of the poll is the question
of how freely the voter was allowed to exercise his choice. Only
a very sketchy answer to this can be attempted here. It is certain
(35)	Loc. Cit., p. 110.
(36)	The corresponding figure for North Sumatra is 86.3%. In West
Java valid votes were cast by 88.2% of those registered. It
must be added that there are base areas of the rebels in each
of these three electoral districts where the government was
unable to conduct registration of voters in 1954. No estimate
has been made of the number of persons deprived of the vote
because of this.43
that electoral abuses occurred at a significant number of polling
stations. Civil courts in Surabaja, Kudus (Central Java) and Padang
Sidempuan (North Sumatra) heard cases involving the use of letters
of notification by persons other than those for whom they were in-
tended. On the island of Lombok in Nusatenggara (the Lesser Sunda
islands), a Polling Station Committee chairman is reported to have
allowed ballot papers to be taken away from the polling station.
In Garut, West Java, police arrested a member of a Polling Station
Committee who had himself marked 34 ballot papers. Repolling had
to be resorted to at several scores of polling stations in differ-
ent parts of the country, not only because of technical short-
comings such as perforated ballot papers or ones meant for another
electoral district, but also because of electoral abuses involving
Polling Station Committees.
Furthermore reports in the Djakarta and regional press tell
of pressure to vote for a particular party exerted in the course of
distribution of letters of notification. And in a number of
places, notably in East and Central Java, members of Polling Sta-
tion Committees and auxiliary policemen are reliably reported to
have applied pressure for one party inside the polling complex.
Such pressure was particularly effective where it was
exercised because provisions for the secrecy of the poll were by
no means adequate. The regulation providing for polling cubicles
to have no rear walls proved highly detrimental in this respect,
because committee members, and often the members of the public as
well, were able to see from behind whether a voter put his hole
on the right, the left or in the center of his very large ballot
paper. Again there were difficulties as a result of the fact that
symbols were printed on that part of the ballot paper at the back
of which were the committees members' signatures which the voter
had to show before he put his paper into the ballot box. The re-
sult of this could be seen very clearly in the electoral district
of North Sumatra, where the Masjumi symbol was one of the ones
printed on this particular part of the ballot paper: the member
of the Polling Station Committee, who was on duty at the ballot
box, could know exactly who had yoted Masjumi and who had not.
However this situation is seen in perspective only when it
is understood that complete secrecy of voting choice was extremely
difficult of achievement in most villages in a first Indonesian
election for sociological reasons. It would be wrong to assume
that secrecy of voting choice had been achieved even where the
ballot was held in strict secrecy. For the village voter had no
convincingly clear guarantee that no one would know which way he
had voted. In the first place he did not understand the electoral
technique well enough to appreciate the guarantee it created. But,
more important, the rank and file villager,particularly in areas
like Java, where feudal social relations reach into the village, is
accustomed to being interrogated by his social superiors, the
elders and prominents of the village, in a way which gives him no
choice WUt to answer. Before the elections he was being asked by
representatives of the parties how he would vote. Could he not
expect to be questioned after the poll on how he had voted?44
Very many village voters in all parts of the country were found
on interrogation to have no clear understanding of the secrecy of
the ballot. Some in fact had no conception that freedom of choice
existed for them, believing as they did that they were under some-
thing like a legal obligation to vote for a particular party. From
the writer’s limited village observations it would seem that village
leaders knew fairly exactly before the poll which party every member
of their village would support—except perhaps in the minority of
villages where active efforts were made in the very last stages
of campaigning to intimidate voters into changing their voting in-
tentions.
Thus effective secrecy of the ballot, that is secrecy of
voting choice, was little to be found in village Indonesia. But
it would be quite wrong to assume that the way was open to intimida-
tion by a political party wherever there was a lack of effective
secrecy of the ballot. This was only one of the conditions which
had to prevail for a party to be able to intimidate voters. (37)
One question which arises at this point is how effectively the
multi-party composition of the Polling Station Committees prevented
intimidation by one party. The writer’s examination of the party
composition of the Ketjamatan Ballot Committees and Village Commit-
tees for the Registration ofVoters established by the Ali Sastro-
amidjojo cabinet in 1954 suggests that there was little attempt
made to give the government parties of this cabinet a position of
dominance in these bodies, but rather that they were established
with a view mainly to what, according to common local belief, were
the relative strengths of different parties in the various areas. (38)
The deduction may perhaps be drawn that this was generally true
also of the Polling Station Committees established in mid-1955,
partly under the Ali cabinet and partly under the cabinet of Burhanuddin
(37)	In this connection it is interesting to note that the results
of the Constituent Assembly elections in which secrecy of the
ballot was much better preserved, as a result of the closure
of the rear side of the voting cubicle, were very similar to
the results of the parliamentary elections, both at the
national level and the level of the electoral district. Fur-
thermore the party which most strikingly increased its vote
in the second election was the P.N.I., the party generally
believed to have been the main beneficiary of the lack of
secrecy of the first one. It has been suggested that this is
evidence that lack of secrecy of the ballot in the first elec-
tions was not a political factor of crucial importance. But
the point would be extremely difficult to establish positively
because of the large number of variable factors involved in the
comparison.
(38)	It was possible to obtain statistics of the numbers of confessed
members of parties and party fropt organizations for 89 of
the 143 kabupatens and kabupaten-level electoral units in Java
and Sumatra, and to compare these with unofficial election re-
sults for these kabupatens.45
Harahap, for the Ketjamatan Ballot Committees played a major part
In determining the composition of the Polling Station’Committees.
There were certainly many Polling Station Committees on which
only one party was represented, and it is most difficult to know
whether these were mainly in villages or polling station areas
where only one party existed. But in any event a further safe-guard
existed in the balloting system which encouraged the participation
of the community of voters in the conduct of the poll, by giving
to every voter the right to lodge protests to the Polling Station
Committee and obliging the Committee to make decisions on these
immediately and publicly, in some villages where a multi-party
system was functioning effectively, the parties took advantage of
this provision by charging those of their members who had acquired
an understanding of polling procedure with the task of scrutinizing
-the procedure followed by polling station oommittees on which they
were not represented. Furthermore community pressure was a check
against abuses of power by Polling Station Committees in some other
areas where there was no such system of organized scrutineering by
party representatives. On the other hand such control machinery
could not function in villages.where the authority and power of
the members of the Polling Station Committee was such as to make
it impossible for the right of protest to be exercised. This was
the situation where a Polling Station Committee was controlled by
a single power group of a village, a power group whose members
were all of one; political party. Where this situation prevailed,
despite the fact that other parties existed in the village, these
other parties had little protection against election-day intimida-
tion.
Reports of Intimidation practiced in the last stages of cam-
paigning and on election day are available from almost all parts
of the country. But two types of areas stand out in this respect.
In the first place large numbers of voters felt under pressure to
vote Masjumi in many of the parts of Atjeh and West Java where Darul
Islamstrength had to be reckoned with. Secondly, in many parts
of"Bast and Central Java intimidation was practiced widely and ex-
tensively by P.N.I. lurahs and their assistants and to a lesser
extent by Communist village guards.
Of the ferns which intimidation took in the insecure areas
little is known. What is known suggests that they were direct
and crass and strongly favored the Masjumi. (39) In the case of
(39) At the same time they appear to have called forth counter-
measures directed against the Masjumi from the military and
civil authorities engaged in fighting the rebel groups. These
were particularly important in Garut and Tasikmalaja in West
Java. Also in a number of areas of Western Central java the
military and civil authorities had come, as a result not only
of the Oar.ul Islam revolt but also of the earlier Islamic
rebellions‘of the Angkatan Ummat Islam (Brigade of the Islamic
Community) and the Army Battalion Humber 426, to be ready to46
East and Central Java on the other hand a good deal of information
is available about a variety of forms of intimidation ranging from
the crass to the subtle and favoring the Communists as well as the
P.N.I. It is in fact very difficult in this case to determine the
points at which exhortation became intimidation, partly because of
the situation where the voter (except in very strongly detradition-
alized villages) could not conceive of a clear distinction between
the office of a person in authority and that person as a citizen.
For instance it is a moot point whether one can speak of intimida-
tion where a Javanese lurah made it known in his village that the
tjamat would be angry with him if his village did not produce a
P.N.I. majority, or that he had been told that ”Pak Karno” (Presi-
dent Soekarno) wanted at least 20 P.N.I. votes in every village,
or that he, the lurah, didn’t mind how anybody else voted, although
for himself the choice was perfectly clear since the Governor
supported the P.N.I..'
In other examples however there can be no doubt that the term
intimidation has direct application. In a number of Javanese villages
lurahs threatened voters with gaol sentences and large money fines
if they did not vote P.N.I. In others they threatened to withhold
supplies of salt, and other commodities normally distributed by
them. In others the djagos (village bullies) employed by them
suggested that villagers might be compelled to leave their villages
unless they followed the lurah's voting instructions. Nor Can
there be any doubt that intimidation was involved where Communist
youths, equipped with knives and truncheons for guard duty went
from house to house at night collecting signatures and thumbprints
of membership of Communist front organizations, or threatened to
kidnap those who failed to pierce the hammer-and-sickle. The prac-
tice of such crass forms of intimidation was much less widespread
than that of the more subtle forms, but it has been reported from
villages in a number of different parts of East and Central Java.
Furthermore where a lurah or the leader of a village guard
group—of whatever party—was confident enough, or afraid enough,
to issue open threats before the poll, he was frequently ready
also to make his power felt by the voters at their polling stations,
and subsequently to implement certain of his threats. As members
of Polling Station Committees and as auxiliary policemen, such men
of power peered demonstratively into voting cubicles, and several
cases have been reported from East and Central Java of acts of
revenge Instigated by lurahs and village guards after the poll
against persons believed not to have voted as they had been in-
use the toughest methods against Islamic radicalism. In Bali
the existence of a small group of rebels with connections
with the Socialist Party was the basis for strong measures
taken by the administration against this party.47
structed by then. (40)
The government did relatively little to prevent the abuse of
its authority by its representatives in the villages. However cer-
tain regulations made by the Ali cabinet made it virtually impossible
for any member of the armed forces to join in campaigning. (41)
Furthermore the Burhanuddin Harahap cabinet on September 13, 1955,
issued a regulation to the effect that no party symbol might be dis-
played outside the house of the head of an area, from governor to
lurah.
No adequate explanation has yet been offered for the fact that
outright intimidation was practiced much more in Fast and Central
Java than in any other part of the country (with the exception of
certain insecure areas). (42) Presumably any satisfactory explana-
tion would be in terms of the high degree of detraditionalization
and social dislocation of many of the village areas of these two
provinces, and the effects of this in producing villages openly
divided along several lines and in breaking a path for the Communist
Party. But it would probably be also in terms of the traditionally
strong position of the village head in Javanese society and of the
tendency for the Javanese village to be subordinated to the quasi-
feudal structure above it. The writer is currently attempting to
test the hypothesis that intimidation was practiced most in the
remoter less detraditionalized villages of East and Central Java.
There it was relatively difficult to expose it. In addition pre·?
paredness to protest against it can scarcely have existed in villages
to which detraditionalization had come only recently, and in small
measure. Such villages would appear—if indeed there is evidence
to confirm the hypothesis—to have been socially unprepared for
the impact of the multi-party system which came in upon them
suddenly in the latter part of the election campaign from the
more detraditionalized villages.
(40)	It must be admitted that the bulk of the evidence here comes
from such anti-P.N.I. and anti-Communist papers as Abadi, Keng
Po, Pedoman and Indonesia Raja in Djakarta, and Surabaja Post
Tn Surabaja. But the general pattern of it is confirmed by
several Independent observers and by political leaders of a
variety of parties who campaigned in East and Central Java.
(41)	The most important of these was the controversial Government
Regulation No. 47, 1954. See also Lieut.-Colonfel S. Parman,
’’Dapat Goalkah," in Duta Tamtama, the periodical of the
Officers* League (Ikatan Perwira Republik Indonesia) January
1956.
(42)	Thie was certainly the case. It was not merely a question of
the accessibility of relevant Information about these areas to
the reporters of newspapers with an interest in exposing such
methods where practiced by the P.N.I. and P.K.I.48
Whatever the explanation, there is little doubt that consider-
able numbers of voters in East and Central Java were under pressure
of threats in making their final decision. But the pressure of
social obligations, and sometimes conflicting ones, was a much more
important factor limiting freedom of voting choice than intimida-
tion in the great majority of villages both in these areas and in
the country as a whole.
No account or assessment of the parliamentary election is
complete without a discussion of the very remarkable level of voters'
participation, and the atmosphere which characterized balloting.
In the last few days before September 29th the atmosphere was
one of tense anticipation. Election Committees were completing their
organizational preparations in a rush of last-minute activity. The
itinerant officials of the Information Ministry, at the climax of
years of elections publicity work in the villages, were giving
their last,instructions on voting procedure. The parties were
still campaigning intensively, and continued to do so by house-to-
house canvassing even after the government ban on electioneering
(of a public kind.) (43) From cities, towns and villages in every
part of the country hundreds of thousands of people were travelling
home to the places where they were registered.
Alarmist rumors about the elections had been abroad in village
communities in many parts of the archipelago for some months. In
some areas these were inchoate; in others there were detailed
stories of forthcoming submarine landings, of white men about to
descend from mountains and of impending attacks from yellow-clad
ghost armies. Invulnerability dealers were reported from several
parts of Java to be selling special election potions, many store-
keepers hoarded goods, and in a few isolated places there was a
rush to the pawnshop. The poisoning scare which spread through
almost all of Java immediately before and immediately after the
parliamentary elections is to be seen as an expression of the same
abnormal socio-psychological conditions. (44)
(43)	This ban, which affected public meetings, demonstrations and
marches, operated for September 28th and 29th in all parts of
the country. It operated from September 25th in all West Java,
and Greater Djakarta, in South Sulawesi, Atjeh and the
kabupaten of Hulusungai in South Kalimantan. In the West Java
kabupaten of Tjiamis, Tasikmalaja and Garut and the Central .
Java kabupaten of Tjilatjap it took effect as from September
22nd.
(44)	This scare led to beatings up of foodsellers in many parts of
the island and was even discussed at some length in cabinet.
The Eyckmann bacteriological institute of the Central Public
Hospital in Djakarta received more than 600 samples of sup-
posedly poisoned food within a period of four days, but it
found that none of this was actually poisoned, Nor was there49
Such rumors as were abroad in the last few days before the
elections were scarcely checked by the government's frequent radio
appeals for calm. The movements of troops to be seen in cities
and towns and on every major road in the few days before September
29th served only to heighten fears that awesome and calamitous
happenings might occur on that day. In many parts of the country
an unproclaimed curfew was observed for two or three nights before
election day. Accounts from every part of the archipelago tell of
the spontaneous closing down of all shop and market trade in town
and village areas alike after midday on September 28th. In some
areas the quiet was described as comparable to that after an air
raid.
On election day itself a striking atmosphere prevailed.
Voters arrived at their polling stations early. By seven in the
morning large numbers were gathered at every center, and everyone
had arrived by eight. The number of those assembled occasioned a
great deal of surprise. Whole families had come, with the old, the
sick, and the very young. Women in an advanced stage of pregnancy
came, and in a number of cases had their babies at the polling
station. In very many cases villagers were there who had long been
away from the village. And all were in good clothes. Almost
everywhere solemnity prevailed and at many places tension. An un-
natural uncanny quietness, broken only by whispering, has been re-
ported from a large number of polling stations. But in many of
these there was a remarkable release from tension as soon as
polling had got under way. The first voters were confused, and
ashamed to be so. Some pierced a symbol on the candidate list
on the wall of their cubicle instead of on the ballot paper; others
could not fold the paper properly. But then most frequently they
were corrected by the spectators, with the children joining in
lustily. After some time everyone understood the procedure. It
continued to have awesome quasi-religious significance, but, like
a religious rite repeated a number of times, it ceased to inspire
disquiet. At the same time everything was peaceful. Except in
insecure areas there were no soldiers or policemen :to be seen at
the polls. Nothing remained to sustain the earlier vague fears.
The widespread feeling that something very bad would happen on this
day was gradually disappearing.
Thus a new atmosphere came to prevail at very many polling
stations, an atmosphere like that of a national celebration, serious
but no longer tense. There too order characterized the proceedings
but the dominant reaction of the voters was one of relief, pride,
and satisfaction. Many villagers, as well as townsmen, were jubi-
lant after casting their vote, proud to have been able to partici-
pate in this important ceremonial adtivity.
evidence elsewhere that there was any foundation in’:the rumor.
Charges were levelled against several parties for instigating
the poisoning and, later, for spreading the false rumors, but
the evidence suggests that the tensions of the social situa-
tion were the primary cause of the scare.50
In some areas the tension continued. There was little relief
from it at that small but significant minority of polling stations
where voters were afraid lest they should be punished for having
voted as they had done or were thought to have. Three cases were
reported in the press of villagers who suffered sudden mental de-
rangement on voting day, and one of these in a fit of amok killed
three fellow-villagers. In some areas an unusual quiet hovered
over the countryside even in the afternoon and evening of September
29th; those who were not at their polling stations were mostly in-
doors. Indeed, even when fear no longer prevailed, the element of
the solemn and uncanny remained as a chief characteristic of the
election day atmosphere.
87.65% of registered voters cast a valid vote; approximately
91.54% voted. (45) Another 2.5% or so would have died in the 12-17
months since registration. (46) Thus only about 6% of the regis-
tered voters failed to use the franchise. This 6% included many
from areas directly threatened by rebel groups. It included some
of the very old and the very ill. It included some who could not
travel to where they were registered and were ignorant of the pro-
cedure for absentee voting. It included a very small group of city
dwellers unaffected by the social pressure for elections. And
finally it included small groups in several parts of the country
who had conscientious objections to voting. (47) Whatever the com-
position of the group, it was tiny. It was smaller than that of
those who failed to use their rights in elections of village heads
in almost any area of the country.
(45)	This figure assumes that the valid vote was 95.75% of the
total vote, Figures for invalid voting are available to the
writer for only 11 of the 15 electoral districts, but it is a
reasonable estimate that between 4% and 4.5% of all votes cast
were no valid.
(46)	The mortality rate is currently estimated at 20 per 1000, but
no information is available on mortality by age groups. The
figure of 2.5% is based on the assumption that the death rate
among voters was no higher than amongst those too young to
vote.
(47)	Among the latter were some members of the small Javanese
anarcho-communalist sect of the Samins, some members of organ-
izations with their origin in the pre-war West Sumatran Moslem
Communist Party (Partai Komunis Indonesia locaal Islamij), a
section of the Batak regionalist sect Si ftadja Batak, and the
followers of the individual religious teachers in several
other parts of the country. A large part of the membership
of the groups which took this stand initially were later won
over to participation in the elections by government informa-
tion officers. Some of those most strongly opposed refused
to be registered and so had no opportunity to vote.51
it was not concern about the political issues at stake which
brought euch very large numbers to the polls. Was it then simply
fear? Fear undoubtedly played an important par-t. Villagers in
many areas believed that voting was compulsory and that those not
voting would be punished severely. Even where no rumors of this
kind circulated voters were afraid of the wrath of their lurah and
other village councilors if they did not go to the polls. Again
they were afraid of the anger of the party leaders who had canvassed
for their votes.
But probably more important than specific fears of this kind
was the powerful general sense of community obligation which vil-
lagers felt. To distinguish this sharply from fear is impossible.
Community obligations are sanctioned by fear, if only fear of iso-
lation and social and moral censure. However there is an important
sense in which village voters discharged their obligations volun-
tarily; and comprehendingly.
In the political thinking of the nationalist elite two main
arguments had long been put forward in favor of the holding of
elections. The first was the one of democratic principle. Because
Indonesia was now a democratic country she had to hold elections.
Frequently associated with this argument was one of nationalist
pride:	Indonesia’s ability to conduct elections had to be proved
before the eyes of the world as a demonstration that she was indeed
ripe for nationhood. A second major argument was the one that elec-
tions were necessary for the attainment of political stability, or,
as some said, that they would create political stability. Since
before the 17th October Affair of 1952 a great deal of. dissatisfac-
tion with the country’s unstable political conditions, the slowness
and ineffectiveness of government action and the frequency of cabi-
net crises, had been channeled into feeling against the existing
temporary and unrepresentative parliament, and the multiplicity of
parties in it. Elections, its advocates argued, would put an end
to these conditions, in that they would create a representative
parliament and one with moral authority,and at the same time act
as a filter of political parties. (48)
In a mass publicity campaign lasting almost three years the
Indonesian voter was repeatedly given these arguments in one or
(48) A summary of the arguments for the holding of elections is to
be found in "Problems of Elections," Indonesian Affairs
(Ministry of Information.), April-May 1952. President Soekarno’s
thinking in relation to elections may be found in his Inde-
pendence Day (August 17th) speeches of 1954 and 1955. The
Ministry of Information booklet MendJelAng 29 September con-
tains pre-election radio speeches given.by'Vlce-rWesiclent
Hatta, Prime Minister Burhanuddin Harahap, Information Minister
Sjamsuddin Sutan Makmur, Religious Affairs Minister K. H.
Iljas and Chairman of the Central Electoral Committee, S.
Hadukusumo.52
other form, ’(49) He was given them by the parties as they explained
the idea of elections. He was given them by the local agent of
the Ministry of Information, by his lurah, by the literacy teacher
who came to his village, by the official from the local Religious
Affairs Office, and by his own children who were at school. At this
level of course the arguments were put in less complicated terms.
The villager was told two simple things about elections, that they
were part of independence, and that they would make independence
better. But both of these things he understood clearly.
His understanding of them was not understanding in the sense
of knowledge of a cause-effect relationship; it was perception and
acknowledgment of a moral (and in most cases also religious)
duty. (50) However much they might seem like discord, a thing
sharply opposed to the traditional values of his society, elections,
he had been taught to believe, were something good, a noble national
cause, an opportunity for serving one's country. If his initial
reaction to them had been one of suspicion he was later certainly
convinced, if only because there was no significant organized oppo-
sition to this new idea which was so vigorously propounded by so
many. In this sense it is true to say that the village voter took
part in the elections from conscious choice. He was performing a
duty which he had been taught to want to perform. But the fact is
that he very much wanted to perform it. One can account in no other
way for the very great enthusiasm which large numbers of village
voters showed for elections, or for the quasi-religious joy which
many experienced in voting.
To vote gave the villager a sense of importance, a sense of
participation in something big. He did not feel that he was taking
part in the governing of the nation, but he did have the feeling
that he had A part in its nationhood in a symbolic ceremonial sense,
in much the same way as a new communicant has of participation in
the Christian Church. And in what was probably a great majority
of cases he could see that elections meant that he had the right to
(49)	The agency through which most of this campaign was channeled
was the Information Ministry. This Ministry had a staff of
two or three persons in every ketjamatan (sub-district) who
spoke to village meetings. In addition the Ministry used
popular theatre and shadow-plays to explain the holding of
elections. The arguments for them were conveyed by six films
made by the State Film Enterprise. They were contained in an
Election Song which every school child and every radio listener
came to know. Finally they were transmitted very effectively
through several millions of copies of large posters issued by
the Information Ministry.
(50)	Several fatwas, Moslem religius edicts issued by councils of
ulamas (scholars) stressed that voting was obligatory for a
Moslem. The most important fatwa, frequently quoted particu-
larly in Sumatra, was the one issued by the All-Indonesian
Conference of Moslem Scholars and Evangelists held at Medan
April 11-15, 1953.53
ft choice between the rival groups of his social superiors in the
village which had each clamored for his favor.
A few brief paragraphs must suffice for a discussion of some
aspects of the Constituent Assembly elections of December 15th.
Campaigning for these second elections began only relatively
late, in middle to late November and in some areas only in December.
Furthermore it was of considerably less intensity than before
September 29th. Despite the frequent statements of Government and
party spokesmen to the effect that the Constituent Assembly was
even more important a body than Parliament, it seems that the effec-
tive leaders of the parties did not believe that the Assembly would
have powers comparable to those of the normal legislative body. (51)
It was frequently said that the parties had almost exhausted their
financial resources. Many of the smaller parties and organizations
gave up hope after receiving only an insignificant number of votes
at the parliamentary elections. But, most important, very many
political leaders believed that the results of the second elections
could not be made to differ radically from the results of the first.
On the other hand very great issues were at stake in the current
Djakarta political struggles over the composition of the coalition
cabinet which would be formed to be responsible to the newly elect-
ed parliament. The attention of the top echelons of the parties
was directed more to these struggles, fought out with the methods
characteristic of the Djakarta level of politics, than it was to
electioneering.
On the basis of the experience gained in the parliamentary
elections the Central Electoral Committee issued a number of new
technical and organizational instructions for the elections for
the Constituent Assembly. The number of polling stations was in-
creased so that none had to serve more than 750 voters. New
arrangements were.made to make it easier to cast absentee votes.
A complicated series of new provisions eliminated many of the short-
comings experienced in the parliamentary elections in the distribu-
tion of letters of notification. Another regulation provided for
the counting of all votes by the Ketjamatan Ballot Committee as well
as the Polling Station Committee. Most important of all a new in-
struction did away with the one strikingly unsuccessful feature of
the balloting system used on September 29th, by providing for a
neck-to-knee screen to cover the back of every voting cubicle. (52)
The result of these changes was decidedly positive, although
they further complicated the tasks of the various election committees
(51) The provision in the interim constitution that a new constitu-
tion must be accepted by a two-thirds majority represents a
strong safeguard against the adoption of a constitution radi-
cally different from the interim one.
(5d) See the Instructions 14 to 22 of the Central Electoral
Committee.54
Organizationally there were fewer hitches on December 15th than
there had been on September 29th. In terms of the maintenance of
security, too, the government was considerably more successful than
at the first election. This second election day did not, as far
as is known, claim any victims and the percentage of registered
persons who cast a vote in the troubled electoral district of South
and South-East Sulawesi rose from 71.4% to 76.4%.
The Constituent Assembly elections were also relatively free
from the intimidation practices which marked the parliamentary
elections in certain areas. A number of Polling Station Committees
were involved in election day abuses, but on all available evidence
the number of these was smaller than at the first poll. Certainly
there were fewer cases of reballoting. But, more important, pre-
election intimidation appears to have been practiced to a remark-
ably smaller extent. In part this is due to the lesser intensity
of campaigning. In part it is the result of the steps which the
Burhanuddin Harahap cabinet took between the two elections to pre-
vent the abuse of government authority for party purposes. (53)
Another important part of the explanation is that closed voting
cubicles offered a better guarantee of the secrecy of the ballot.
But perhaps the most important new factor was the new understanding
of the secrecy of the ballot acquired by large numbers of voters
in areas where there had been no electoral abuses at the parlia-
mentary election. These voters now really believed that if they
could evade or refuse interrogation on the point, their voting
choice would remain a secret.
But the most striking contrast between the two elections was
in the matter of atmosphere. At this second election there were
next to no alarmist rumors, and little tense anticipation. Many
voters traveled long distances to be able to be where they had
been registered. But many others who had done so on September 29th
did not do it a second time, and in many cases these were people
who did not use the improved facilities for absentee voting. On
election day itself there was again very little trade carried on
and very little public transport, but not the virtually complete
standstill of September 29th. With many voters leaving the polls
as soon as they had cast their vote, balloting was a less communal
and more individual affair. It still had a ceremonial aspect, but
much less markedly than on September 29th.
(53) In a government instruction issued on November 12th it forbade
the use by any party of the name or picture of the President
or Vice-President, and also forbade all government servants,
particularly heade of areas, from governors to lurahs, to
abuse their official influence, position or power for the bene
fit of a party. See the Prime Minister’s speech of December
1st. However enforcement of these interdicts, particularly
the second, was extremely difficult the more so because of
the weak position of the cabinet after the results of the
parliamentary elections were known.55
Nevertheless the level of voters’ participation was again
very high, only slightly lower than for the parliamentary elections
If the writer’s estimate of invalid voting of 1.5%-2% is correct,
the number of those who cast a vote was approximately 89.33% of
the total number of registered voters, only 2.21% less than in the
first election. (54) The major part of such decline as occurred
can be accounted for in terms of city and town voters. The fact
that the decline was so small and that there was scarcely any
overall decline in the village vote, suggests confirmation of the
earlier argument that specific fears were a much less important
factor than general social pressure and community obligations in
producing the high level of voters' participation.
(54) This assumes that invalid votes were exactly 1.75% of the
total number of votes cast. The l,5%-2% estimate is based
on figures for 6 of the 15 electoral districts. The number
of valid votes cast in the second election was actually greater
than the number cast in the first, 87,77% as compared with
87.65%.57
PART V
ANALYSIS
As it became possible about October 8th to see a picture
emerging of the overall results of the elections, the number of
surprises was great. Probably the biggest were the success of
the Nahdatul Ulama which was to raise its parliamentary representa-
tion from 8 to 45, and the unexpectedly small vote received by the
Masjumi, particularly in Central and East Java. P.N.I. and
Communist strength in East and Central Java also caused surprise,
though not as much. A good deal of comment was devoted to the low
vote of the Socialist Party, to the even lower vote of the nation-
al-communist Partai Murba and to the virtual disappearance of the
minor nationalist parties, P.R.N. (Partai Rakjat National, National
People’s Party), the two P.I.R.'s (Persatuan Indonesia Raja—Greater
Indonesian Union) of Mr. Wongsonegoro and Prof. Hazairin respective-
ly, Parindra (Partai Indonesia Raja, Greater Indonesia Party),
S.K.TI (Serikat Kerakjatan Indonesia, Indonesian People's Associa-
tion) and the Labor Party, which had had such important roles in
the cabinets responsible to the temporary parliament in the pre-
ceding five years. Although some observers had predicted the
emergence of the P.N.I., Masjumi, N.U. and P.K.I. as the "big
four," none expected as sharp a dexineation as evolved, with the
smallest of the four major parties, the P.K.I., receiving more
than five times as many votes as the largest of the other parties,
the P.S.I.I.
An examination of the Djakarta press suggests that persons of
different political allegiances were surprised by substantially
the same aspects of the result. Few had been confident that they
could predict the outcome; all expected surprises. But their ex-
pectations appear to have had a great deal in common. Apparently
the body of assumptions about the relative strengths of the parties
was. erroneous, something on which there was general agreement
between all groups at the Djakarta level.
The overall results obtained by the parties in the parliamen- .
tayy elections are set out in the Table on the following two pages.
The I.P.K.i. (Ikatan pendukung Kemerdekaan Indonesia—League
for the Upholding of Indonesian Independence) is a "voters' associa-
tion,” an organization formed in 1954 specifically so as to be able
to contest the elections. Led by a group of senior army officers
and ex-officer veterans, it was variously thought to be politically
akin to the Socialist Party and the Nationalist Party. Its leading
candidate in a number of areas was Col. A. H. Nasution, a former
Army Chief of Staff, who was suspended from active service for his
involvement in the 17th October Affair of 1952 and was to be rein-
stated in this position shortly after the parliamentary elections.
The G.P.P.S. (Gerakan Pembela Pantja Sila—Movement to defend
the Pantja Sila) was also formed with the elections specifically98
Table 1
THE RESULTS OF THE PARLIAMENTARY ELECTIONS
1.	P.N.I. (Indonesian
Nationalist Party)	8
2.	Masjumi (Consultative
Council of Indonesian
Moslems)	7
3.	Nahdatul Ulama (Ulama
Association)	6
4.	P.K.I. (Communist Party) 6
5.	P.S.I.I. (Islamic
Association Party)	1
6.	Parkindo (Christian
Party)	1
7.	Partai Katolik (Catholic)
8.	PO37T. TSocialist)
9.	J .P.K. I. (blague fcr the Tphold-
ing of Indonesian Independence)
10.	Perti (Islamic Education
Party)
11.	P.R.N. (National
People's Party)
12.	Partai Buruh (Labor)
13.	G.P.P.S. (Movement to
Defend the Pantja Sila)
14.	P.R.I. (People's Party)
15.	P.P.P.R.I. (Police
Employees' Association)
16.	Partai Mur ba (Proletarian)
17.	fiaperki (Citizenship
Consultative Council)
18.	P.I.R. (Greater"Indonesian
Union)--Wongsonegoro
19.	Gerinda
20.	Permai (Proletarian
People's Union)
21.	Partai persatuan Daya
‘(Dayak Unity Party)
22.	P.I.R. (Greater Indonesia
Union)—Hazairin
23.	P.P.T.I. (Tharikah
Unity Party)
24.	A.K.U.I.
25.	P.R.D. (Village People*#
Party)
Number of valid votes	Percent- age of total vote	Number of seats	Number of seats in..pro- visional parlia- ment
434,653	22.3	57	42
903,886	20.9	57	44
955,141	18.4	45	8
176,914	16.4	39	17
091,160	2.9	8	4
003,325	2.6	8	5
770,740	2.0	6	8
753,191	2.0	5	14
541,306	1.4	4	-
483,014	1.3	4	1
242,125	0.6	2	13
224,167	0.6	2	6
219,985	0.6	2	
206,261	0.5	2	-
200,419	0.5	2	
199,588	0.5	2	4
178,887	0.5	1	-
178,481	0.5	1	1
154,792	0.4	1	-
149,287	0.4	1	-
146,054	0.4	1	-
114,644	0.3	1	18
85,131	0.2	1	
81,454	0.2	1	-
77,919	0.2	1	59
	Number of valid votes	Percent- age of total Vote	Number of seats	Number of seats in pro- visional parlia- ment
26. P.R.I.M. (Party of the People of Free Indonesia)	72,523	0.2	1	
27. Acoma (Young Generation Communists)	64,514	0.2	1	
28.. R. Soedjono Prawirosoedarso and Associates	53,305		0.1	1	
29. Other parties, organiza- tions and individual candidates	1,022,433	2.7	-	46
Total	37,785,299	100.0	257	233
This table is taken over from A. van Marie, "The First Indonesian
Parliamentary Elections," Indonesie, 1956.
in view, and also in 1954. Its form and development was linked
closely with the veteran West Java P.N.I. leader Gatot Mangkupradja.
By the P.N.I. this party was conceived of as a type of front organ-
ization, many G.P.P.S. candidates were prominent government leaders
who were P.N.I. members. But a breach between Gatot and the P.N.I.
central leadership which came to a head in June 1955 changed the
organization’s political orientation. Now it may be classified
with the nationalist personality parties of ill-defined political
standpoint, like the P.R.N. of Mr. Djody Gondokusumo, the P.I.R.
of Mr. Wongsonegoro, the P.I.R. of Professor Hazairin, the Labor
Party of Professor S. M. Abidin and Asraruddin and the P.R.I. of
Sutomo.
The other two important voters' associations are more specify
ically sectional.The Baperki (Badan Permusjawaratan Kewarganegaraan
Indonesia—Citizenship Consultative Council) is to a!l~Tnfents and"
purposes, although not officially, an organization to represent
the interests of the Chinese of Indonesian citizenship. It is
headed by the Communist-sympathizing Slauw Giok Tjhan. The Police
Employees’ Association had a group of five high police officers as
its candidates.
P.P.T.I. and A.K.U.I. are minor Moslem parties. P.P.T.I.
(Partai Persatuan Tharikat Islam), representing a group of Moslem
mystical brotherhoods, is centered in Central Sumatra. A. K. U. I.
centered in East Java, and with candidates drawn particularly from
the Madurese, is politically close to the Masjumi.
Permal( Gerlpda and R. Soedjono Prawirosoedarso and Associates
are mystical groups with strength in Java. Permai has the longest60
political existence and support in West, Central and East Java, and
has associations with the Communist Party. Gerinda is an old organ-
ization of a section of the Jogjakarta nobility. R. Soedjono is
an octogenarian mystical teacher from Madiun.
Acoma (young Generation Communists) is an organization politi-
cally akin to the national-communist Partai Murba.
The only avowedly ethnic group successful in the parliamentary
elections is the Dajak Unity Party of West Kalimantan. The P.R.D.
(Village People’s Party) and P.R.I.M. (Party of the People of Free
Indonesia), although not avowedly ethnic or regional, are parties
of one region, West Java. This can be said also of A.K.U.I.
(Madura), Gerinda (Jogjakarta) and R. Soedjono and Associates
(Madiun).
All of the six bodies which were successful in the elections
for the Constituent· Assembly though unsuccessful in the parliamen-
tary elections, are ethnic or regional in one or other sense. One,
the Gerakan Pilihan Sunda (Sundanese Election Movement) of West
Java is speoifically ethnic, and another, the P.I.R. (Greater
Indonesia Union) of West Nusatenggara, strong in Lombok, is specif-
ically regional. Three others, the Partai Tani Indonesia (Indonesian
Peasants* Party), the Gerakan Banteng (Buffalo Movement) and the
group of the Cheribon mystical teacher Radja Kaprabonan and his
associates, are in effect West Java groups, and the Pusat Penggerak
Pentjalonan L. M. Idrus Effendi; (Association of Supporters of the
Candidature of L. M. Idrus Effendi) obtained virtually all of its
votes from the kabupaten of South-East Sulawesi.
In terms of this Table of results divisions suggest themselves
between what we may caxl the major parties, the medium-sized parties
and organizations, and the small bodies. In the medium-sized cate-
gory one may place the parties and organizations which obtained
between four and eight seats, the P.S.I.I., the two Christian
parties, the Socialists, the Islamic Perti and the officers' and
ex-officers’ I.P.K.I. AH others, with two seats or less, may be
termed small parties and organizations. Each of the medium-sized
bodies obtained a very large part of its voting strength in one,
two or three electoral districts. But nevertheless all of them,
with the possible exception of Perti, have a right to be consider-
ed organizations of nation-wide significance. Among the small or-
ganizations some have this right and others not.
This division will become clearer as we examine the geograph-
ical extent of the candidature of the various groups. Seven parties
and organizations, P.N.I., Masjumi, P.K.I., P.S.I.I., the Socialist
Party, the P.R.N. of Mr. Djody and the Police Employees' Associa-
tion, ran candidates in every one of the 15 electoral districts and
another five, the N.U., the two Christian parties, the Chinese-
Indonesian Baperki and the P.N.I.-associated Movement to defend the
Pantja Sila, participated in 14 of the 15. The officers’ and ex-
officers ' Γ.Ρ.Κ.Ι., the national-communist Partai Murba,the Labor
Party, the p.R.l. of Sutomo (Bung Tomo) and the two P.I.R.'s each
submitted candidates in 10 or more districts. Perti and P.P.T.I.,
centered on Sumatra, and Permai and Acoma, centered on Java, each61
with candidates in five or more districts, may be said to complete
the list of organizations which are more than regional in character
Among these 22 are the four major parties, the six medium-sized
organizations and 12 of the 18 smaller bodies which obtained seats
in Parliament (12 of the 24 which obtained Constituent Assembly
seats). One can then make the following four-fold classification.
1.	Major Parties
P.N.I. (Indonesian Nationalist Party)
Masjurni (Consultative Council of Indonesian Moslems)
Nahdatul Ulama (Ulama Association)
P.K.I. (Communist Party)
2.	Medium-sized Parties
P.S.I.I. (Islamic Association Party)
Parkindo (Christian Party)
Partai"gatollk (Catholic Party)
P. S. I. (Socialist Party)
Perti (Islamic Education Party)
I.P.K.I. (League for the Upholding of Indonesian Independence)
3.	Small Groups of Nation-wide Significance
B.R.N. (National People’s Party)
Partai Buruh (Labor Party)
6.P.P.S. (Movement to Defend the Pantja Sila)
P. R. I. (People’s Party)
P.P.P.R.I. (Police Employees' Association)
Partai Murba (Proletarian Party)
Baperki (Citizenship Consultative Council)
B. I. R.-Wongsonegoro (Greater Indonesian Union)
Permai (Proletarian People's Union)
P.I.R.-Hazairin (Greater Indonesian Union)
P.P.T.I. (Tharikah Unity Party)
Acoma (Young Generation Communists)
4.	Small Groups of Regional Significance
Gerinda—Jog j akar t a
Partai persatuan Daya (Dayak Unity Party)—West Kalimantan
A. K U.I.—Madura	’
P.R,D. (Village People's Party)—West Java
P.R.I.M.(Party of the People of Free Indonesia)—West Java
R. Soedjono Pr.awirosoedarso and Associates—Madiun
Gerakan Pijihan Sunda (Sundanese Election Movement)—West Java
Bartai Tani Indonesia (Peasants' party)—West Java
Radja Kabrabonan and Associates—Cheribon, West Java
Gerakan Bantang (Buffalo Movement)—West Java
B.	I.ft.-Nusatenggara Barat (Greater Indonesian Union of West
Nusatenggara)—Lombok
P.P.P.L.M. Idrus Effendi (Association of Supporters of the Candi
dature of L. M. Idrus Effendi)—South-East Sulawesi62
This classification should not however obscure the fact that
many of the organizations which competed in a large number of elec-
toral districts obtained significant support in only a small pro-
portion of these. Among the medium-sized groups the P.S.I.I.
(Islamic Association Party) obtained 62.4% of its total votes in
West Java and Sulawesi and the Parkindo (Christian Party) 86.3% of
its in North Sumatra, Sulawesi, Maluku and East Nusatenggara.
59.6% of the Catholic vote came from the one district of East Nusa-
tsnggara, 60.2%.of the Socialist vote from West Java and West Nusa-
tenggara (Bali), 72.8% of the Perti vote from Central Sumatra and
81.7% of the I.P.K.I. vote from West Java. Among the small groups
of nation-wide significance one finds that 75.2% of the Pantja Sila
Movement’s votes came from West Java, 48.5% of those of Bung Tonto's
P.R.I. from East Java, 51.7% of those of P.I.R. of Hazairin from
East Nusatenggara (virtually all from the island of Sumbawa), and
73·. 1% of the P.P.T.I. ones from Central and North Sumatra.
Indeed the strength of three of the four major parties was con-
centrated in a small number of areas. The P.N.I. obtained 85.97%
of its parliamentary vote in Java, the N.U. 85.6% and the P.K.I.
88.6%, whereas the population of Java, (51,637,552 persons of
Indonesian citizenship out of an all-Indonesian total of 77,987,879
according to Central Electoral Committee Statistics of 1954), (55)
was no more than 66.2% of that of Indonesia. More particularly
the strength of these three parties was concentrated in the two
electoral districts of East and Central Java. In this area, where
45.6% of Indonesia's population lives, the P.N.I. got 65.5% of its
total vote, the N.U. 73.9% and the Communists 74.9%.
Not one of the many individual candidates who stood for elec-
tion was successful. The group of R. Soedjono Prawirosoedarso
and Associates which was successful in both elections and that of
Radja Kaprabonan and Associates and the Association of Supporters
of the Candidature of L. M. Idrus Effendi, each of which obtained
a seat in the Constituent Assembly, were, technically, voters'
associations.
Another intersting fact is that no candidate elected from the
list of a party or organization owes his election to the voters’
preference for him (as distinct from the position in the list given
him by the party). Provision was made in the electoral law for a
candidate to be elected regardless of the order in which his name
was placed on his party's list, if he had obtained, by the write-
in vote System, as many as 50% of the number of his party's quotient
of votes in any district, that is 50% of the figure obtained by
dividing a party's total vote in a district by the number of seats
(55) This figure is dated October 30, 1954. In a joint statement
to the U.N. Seminar on Population in Asia and the Far East,
held in November-December 1955 by the Indonesian participants,
the population in 1955 is estimated as 82.3 million (includ-
ing foreign nationals). It is further estimated that 54.2
million of these live in Java. See Ekonomi dan Keuangan
Indonesia, February 1956.63
allocated to it there. But the write-in method was scarcely used.
The 22,087 votes given to the P.N.I. by this method in the parlia-
mentary elections in North Sumatra (7.2% of the party’s total vote
in this district) and the 13,457 votes given to the P.N.I. in
North Sulawesi (15% of its total there) are the only two cases
where the method was used to any significant extent. And even in
these two districts (each of which includes an area of abnormally
high literacy, the Protestant Christian areas of Tapanuli and
Minahasa) the number of votes obtained by individual members of
candidate lists by the write-in method was far from sufficient to
ensure them election.
The role of individuals was made somewhat greater however by
another of the Indonesian system’s elaborate devices, the provision
for vote-pooling arrangements. Under this provision it was possible
for two or more candidate bodies within an electoral district to
enter into an agreement at the time of candidature to the effect
that any remainder votes that they might have in that electoral
district after the first stage of allocation of seats, should be
pooled. This was the type of arrangement which the Movement to
Dsfend the Pantja Sila had with the P.N.I. in all districts except
West Java, with the result that 72,415 Pantja Sila parliamentary
votes accrued to the P.N.I. The vote-pooling arrangement between
the P.N.I. and the People's Front (Front Rakjat) of East Nusa-
tenggara gained the P.N.I. an additional 60,107 parliamentary votes
xn this district, and it gained a further 29,923 votes from its
vote-pooling association with the Prabu Kresno organization in
West Java and Djakarta Raja. Similarly the Masjumi had vote-pooling
arrangements with local organizations in Atjeh and the Djambi area
of Central Sumatra. The P.K. I. , P.S.Hv P.S.I., P.R.N., P.I.R.-
Wongsonegoro, P.I.R.-Hazairin and P.R.I.M. each had such arrange-
ments with organizations of local importance in one or more elec-
toral districts. Not the least interesting of these were the
association between the Communist Party and the West Sumatran
Islamic party Pernsji and the one between the P.I.R. of the devotee
of Javanese mysticism, Mr. Wongsonegoro and the Pentecostal Church
in North Sumatra.'
But more frequently arrangements of this kind were made between
the parties and individuals. The P.N.I. and the Catholic Party
used this technique most extensively, the Ρ,Ν.ί. particularly in
Sumatra where P.N.I. leaders believed their party to have a bad
name, and the Catholic Party in Java, where the Catholic minority
is tiny—132,629 persons of all ages in 1955, (56) but the number
of prominent men who are Catholics relatively great. It was thought
that Sumatrans who would not vote for the P.N.I. might vote for
prominent individual P.N.I. members or sympathizers if these stood
as independent candidates, and similarly that non-Catholics in Java
who would not consider voting for the Catholic Party would perhaps
vote for individual Catholics.
(56) This figure, dated September 1, 1935 is given by the Vatican
Legation and the Central Mission Office in Djakarta.64
But in fact such arrangements with individuals were made by
almost all parties in one or other electoral district, and in many
cases not as the result of a consciously elaborated strategy as in
the case of the P.N.I. and Catholic Party. In some cases they
proved markedly effective. The Catholic Party raised its Java vote
from 67,820 to 225,523 through vote-pooling arrangements with indi-
vidual . candidates, albeit with the help of a large number of votes
obtained because of a confusion between symbols in the minds of
voters. (57) The P.N.I. gained 33,269 parliamentary votes in South
Sulawesi through its association with La Ode Hadi; and the P.S.I.I.
and Masjumi each benefitted, particularly in the Constituent
Assembly elections, from the popularity of individuals in the same
district, the P.S.I.I.’s associate Ambo Dalle receiving 19,581 Con-
stituent Assembly votes there and the Masjumi's Η, M. Dg. Radja
18,963.	-------
Tables 2 and 3 make clear the remarkably small extent to which
the voting pattern changed between the elections for Parliament and
those for the Constituent Assembly, at least at the national and
electoral district levels. In general the vote of the major parties
increased slightly and that of all other parties fell. Whatever
the explanation of these tendencies—and they are highly compli-
cated—the exceptions to them are relatively few. They are worthy
of attention here.	......
In the first place the P.N.I. increased its vote not slightly
but by 635,565, and the Masjumi, although a major party, obtained
114,267 fewer votes at the Constituent Assembly elections than at
the parliamentary ones. Secondly the Socialist Party, the P.N.I.-
associated Pantja Sila Movement, Bung Tomo's P.R.I., and the small
West Java PTr7T57 (Village People’s Party) all lost more than a
small percentage of their parliamentary votes. Finally several
medium-sized and smaller groups, the officers’ and ex-officers'
Ϊ.Ρ.Κ.Ι., the national-communist Partai Murba, the Communist-sym-
pathizing mystical group permai and the regional bodies, Grinda,
Persatuan Daya and A.K.U.TI increased their vote slightly^ and
two other small groups, the Labor Party and the ;W£>st Java P.R.I.M.
increased theirs very considerably.
The great gains of: the P.N.I. and the losses of the Masjumi
and the P.S.I., (and probably also those of the P.R.I. of Bung "
Tomo, at least in part) may be regarded as part of a single change
in the electorate’s political choices, not a large change but a
highly significant one. The fall in the number of votes obtained
by the Pantja Sila Movement was in part at least the result of
the same swing to the P.N.I., and so in another sense were the
(57) So for instance the little-known East Java candidate p. M·
Koesadi received 64,522 parliamentary votes largely because
of the great similarity of his symbol to the Communist
hammer-and-sickle. It has been argued that in this and some
other cases the Central Electoral Committee was too lenient
in its policy as regards endorsement of symbols put forward by
parties.65
Table 2
THE PARTIES’ TOTAL VOTES AT THE ELECTIONS
FOR PARLIAMENT AND THE CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY *
Parlia- mentary vote	Constit- uent Assembly vote	Differ- ence
8,434,653	9,070,218	+635,565
7,903,886	7,789,619	-114,267
6,955,141	6,989,333	+34,192
6,176,914	6,232,512	+55,598
1,091,160	1,059,922	-31,238
1,003,325	988,810	-14,515
770,740	748,591	-22,149
753,191	695,932	-57,259
539,824	544,803	+4,979
483,014	465,359	-17,655
219,985	152,892	-67,093
242,125	220,652	-21,473
200,419	179,346	-21,073
199,588	248,633	+49,045
224,167	332,047	+107,880
206,261	134,011	-72,250
178,481	162,420	-16,061
114,644	101,509	-13,135
149,287	164,386	+15,099
178,887	160,456	-18,431
154,792	157,976	+3,184
146,054	169,222	+23,168
72,532	143,907	+71,375
81,454	84,862	+3,408
)	64,514	55,844	-8,670
85,131	74,913	-10,218
77,919	39,278	-38,641
53,305	38,356	-14,949
4,
5,
6,
7,
8,
9,
10,
11,
12
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19,
20,
21.
22.
23.
24
25
26
27
28
P.N.I. (Indonesian Nationalist
Party)
Masjumi (Consultative Council
of Indonesian Moslems)
Nahdatul Ulama (Ulama
Association)
P.K.I (Communist Party)
P.S.I.I. (Islamic Association
Party)
Parkindo (Christian Party)
Partai Katolik (Catholic)
P.S.I. (Socialist)
I.P.K.I. (League for the Upholding
of Indonesian.Independence)
Perti (Islamic Education Party)
G.P.P.S. (Movement to Defend the
Pantja Sila)
PRN. (National People’s Party)
P.P.P.R.I. (police Employees'
Association)
Partai Murba (Proletarian)
Partai Buruh (Labor)
P.R.I. (People’s Party)
P.I.R. (Greater Indonesian
Union)—Wongsonegoro
P.I»R. (Greater Indonesia
Union)— Hazair in
Perroai (Proletarian People’s
(Jnion )
Baperkl (Citizenship Consultative
Council)
Gerlnda
Partai Persatuan Daya (Dayak
Unity Party)
P.R.I.M. (Party of the People of
Free Indonesia)
A.K.U.I.
P.P.T.I. (Tharikah Unity Party)
P.R.D. (Village People’s Party)
R. Soedjono Prawirosoedarso
and Associates
* Votes obtained by parties through vote-pooling arrangements at the
level of the electoral district are here included with the votes
originally obtained by the parties themselves.66
THE RESULTS OF THE PARLIAMENTARY AND CONSTITUENT
ASSEMBLY ELECTIONS ACCORDING TO ELECTORAL DISTRICTS
(ALL PARTIES, ORGANIZATIONS AND INDIVIDUAL CANDIDATES
OBTAINING 10,000 OR MORE VOTES IN ANY ELECTORAL DISTRICT)
1. EAST JAVA
	Parliamentary Vote	Constituent Assembly Vote	Differenc
P.N.I.	2,251/069	2,329,991	+78,922
Mas j tuni	1/109,742	1,119,595	+9,853
N.U.	3,370,554	3,260,392	-110,162
P.K.I.	2,299,602	2,266,801	-32,801
P.S.I.I.	43,357	43,458	+5,501
Parkindo	36,506	34,840	-1,666
Katolik	13,976	11,769	-2,207
PS.I.	59,093	59,902	+809
I.P.K.I.			— —
Perti	2,078	1,792	-286
Buruh	51,333	149,796	
Murba	16,384	32,194	
P.R.N.	32,131	17,297	
P.P.P.R.I.	48,333	44,410	
Permai	54,148	57,417	
P.I .R. (W)	13,807	12,971	
Baperki	35,489	33,369	
G. P. pantja Sila	22,565	14,026	
A.K.U.I.	78,281	82,370	
P.R.I.	100,076	63,220	
Soedjono Prawirosoedarso	47, 191		38,356	
Koesadi P.M,	64,522 2. CENTRAL JAVA	30,986	
P.N.I.	3,019,568	3,171,588	+152,020
Masjumi	902,387	892,556	-9,831
N.U.	1,772,306	1,822,902	+50,596
P.K.I.	2,326,108	2,305,041	-21,067
P.S.I.I.	62,922	69,355	+6,433
Parkindo	35,652	46,220	+•10,568
Katolik	40,738	38,976	-1,762
P.S.I.	30,819	26,685	-4,134
I.P.K.I.	21,233	.	.23,248	+ 2,015
Perti			
Burub	90,994	82,672	
Murba	20,827	23,725	
P.R.N.	53,285	55,595	
P.P.P.R.I.	47,850	40,823	
Permai	27,641	38,021	
P.I.R. (W)	60,811	58,747	
Baperki	44,743	43,908	
Gerinda	154,792	157,967	
GPP.8.	12,364	10,377	67
CENTRAL JAVA (Contd)
A„K„U„I.	Parliamentary Vote	Constituent Assembly Vote
P.R.I.	33,674	21,304
Prawirosoedarso		
Koesadi P.M.		
Radja Kaprabonan	16,682	12,402
Sarsadi Ariohudojo	15,562	18,375
Tani Makmur (a)	12,404	11,962
K.P.R.S.I. (b)	10,286	10,453
A. Djakartirtana	43,050	38,944
Soeroto	13,115	13,569
P.B.P.N.I. (c)	26,612	16,139
(a)	Prosperous Peasant
(b)	All-Indonesian Voters’ Committee
(c)	Former Government Servants’ Association
3. WEST JAVA
P.N.I. Masjumi N.U. P.K.I.	1,541,927 1,844,442 673,466 755,643	1,586,507 1,761,406 692,755 827,858	4-44,580 -83,036 +19,289 +72,215
P.S.I.I.	393,174	384,790	-8,384
Parkindo	14,262	19,879	+5,617
Katolik	6,054	6,104	+-60
P.S.I.	220,108	238,136	+18,028
I.P.K.I.	441,270	450,091	+8,821
Perti			
Murba	121,312	142,434	
P.R.N.	69,035	53 280	
P.P.P.R.I.	36,025	37 385	
Permai	43.539	48 211	
P„I.R. (W)	21,407	18 265	
Baperki	38.375	j t4\JU 33 596	
G.P.Pantja Sila	219,985	152.892	
P.R.I.M.	59.156	143 907	
P.R.I.	23,001	19 396	
Gerakan Banteng R.I. (a)	35 632	•MW J Wv V 32 084	
P.R.D,	77,919	j uOTC 39 278	
Radja Kaprabonan	26,588	21,258	— —.«··—«·
P.T.I. (b)	33.894	28 918	
Partai Republik	19,194	, W X U 11,699	— M 1WM TT
Parki (c)	16,215	13 515	
Odo Suramihardja	19,193	-*·<χ I WAlS 21,123	M — «··*·■*
K.P.R.S.I. (d)	11,923	14 345	
Gerpis (e)	18,227	, UilU 34,073	«■MMM*·»
Acoma	34,352	27 946	
Prabu Kresno	28,215	28,457	
(a) Buffalo Movement			
(b) Indonesian Peasants'	Party		
(c) Indonesian National	Party		
(d) All-Indonesian Voters’ Committee			
(e) Sundanese Voters' Movement			68
4. GREATER DJAKARTA
	Parliamentary Vote	Constituent	Difference Assembly Vote	
P.N.I.	152,031	173,580	-*-21,549
Masjumi	200,460	180,488	-19,972
N.U.	120,667	124,923	+4,256
P.K.I.	96,363	89,612	-6,751
P.S.I.I.	23,245	19,971	-3,274
Parkindo	17,456	17,667	+217
Katolik	7,570	7,052	-518
P.S.I.	34,949	27,136	-3,813
I.P.K.I.	14,586	12,313	-2,273
Perti			
Baperki	26,944 5. SOUTH SUMATRA	23,384	
P.N.I.	213,766	257,528	+43,762
Masjumi	628,386	594,662	-33,724
N.U.	115,938	136,008	-+20,070
P.K.I.	176,900	168,095	-8,805
P.S.I.I.	149,239	132,439	-16,800
Parkindo	4,696	3,892	-804
Katolik	3,817	3,889	+72
P.S.I.	21,873	19,875	-1,998
I.P.K.I.			
Perti	42,912	41,321	-1,591
Buruh	17,111	18,595	
Baperki	10,178	8,496	
Tani Makmur (a)	20,562	16,833	
(a) Prosperous Peasant
6. CENTRAL SUMATRA
P.N.I.	42,558	56,512	+13,954
Masjumi	797,692	797,897	+205
N.U.	71,959	78,164	+6,203
P.K.I.	90,513	98,583	+8,070
P.S.I.I,	32,753	30,899	-1,854
Parkindo	8,983	7,875	-1,108
Katolik			——
P.S.I.	24,573	30,969	+6,396
I.P.K.I.	6,512	9,699	+3,187
Perti	351,768	337,081	-14,687
Pemsji (Islamic)	12,072	10,576		
M.T.K.A.A.M. (a)	13,485	11,369	
Partai Islam Indonesia	31,066	26,894	
P.P.T.I.	35,156	33,516	
(a) Minangkabau Adat Council69
7. NORTH SUMATRA
	Parliamentary Vote	Constituent Assembly Vote	Differenc
P.N.I.	329,657	332,782	-3,125
Masjumi	789,910	762,404	-27,506
N.U.	87,773	103,823	+16,050
P.K.I.	258,875	277,546	+18,671
P.S.I.I.	26,393	26,719	+326
Parkindo	291,319	292,794	1,475
Katolik	29,009	29,938 15,257	+929
P.S.I.	18,229		-2,972
I.P.K.I.	9,688	11,309	+1,621
Perti	78,358	75,177	-3,181
Buruh	20,264	23,646	
P.P.P.R.I.	14,306	11,992	
P.I.R. (W)	27,510	19,096	
Baperki	4,674	4,044	
P.P.T.I.	27,084	21,459	
Geredja Pentekosta	(a)	12,357	10,817	
K.R.S.S.T. (b)	19,000	8,043	
(a) Pentecostal Church
(b) Awakening of the People of Simelungun, East ^Sumatra			
	8. WEST KALIMANTAN		
P.N.I.	64,195	74,123	+9,928
Masjumi	155,173	152,715	-2,458
N.U.	37,945	37,123	-822
P.K.I.	8,526	8,680	—
P.s.I.I. Parkindo Katolik	3,030	1,863	-1,167
	2,505	2,259	-246
P.S.I.	15,909	13,848	-2,061
I.P.K.I.	7,289	5,993	-1,296
P. Daya	146,054	157,490	
9. SOUTH KALIMANTAN
P.N.I.	46,440	60,860+	+14,420
Masjumi	252,296	236,513	-15,783
N.U.	380,874	390,561	+9,687
P.K.I.	17,210	20,092	+2,882
P . S . I. I.	6,717	4,916	-1,801
Parkindo	10,642	13,221	+ 2,ξ>19
Katolik	484		—
P.S.I.	5,307	4,664	-643
I.P.K.I.	19,383	13,997	-5,386
perti			
P. Daya	11,641	11,732	
P.P.T.I.	16,429	14,074	
Baperki	2,152	1,981	
♦Figures	represent the total number of	votes, after the	votes have
been added of organizations with whom		vote-pooling arangements ha1	
been made.70
10. EAST KALIMANTAN
Parliamentary
Vote
Constituent
Assembly
Vote
Difference
P.N.I.	43,067	50,940*	■+7,873
Masjumi	44,347	38,610	- 5,731
N.U.	20,795	24,304	-t-3,509
P.K.I.	8,209	8,762	+ 553
P.S.I.I.	7,401	5,521	- 1,880
Parkindo	2,585	4,223	+1,638
Katolik	4,153	4,025	-128
P.S.I.	13,029	12,008	- 1,021
I.P.K.I.			
Perti
Baperki
11. NORTH SULAWESI
P.N.I.	102,855	132,140*	+29,285
Masjumi	189,198	192,313	+3,115
N.U.	21,619	23,744	+2,125
P.K.I.	33,204	37,541	+4,337
P.S.I.I.	173,364	166,148	'7,216
Parkindo	144,273	138,614	-5,659
Katolik	17,042	16,508	-534
P.S.I.	9,292	9,445	- 153
I.P.K.I.			
Perti			---
Baperki	2,195 12. SOUTH SULAWESI	2,100	
P.N.I.	46,334	85,144	+ 38,810
Masjumi	446,255	502,357	+ 56,102
N.U.	159,193	173,291	+14,098
P.K.I.	17,831	23,402	+5,511
P.S.I.I.	114,798	106,280	'8,518
Parkindo	118,850	114,524	- 4,326
Katolik	9,024	9,354	+ 334
P.S.I.	6,770	8,780	+ 2,010
I.P.K.I.	1,679	2,481	+ 802
Perti			---
Baperki	1,462	1,164	—
Buruh	15,876	15,682	—
P.R.N.	13,384	21,101	——
P.K.R. (a)	21,512	22,597	—
La Ode Hadi	33,269	5,263	—
P,I.R. (H)	12,527	14,012	—
P.P.P. La Ode (a) People's	Idrus Effendi 46,835 Sovereignty Party	31,915	71
13. MALUKU
	Parliamentary Vote	Constituent Assembly Vote
P.N.I.	30,218	36,602
Masjumi	117,440	122,615
N.U.		
P.K.I.	4,792	4,934
p.s.i.i.	11,310	9,162
Parkindo	108,920	109,262
Katolik	18,710	18,896
P.S.I.	1,458	1,814
I.P.K.I.	2,773	2,649
Perti		
P.I.R. (H)	19,068	18,204
Difference
+ 6,384
+ 5,175
+ 142
-2,148
+ 342
+ 186
+356
-124
14. EAST NUSATENGGARA**
P.N.I. Masjumi	65,027 157,972	154,386
N.U.	17,684	18,111
P.K.I.	5,008	6,626
P.S.I.I.	23,046	22,452
Parkindo	203,579	178,582
Katolik	459,255	477,053
P.S.I.	1,476	2,070
I.P.K.I.	1,634	1,936
Perti	3,487	3,207
P.I.R. (H)	59,257	56,705
P.R.N.	22,312	34,531
Front Rakjat (a)	60,107	
Front National (b)	22,129	
Baperki	3,784	
-3,596
+ 427
+1,618
-594
—24,997
+17,798
+594
+302
-280
(a)	People's Front
(b)	National Front
** The P.N.I. had a vote-pooling arrangement with the People's
Front and the P.I.R. of Wongsonegoro with the National Front.
The P.N.I. and People's Front together received 125,134 votes
in the first election, and 109,009 in the second, a fall of
16,125 votes. The other two organizations received a combined
vote of 22,753 in the first election and of 32,755 in the second
a rise of 10,002.
15. WEST NUSATENGGARA
P.N.I.	464,398	512,000	+47,602
Masjumi	264,719	258,358	-6,361
N.U.	104,282	102,294	-1,988
P.K.I.	66,067	78,363	+12,296
P.S.I.I.	7,020	5,804	-1,216
Parkindo	2,944	3,217	+ 27372
WEST NUSATENGGARA (Contd)
Parliamentary
Vote
Constituent
Assembly
Vote
Difference
Katolik
P.S.I.
I,Ρ.Κ.Ι.
1,188
233,371
1,290
190,267
-f-102
-43,104
Perti
Buruh
P.I.R. (H)
P.R.N.
Baperki
8,618
33,457
14,386
12,159
3,859
6,582
1,981
large increases obtained by the Labor Party in East Java and the
P.R.I.M. in West Java. Both of these parties used the buffalo in
their symbol, and apparently many would-be p;.,N.I. voters remembered
the instructions they had received before September 29th to "look
for the buffalo in the left-hand top corner"—whereas the arange-
ment of symbols on the ballot paper was quite different on December
15th.
Separate hypotheses would be required to explain the sharp fall
in voting strength of the West Java P.R.D. and the increases regis-
tered by I.P.K.I., Murba and Permai. The gains of the three unam-
bitiously regional groups , Ger in da, Persatuan Daya and A.K.U.I. may
be accounted for partly in terms of the great stimulus to them of
their success at the parliamentary elections; they had obtained
votes, or almost as many, as parties like Parindra, S.K.I., and
the two P.I.R.'s, which had held so many cabinet portfolios.
But the main trends to be explained are firstly the very great
similarity in results between the two elections, secondly the ten-
dency for the major parties to increase their vote in the second
elections and for all others to lose, and thirdly the tendency for
the P.N.I. to register particularly strong increases, partly at the
expense of the Masjumi.
This brings us to the heart of the analytical problems posed
by the election results. Immensely valuable as they are as source
material for the student of Indonesian society and politics, the
election results are not easily understood. Many interpretations
of them have been given by both participants and observers. But
the questions which have evoked them have usually been in terms of
unclear concepts. Thus there exists a variety of answers to the
question "Why did the Masjumi fail?" The Mhsjumi’s "failure" is
said to have resulted from its campaigners * readiness to call their
opponents heathens, from their strong anti-Communism, from the
party’s concentration on political rather than religious campaign-
ing, from its over-scrupulous avoidance of anti-foreign appeals,
and its lack of a positive economic program. It is likewise attrib73
uted to the effectiveness of the anti-Masjumi appeals of parties
like the P.N.I., the P.K.I., and the N.U. Again it is ascribed to
the ineffectiveness of Masjumi organization--its inadequate use
of professional organizers” TEs excessive concentration on mass
publicity and so on—and to its competitors’ greater access to in-
struments of government power. There are many similar explanations
of the ’’success" of the Nahdatul Ulama, the P.N.I. and the Com-
munist Party and of the '‘failure’’ of the Socialists and the various
minor nationalist parties.
All of these have value regarded as hypotheses. And where it
can be demonstrated that an interpretation of this type was accepted
by one of the parties concerned as a guide to future strategy, as
for instance in the case of the Masjumi’s decision to adopt a more
positive attitude towards the Pantja Sila in its campaigning for
the Constituent Assembly elections, this fact represents positive
evidence towards a confirmation of the hypotheses. But as explana-
tions these interpretations are inadequate. This is so firstly be-
cause to ask why the Masjumi failed is to beg the question. It is
possible to speak of the failure of a party only in terms of ex-
pected electoral strength and the designation is not an objective
one inasmuch as the basis of predictions of the strength of parties
was not the measurable fact of the results of a previous election
but a very subjective body of assumptions of quite different origin.
A second reason for the inadequacy of such interpretations is
that it is impossible to assess their importance in relation to one
another while the question is not posed in terms of comparisons.
If it is true that the Masjumi vote was lower than it would other-
wise have been because the party’s strong anti-communism repelled
voters, and also because the party's organization was bad, and also because
its opponents used their position inside the machinery of government
against it, the question arises what the relative importance of
each of these three factors was. The only way to answer this is to
compare situations where each of the factors was present with other
situations where it was not.
Two types of comparisons can be made. On the one hand one
can compare areas with one another. One could for instance com-
pare the strength of the Masjumi in the Central Javanese kabupaten
where the bupati was actively anti-Masjumi in the elections with
another socially similar one whose bupati played no active poli-
tical role. One could compare an area where the Masjumi leader-
ship was in the hands of a strongly anti-Communist section of the
party with another socially similar one where this was not the
case. Or one could compare two areas where a similar situation
existed as regards the political control of government machinery,
but which were dissimilar as regards a particular aspect of their
socio-economic situation, for instance as a result of the presence
in one area of a tea plantation or sugar factory, or of a large
group of former guerrilla fighters uprooted from their villages
during the Revolution, or of a duality of ethnic groups. In this
way one could isolate some of the very important aspects of voting behav
ior which have only an indirect connection with consciously-elaborated
campaign strategy, questions which concern the social roots of74
particular political divisions. (58)
On the other hand it is possible to compare the results
achieved in the same area at the two elections in September and
December. This type of comparison can be particularly valuable in
confirming or invalidating hypotheses relating to the effectiveness
of various types of campaign strategy, hypotheses relating to the
importance of the current economic situation and the current situa-
tion of Djakarta politics at the time of the elections and others
relating to the electoral power of President Soekarno when the
weight of his authority was thrown on the side of one or several
parties. In this Interim Report however it is difficult to do
more than suggest hypotheses.
How then is one to explain the differences between the results
of the two elections? It has been suggested that the main trends
calling for explanation are the similarity in results of the two
elections, the tendency for the major parties to increase their
vote in the Constituent Assembly elections and for all other parties
to lose, and finally the large rise in the P.N.I. vote.
How similar were the results of the two elections? For this
writer there has not been the opportunity to examine a systemati*-
cally chosen sample of comparisons at the kabupaten, ketjamatan
and village levels. But where the necessary figures have been
accessible it has been clear that a great deal of similarity exists.
Furthermore it has been noticeable that where a party has registered
a significant rise in its vote in a kabupaten—for instance :
I.P.K.I.’s rise in the Bogor kabupaten from 52,757 (out of 491,584)
to 59,948 (out of 501,795)—this has resulted not from changes in
all or most of the ketjamatan units making up the kabupaten but
from only a very small number of them, while in all others there
has been no substantial change in voting pattern.
It would seem that this is to be understood in terms of what
has been said above about party loyalties in the village context.
Inasmuch as an individiual*s party loyalty is common knowledge in
his village, inasmuch as this is limited by his estimation of his
position in relation to a number of pulls made upon him with dif-
ferent degrees of obligatoriness in the context of the village net-
(58) Election statistics could be of value also as indices of such
concepts as the level of political activity and national poli-
tical effectiveness. Kabupatens could be compared with one
another as regards the ratio between their population and the
numbers of their residents who became election candidates.
Also figures for the proportion of voters in any area who
voted invalidly could fruitfully be compared with figures for
such other indices of prosperity and social development as
communications, press, radio, cinema, literacy, schools and
so on. Statistics of the number of persons not casting a vote
could perhaps be used as an index of individualization in
cities.75
work of social obligations, and inasmuch as membership of a party
or even publicly known voting support for it creates effective
ties to it—to this extent a somewhat inflexible pattern of village
voting is to be expected. In such situations the changes which
occur are the result not of rank and file villagers' changes in
loyalty as between one village leader and another, but of village
leaders’ suggesting to their followers that they should support a
different party. Changes in voting pattern then have their origin
in the group of village leaders (or of those outside the village
community to whom village leaders have personal loyalty or social
obligations).
How true to reality is this model? Where did. the changes in
voting choice take place? Were they greater in villages or in
town or cities? To what extent were they to be found in plantation
areas? Were there many one-party villages whose political loyalty
changed? In the absence of detailed investigation one can only
speculate as to where, under what circumstances and how closely the
reality of voters’ choices approximated to the pattern sketched
above. To the extent that it did this would seem to provide a
possible explanation of the tendency for the major parties and the
parties thought to have been successful at the first elections to
have increased their vote at the second. For men of influence at
the village level and above it, it was clearly preferable to have
powerful parties indebted to them than weak ones. However the
crucially important question. Still uninvestigated here is the one
of the levels at which the bandwagon effect operated, whether
mainly at the national level, the level of one region, one kabupaten,
or at lower levels.
The rise in the P.N.I. vote and the lasses suffered by the
Masjumi and P.S.I. will merit a great deal of detailed study,
particularly when the results have been made available on a level
sufficiently detailed to enable the changes to be localized. Some
of the questions to be asked emerge from a cursory examination of
Tables 2 and 3. Did the rise in the P.N.I.'s East Java vote come
from the areas where the N.U. vote fell? Did the falls in the
Masjumi vote in Sumatra and Kalimantan occur in the same areas
where the P.N.I. vote rose? What connection can be established
between the rise in the P.N.I. vote in Bali and the fall in the
Socialist vote there?
Of very great importance in this regard is the question of
how far these changes reflect a change in attitudes towards the
Burhanuddin Harahap cabinet. For it would seem that a certain
level of sensitivity in an electorate to happenings at the level
of national politics is a prerequisite for elections if these are
to fulfill the control function which democratic theory requires.
It is certainly possible to interpret the P.N.I.'s gains in
the light of new attitudes to the cabinet from which it was ex-
cluded. In September the Burhanuddin Harahap cabinet had had
great achievements to its credit. In its seven weeks of office
it had brought down prices, particularly clothing prices, dramati-76
cally, and had taken vigorous action against a number of corruptors.
In December by contrast many parts of the country, particularly
outside Java, were suffering from acute shortages of rice. The
anti-corruption drive had been halted and the government had entered
upon a highly unpopular oourse of negotiations with the Netherlands
about the future of the Netherlands-Indonesian Union.
But perhaps more important than this was another, aspect of
Djakarta politics, one which made the position of the cabinet, and
particularly of its Masjumi leadership, manifestly weak. This was
the series of negotiations taking place as to the composition of
the future cabinet to be formed when the newly elected parliament
assembled. Already well before December it had become clear to all
with an interest in Djakarta politics that these negotiations were
proceeding on the basis of the assumption that, while the P.N.I.
and the N.U. were assured of a position in this future cabinet,
the Masjumi was not. Thus the bandwagon factor operated doubly in
favor of the P.N.I. (and the Nahdatul Ulama). Both of these were
thought victors in the parliamentary elections and because of the
logic of the political situation (and the relationship of the
other three parties to the Communists) both were assured of a majoi·
cabinet role. By the same token it operated doubly against the
Masjumi.
Again the extensive speaking tours in which President
Soekarno engaged during the month before the Constituent Assembly
elections may have been an important factor in helping to explain
the rise in the P.N.I. vote and the losses of the Masjumi and
P.S.I. Temporarily eclipsed by the chain of developments which
began with the army crisis of June 1955 and the fall of the P.N.I.-
led cabinet of Ali Sastroamidjojo, the President did little public
speaking before September 29th. When the Burhanuddin Harahap
cabinet decided to forbid the holding of a mass rally scheduled to
be held in Bandung on September 25th with him as the principal
speaker, he accepted the decision. By November and December how-
ever the power balance had changed. The factors weakening the
cabinet, chief of them being the election result, had strengthened
President Soekarno’s position. At the scores of huge meetings
which he addressed in Java, Sumatra, Kalimantan and Sulawesi, he
stressed that there were groups attempting to overthrow the Pantja
Sila, and denounced these. In many places he warned against the
"socialists who are not revolutionary," and very frequently he
issued reminders that it was he who had founded the P.N.I. Not
the least important part of these tours of the President was the
confidence which they gave to sections of the administration apply-
ing pressure for a P.N.I. vote. The tours, and the weak and iso-
lated position of the Masjumi which made them possible, counteracted
the cabinet’s policy of checking the exercise of political power
through the government apparatus.
For explanatory patterns relating to the social roots of the
strength of different parties it is not so important to look at the
differences between the results of the two elections as it is to
examine party strengths in different parts of the country.77
A glance at Table 4';shows the very great differences in voting
pat t er n b e-twee n* df f f eren t - ■ p ar ts -of—the- country *. What - types of soc ial
patterns do they reflect? One breakdown of party results which
throws light on a variety of socio-political patterns is the one
between religious and non-religious parties.
Table 5 shows the combined strength of the major and medium-
sized parties divided into three categories, non-religious, Moslem,
and Christian. From it, it is clear that throughout Java (except
in Greater Djakarta), and particularly in Central Java, the com-
bined non-religious parties were stronger than the combined Moslem
parties, and that this was also true of West Nusatenggara, the
majority of whose voters live in predominantly Hindu Bali. In all
other areas the non-religious parties showed themselves weaker
than the Moslem ones. The combined Moslem vote was particularly
high in South Kalimantan (N.U. and Masjumi) and Central Sumatra
(Masjumi and Perti) and to a slightly lesser extent in South
Sulawesi and South Sumatra (Masjumi, N.U. and P.S.I.I. in both
areas). The combined Moslem-Christian vote was overwhelmingly
large in Maluku and East Nusatenggara..
The contrast between the four-fold division of East and Central
Java where two religious and two non-religious parties are strong
and the two-fold division of the Minangkabau area of Sumatra where
both parties are religious and Moslem has been discussed in Part
III. What similar pattern does Table 4 suggest? The four-fold
division between P.N.I., P.K.I., N.U. and Masjumi which exists in
almost all parts of East and Central Java Ts found nowhere outside
these two provinces (except in certain parts of West Java and
South Sumatra, and there with markedly different relationships be-
tween the parties and social groups). On the other hand one does
find a number of areas where the political cleavage resembles that
in Minangkabau, being two-fold and along religious lines: most
parts of South Kalimantan, (Masjumi and,N.U.), South Atjeh (Masjumi
and Perti), North Bengkulu (Masjumi and Perti) and some parts of
North Sulawesi (Masjumi and P.S.I.I.).
Atjeh (Masjumi) and Madura (N.U.) are two examples of regions
of which large areas supported a single religious party. A three-
fold division between Masjumi, N.U. and P.S.I.I. is to be found in
Banten, in a number of areas in South Sumatra and a number of others
in South Sulawesi. This may be said to complete the list of areas
which no non-Moslem party has succeeded in penetrating. If Flores
(Catholic Party) and certain parts of Maluku (Parkindo and Masjumi)
are added, the list of areas unpenetrated by non-religious parties
is complete.
Elsewhere outside Java one finds a variety of combinations of
religious and non-religious parties. In East Sumatra the pattern
is four-fold—Masjumi, Parkindo, P.N.I. and Communists. In South
Tapanuli, parts of Riau~ Djambi and South Sumatra, many parts of
Kalimantan and Lombok, it is three-fold—Masjumi, N.U., P.N.I.;
and in some parts of South Sulawesi and Kalimantan simply two-fold—
Masjumi and P.N.I.78
Table 4
THE NUMBER OF VOTES, AND PERCENTAGE OF TOTAL VOTES,
OBTAINED BY THE TEN LARGEST PARTIES IN EACH ELECTORAL DISTRICT
IN THE PARLIAMENTARY ELECTIONS (See Map)
A. The Major Parties
1.	East Java
2.	Central Java
3.	West Java
4.	Greater Djakarta
5.	South; Sumatra
6.	Central Sumatra
7.	: North. Sumatra
8.	West Kalimantan
9.	South Kalimantan
10.	East Kalimantan
11.	North and Central Sulawesi
12.	South and Southeast Sulawesi
13.	Maluku
14.	East Nusatenggara
15.	West Nusatenggara
1.	East Java
2.	Central Java
3.	West Java
4.	Greater Djakarta
5.	South Sumatra
6.	Central Sumatra
7.	North Sumatra
8.	West Kalimantan
9.	South Kalimantan
10.	East Kalimantan
11.	North and Central Sulawesi
12.	South and Southeast Sulawesi
13.	Maluku
14.	East Nusatenggara
15.	West Nusatenggara
Masjumi
2,251,069	22.8	1,109,742	11.2
3,019,568	33.5	902,387	10.0
1,541,927	22.1	1,844,442	26.4
152,031	19.6	200,460	26.0
213,766	14.6	628,386	43.1
42,558	2.7	797,692	50.7
329,657	14.0	789,910	36.4
64,195	13.7	155,173	33.2
46,440	5.9	252,296	31.9
43,067	25.0	44,347	25.7
102,855	13.6	. 189,198	25.1
46,334	4.15	446,255	40.0
30,218	9.1	117,440	35.4
65,027	5.8	157,972	13.9
464,398	37.1	2β4,719	21.1
N.U.		P.K.I	
3,370,554	34.1	2,299,602	23.2
1,772,306	19.6	2,326,108	25.8
673,552	9.6	. 755,634	10.8
120,667	15.7	96,363	12.0
115,938	7.2	176,900	12.1
71,959	4.6	90,513	5.75
87,773	4.2	258,875	10.8
37,945	8.1	8,526	1.8
380,874	48.6	17,210	2.18
20,795	10.7	8,209	4.76
21,619	2.9	33,204	4.39
159,193	14.3	17,831	1.6
-	-	4,792	1.44
17,684	1.57	5,008	0.45
104,282	8.3	66,067	5.379
B. The Medium-Sised Parties
P.S.I.I.	Parkindo
1.	East Java 2.	Central Java	43,357 60,922	0.43 0.67	36,506 35,652	0.37 0.39
3. West Java	393,174	5.6	14,262	0.2
4. Greater Djakarta	23,245	3.0	17,456	2.1
5. South Sumatra	149,239	10.2	4,696	0.3
6. Central Sumatra	32,753	2.04	8,983	0.51
7. North Sumatra	26,363	1.1	291,319	13.6
8. West Kalimantan	3,030	0.6	-■	
9. South Kalimantan	6,717	0.85	10,642	1.35
10. East Kalimantan	7,401	4.28	2,585	1.5
11. North and Central Sulawesi	173,364	22.9	144,273	19.1
12. South and Southeast Sulawesi	114,798	10.3	118,850	10.6
13. Maluku	11,310	3.41	108,920	32.8
14. East Nusatenggara	23,046	2.05	203,579	18.04
15. West Nusatenggara	7,020	0.5	2,944	0.2
	Katolik		P.S.	I.
1. East Java	13,976	0.14	59,093	0.6
2. Central Java	40,738	0.45	30,819	0.34
3. West Java	6,054	0.08	220,108	3.1
4. Greater Djakarta	7,570	0.9	34,949	4.5
5. South Sumatra	\ 3,817	0.2	21,873	1.5
6. Central Sumatra			24,573	1.37
7. North Sumatra	29,009	1.2	18,229	0.85
8. West Kalimantan	2,505	0.5	15,909	3.4
9, South Kalimantan	484	0.06	5,307	0.67
10. East Kalimantan	4,153	2.41	13,029	7.57
11. North and Central Sulawesi	17,072	2.26	9,292	1.22
12. South and Southeast Sulawesi	9,024	0.81	6,770	0.61
13. Maluku	18,710	5.61	1,458	0.44
14. East Nusatenggara	459,255	40.7	1,476	0.13
15. West Nusatenggara	1,188	0.09	233,371	18.6
	Perti		I.P.K	.1.
.1. East Java	2,078	0.02		*
2. Central Java	—	—	21,233	0.23
3. West Java	3'869	0.05	441,270	6.3
4. Greater Djakarta	542	0.01	14,586	1.9
5. South Sumatra	42,912	2.9	13,560	0.9
6. Central Sumatra	351,768	22.4	6,512	0.42
7. North Sumatra	78,358	3.7	9,688	0.4
8. West Kalimantan	—	—	7,289	1.5
9. South Kalimantan		—	19,383	42.45
10. East Kalimantan	—	—	—	—
11. North and Central Sulawesi	—	—	—	—
12. South and Southeast Sulawesi	—	—	1,679	0.15
13. Maluku	—	—	2,773	0.83
14. East Nusatenggara	3,487	0.31	1,634	0.15
15. West Nusatenggara	-	-	-	-oo
o
ELECTORAL DISTRICTS OF INDONESIA
East Nusatenggara
° V 6
At> f ^Central
V81
Table 5
THE PERCENTAGE OF VOTES OBTAINED
BY THE SIX MAIN RELIGIOUS PARTIES
AND THE FOUR MAIN NON-RELIGIOUS PARTIES
IN THE VARIOUS ELECTORAL DISTRICTS
	Main non-religious parties (P.N.I., P.K.I., P.S.I., I.P.K.I.)	P	Main Moslem parties (Masjumi,N.U., .S.I.I.,Perti)	Christian parties
East Java	46.6	45.75	0.51
Central Java	59.53	30.27	0.84
West Java	42.3	42.1	0.28
Greater Djakarta	38.0	44.71	3.0
South Sumatra	29.1	63.4	0.5
Central Sumatra	10.24	79.74	0.51
North Sumatra	26.05	45.4	14.8
West Kalimantan	20.4	41.9	0.5
South Kalimantan	11.2	81.35	1.41
East Kalimantan	37.33	40.68	3.91
North Sulawesi	19.21	50.9	21.36
South Sulawesi	6.51	64.3	11.41
Maluku	11.81	38.81	38.42
East Nusatenggara	6.53	17.52	58.74
West Nusatenggara	61.0	29.9	0.2982
In a number of the majority Protestant areas, particluarly
North Tapanuli, Minahasa, and Sangir-Talaud, one finds a two-fold
Parkindo-P.N,I. division. The pattern is Masjumi-Parkindo-P.N.I.
in parts of Central Sulawesi and Maluku; and it is Parkindo-Catholic
P.N.I. in some of the eastern islands of East Nusatenggara. Only
one case is to be found of an area with no strong religious party
and that is Hindu Bali with its P.N.I.-Socialist-Communist division.
No Hindu party exists.
Perhaps then one may look at party strengths in Java and the
areas outside Java in terms of two different "ideal type" patterns.
The Javanese pattern, most characteristic of East and Central
Java, and more particularly of the areas of the Javanese ethnic
group (as distinct from the Madurese), is marked by the strength
of non-religious parties. For reasons which have their roots in
the history of Islam in Java as well .as the economic development
of the island and are closely linked to the socio-religious duality
of the self-conscious groups of santri and abangan, religious and
non-religious parties exist side by side in Java; the former some-
what weaker than the latter.
In the areas outside Java (and Bali) the division between re-
ligious and non-religious parties may be seen in terms of the
religious parties having an initial advantage o.ver the non-religious
In terms of this heuristic construction this may be regarded as
having its roots in the non-existence of a self-conscious group of
anti-Moslem Moslems, the equivalent of the Javanese abangan. Thus
social conflicts express themselves as conflicts between rival
religious groups. The actual strength of non-religious parties
in some of the areas outside Java is explained in terms of special
circumstances which cancel out the Moslem parties' initial advant-
age. One such circumstance is the coming together as wage-earners
of large numbers of workers on estates and mines (East Sumatra,
Palembang, Bangka, Pontianak, Balikpapan). Another is the exist-
ence of a group of peasants squatting on former estate lands to
which their legal rights are doubtful and politically exposed (East
Sumatra). Another is the presence of a self-conscious ethnic ...
minority such as the Javanese former contract laborers in East
Sumatra and the Javanese "transmigrants" in Lampong. Yet another
is the existence of an ethnic group like the Karo Bataks of North
Sumatra who are unattracted to any religious party because of
traditional, hostility towards the ethnic groups with which the
religious parties of their region are associated. A final factor
is the existence in a number of areas outside Java of equivalents
of the Javanese santri-abangan duality.
In areas marginal to each of the two patterns,areas like
West Java and South Sumatra, actual party strengths can be examined
fruitfully in terms of either or both of them, and the same is
true of the Protestant areas like North Tapanuli and Minahasa
where the Parkindo shares power with the P.N.I.
What social factors underlie the divisions between Moslem;
parties? It has been suggested that in both East and Central Java83
and Minangkabau there is a certain correlation between the parties
of modernist Islam and urban and economically developed areas, but
that historical factors and the influence of rival schools of
Moslem theology and law may be equally important causes of the
strength of the Masjumi in one area and of one of the conservative
Moslem parties in another. But of course it cannot be supposed that
the Masjumi-N.U. division in Java where the santris live in one
community with the abangan is socially parallel to the Masjumi-N.U.
division in an area like South Kalimantan where there are no
abangan and almost all social conflicts are understood in religious
terms.
The number of different patterns is very great. It has been
suggested that the N.U, is in some areas like East Sumatra associ-
ated with aristocratic groups. In other regions like South
Kalimantan, South Sulawesi and the half-Madurese areas of East
Java, divisions between Moslem parties have been thought to be
parallel to ethnic divisions. How far parties like the Masjumi
and N.U. have attracted the support of social groups of similar
interests in different parts of the country is far from clear.
To a considerable extent certainly it is true that social groups
which chose to associate themselves with one Moslem party in one
part of the country were linked with another Moslem party (or even
the P.N.I.) elsewhere. Where this is the case it is not clear
whether the explanation is to be given primarily in terms of
economic or ethnic tensions between different areas or rather in
terms of the traditional strength of a party or religious or social
organization in a particular area. Needless to say the questions
involved here cannot be answered without detailed study of the
elections returns or close acquaintance with particular regions.
Rationalization of social interests in terms of political
parties is further advanced and more easily detected in the case
of the non-religious parties and more particularly the Communist
Party. But the lines of division are by no means clear. It is
striking that the P.N.I. was more successful than any other non-
religious party in every electoral district outside Java (with the
one exception of Central Sumatra where the P.K.I. vote was slightly
higher, but where neither party gained as much as 6% of the total
vote). Only in North and South Sumatra and Bali did the Communists
establish considerable strength and each of these is an area where
P.N.I. strength is greater.
Is there a causal connection between P.N.I. and Communist
strength in these areas? Does P.N.I. strength, or the situation
which makes it possible, represent a necessary condition for the
establishment of the Communist Party? The presence of estates and
a squatting problem would appear to have been conducive to the
strength of both the P.N.I· and the Communists in East Sumatra, al-
though the point cannot be positively established without a thorough
investigation of the role of the complex pattern of ethnic animosi-
ties in this area. On the other hand other factors mentioned above
as conducive to the strength of non-religious parties in areas out-
side Java, seem to have favored only the P.N.I» For instance there84
appear to be next to no cases where ethnic group tensions opened the
way for Communist strength. Communist support outside Java (and
Bali) came almost entirely from cities and towns, from the areas
of present or former Western-type economic enterprise and some
neighboring areas, and to a minor extent from Protestant areas like
North Tapanuli and Minahasa. P.N.I. strength on the other hand
is found in every area which non-religious parties have succeeded
in penetrating and would appear to be drawn from a wide range of
social groups.
In Java the pattern is substantially different. Not only is
the overall strength of the non-religious parties much greater than
in the areas outside Java, but the strength of the Communist Party
extends far beyond city and plantation areas. The several hypotheses
which have been formulated to explain Communist strength deserve
careful examination.
As Table 6 shows, Communist votes came in greatest numbers
from Central Java and the Western part of East Java, the central
area of Javanese culture. The P.K.I. emerged as the strongest
party in the North coast residency of Semarang and the four South
coast residencies of Jogjakarta, Surakarta, Madiun and Kediri in
all of which the P.N.I. was the second strongest party. All of
these are strongly abangan areas. What are the special social
features of these areas and what relationships obtained there be-
tween the two abangan parties P.N.I. and P.K.I.?
One hypothesis is that Communist strength was greatest in
areas of extreme poverty, agricultural depression and population
pressure. The South Coast areas particularly are dry and in ;
general cannot supply their own rice needs. Another interpretation
stresses not poverty but detraditionalization. Its propounders
point on the one hand to the decline in communal land:ownership,
to landlessness and increasing economic differentiation in the
villages, and on the other hand to the ravages of the Japanese
occupation and particularly of the Revolution, which not only
wrought severe material and economic disruption and social disloca-
tion but also created a large group of unaccommodated youths up-
rooted from village life and not fitted to find employment outside
it. The result of all this, it is argued, has been to sharpen the
class struggle in the village and provide political leaders for
the poor peasants and landless laborers.
Here there is indeed excellent scope for fruitful investiga-
tion; for it is not impossible to find measureable indices of the
poverty, the economic differentiation and the 1945-49 military in-
volvement of different areas. The investigator would attempt to
ascertain to what extent Communist strength came from divided
villages and to what extent from one-party all-Communist ones. He
would be concerned to see how far it is correct to see Javanese
Communism as a purely abangan phenomenon. He would examine the
special conditions prevailing in the areas of East and Central Java
affected by the Madiun-centered abortive Communist revolt of 1948.
Furthermore he would compare the strength of the P.K.I. in kabupatens
which between 1950 and 1955 were under bupatis with a neutrally85
Table 6
THE APPROXIMATE NUMBER (IN 1000’s) OF VOTES
OBTAINED BY THE FOUR MAJOR PARTIES IN EACH RESIDENCY
IN JAVA IN THE PARLIAMENTARY ELECTIONS (See Map) *
	P.N.I.	Masjumi		Nahdatul Ulama	P.K.I
East Java				
1. Besukl	380	150	699	232
2. Malang	- ·	—	—	—
3. Madura	88	134	591	3
4. Surabaja	265	117	431	231
5. Kediri	455	155	366	457
6. Madlun	254	137	92	447
7. Bod j'onegoro	155	300	131	289
Total (Official)	2,251,069	1,109,742	3,370,554	2,299,602
Central Java				
8. Pati	322	48	285	235
9. Surakarta	595	198	45	736
10. Jogjakarta	207	134	99	237
11. Semarang	221	53	370	474
12. Kedu	551	120	470	267
13. Pekalongan	662	138	361	172
14. Ban juntas	630	171	259	237
Total (Official)	3,019,568	902,387	1,772,306	2,326,108
West Java				
15. Tjirebon	330	298	167	162
16. Priangan	478	578	199	332
17. Djakarta	182	269	63	108
18. Bogor	315	416	107	86
19. Banten	104	224	84	9
Total (Official)	1,541,927	1,844,442	673,466	755,693
Greater Djakarta				
20. Djakarta Raja	152	200	121	96
Total (Official)	152,031	200,460	129,667	96,363
* This chart has been	, compiled	from unofficial press reports and		
contains considerable Inaccuracies.RESIDENCIES OF JAVA - MADURA
00
OS
Besuki87
permissive attitude towards Communism, with its strength in
kabupatens where the pamong pradja leadership was actively anti-
Communist. Among the most fruitful comparisons he could make are
ones between selected village areas of Central and East Java on
the one hand and of West Java on the other, and between the Com-
munist-voting cities and towns of Central and East Java and the
Masjumi-voting cities and towns of West Java, including Djakarta.
Many of the questions to be asked as regards the P.N.I.’s
strength in East and Central Java are the same ones in another
form. At least this is the case to the extent that it is correct
to see the strength of the two parties as bounded by the existence
of an abangan-santri line. But this itself is of course only an
abstract ’’ideal type” pattern; the task remains of ascertaining
where and how the reality differs from it. There can be little
doubt that the P.N.I. did compete with the Masjumi and Nahdatul
Ulama in many parts of Java, but it is unclear how far it succeeded
in winning support in strongly Moslem villages.
However some of the most rewarding questions about the P.N.I.
in Java are the ones which compare the area of its strength with
those of Communist strength. Here again one comes immediately to
poverty and the economic and political forces making for detradi-
tionalization. The power of the pamong pradja and other branches
of the government administration is one of the most important
aspects of P.N.I. strength to be measured. What was the importance
of direct bupati and tjamat pressure for a P.N.I. vote as compared
with the attraction of the P.N.I. as a party giving expression to
the social interests and outlook of the aristocratic priai, and in
part of the commoner abangan? And how far can P.N.I. strength be
traced to the personal traditional authority of certain individuals?
Finally one must ask what is to be learned from these compari-
sons of social patterns, about the importance of campaigning. What
social factors can explain why campaigning was more intense in
some areas than others? How long and how intensively had a Moslem
party, the Communists or the P.N.I. to campaign in any particular
area in order to maximize the marginal utility of its election-
eering? How great was the relative importance as a co-determinant
of the election result of the social patterns of particular areas
on the one hand and the campaigning efforts made by parties there
on the other? These questions are keys to an understanding not
only of the elections or the new phenomenon of national politics
at the grassroots level but also of the whole complex of fast and
slow social change which is contemporary Indonesia.
On March 26	1956 the elected parliament was installed and on
November 10th the Constituent Assembly. How much had changed in
the country’s political life?
The new parliament in which 28 parties, organizations and
voters* associations are represented, divided into 17 "fractions"
or parliamentary groups as compared with 20 in the temporary88
parliament.. The main new entities were the ten-member National
Progressive Fraction (Mr. Djody's P.R.N., the national-Communist
Partai Murba and Acoma, the Chinese-Indonesian Baperki, the P.I.R,
oT Mr. Wongsonegoro, and the mystical Permai, Ger'inda and R. Soedjono
Prawirosoedarso), the eight-member Association of Fractions of
Upholders of the Proclamation (I.P.K.I., the Labor Party, Bung
Tomo’s P.R.I. and the West Java organizations P.R.I.M. and P.R.D,)
and the seven-man Fraction for the Upbuilding of the Country (con-
sisting of non-Communist members of P.K.I. candidate lists).
Many of those who had hoped for a radical pruning of Indo-
nesia’s multi-party system were disappointed. Others were satis-
fied to see the clear emergence of four majoi· parties, each very
much stronger than any other pax’ty and together holding 198 of the
new parliament's 257 elected seats.
However even before the new parliament had assembled it was
clear that its composition was somewhat unsatisfactory in another
way, that is as regards representation of the areas outside Java.
The electoral system favored these areas in one respect in that
it created smaller electoral districts outside than inside Java.
But this was more .than counteracted by the system of allocation of
remainder seats, which favored densely populated areas. The result
of this was that 179 members were elected from the electoral
districts on Java which had been allocated the right to choose only
168, and that thinly populated East Kalimantan elected no members
at all. Java with 66.2% of the population received 69.65% of the
seats in Parliament. The outside areas then not only lacked the
guarantees which a second chamber could have provided; they were
also under-represented in terms of population. (59) A large number
of people outside Java felt that their areas were less adequately
represented than in the temporary parliament.
The elected parliament is characterized by its new blood.
Less than a quarter of the members of the new body are men who
sat in the old parliament. Only 88 of the 257 elected members were
residents of Djakarta at the time of candidature, and 89 lived
(59) In ethnic terms the peoples of the areas outside Java (if
they may be taken together) were not under-represented. The
number of persons belonging to one of Java's three ethnic
groups who were elected from one of the electoral districts
outside Java was smaller than the number of persons of ethnic
groups centered outside Java who were elected in electoral
districts in Java. In part this is a result of the marked
under-representation of the Sundanese of West Java; less than
half of this area.'s parliamentary representatives can be
considered Sundanese. But ethnic representation was satis-
factory on the whole. As a re t of internal party arrange-
ments virtually all ethnic groups gained representation in
parliament.δ9
neither in Djakarta nor in the capital of any electoral dis-
trict. (60) The number of M.P.’s with academic titles is somewhat
smaller than in the old parliament, the number of those with Moslem
religious titles much greater. No less than 15 members of the new
body are women, as compared with the 8 women in the temporary
parliament.
Of the legally recognized minorities the group of citizens of
Arab origin gained by election more than the three seats guaranteed
them constitutionally. Those of Chinese origin gained two seats
by election and seven others were later given it by government
appointment to make up the guaranteed total of nine. No candidate
of European origin succeeded in winning an election seat, and so
all of the six seats reserved for this group were filled by
appointment. In addition three men were appointed to sit as repre-
sentatives of West Irian.
The costs of holding the elections were very considerable.
Up to February 29,1956 the Ministries of the Interior and Justice
had allocated Rp. 479,891,729 or more than Rp. 11 per registered
voter. This high figure was reached not only because of heavy ex-
penses for the purchase of materials such as ballot boxes, which
could be used for more than one election, but also because of the
large sums paid to the members of the various multi-party electoral
committees in the form of honoraria. To this must be added the
very large cost of the direct and indirect appropriation of public
funds to which several government parties resorted to defray cam-
paigning expenses. A less important factor is the cost entailed
by the many local administrative delays of various types occasioned
by the preoccupation of local administration with the considerable
additional work which the elections required of them.
What then have the elections achieved? The existence of an
elected parliament has clearly not produced a situation of poli-
tical stability, and the fact that it has not done this has cer-
tainly intensified dissatisfaction with the present political
institutions. But elections have had other consequences hoped
for by the Indonesian leadership. Their value as political educa-
tion was enormous; understanding of national-level politics by the
people of Indonesia's villages was greatly increased. They have
also produced greater understanding of village Indonesia in
Djakarta and exposed a number of political and sociological myths
previously accepted by social planners as well as politicians in
the capital. They have tapped new sources of leadership and
afforded representation to a number of social groups which pre-
viously had none. They have helped to strengthen all-Indonesian
(60) These figures are based on the March 1, 1956 announcements of
the Central Electoral Committee. Certain changes in member-
ship were made by the parties between this date and the opening
of parliament 25 days later, and again after parliament had
begun sitting.90
consciousness, by affording large groups of people a sense of par-;
ticipating in the affairs of the nation. They have also been
valuable from a foreign publicity point of view. The fact that
they were held at all, and that they were carried through success-
fully, represents an important vindication of the case of the· Indo-
nesian nationalists against those who insisted that Indonesians,
were incapable of self-government.
The importance of the social consequences of campaigning or-
ganization in village Indonesia has been stressed above. One
thinks of its effects in legitimizing social conflict within
villages, in undermining traditional authority and creating new
collectivist social entities within detraditionalized villages.
One thinks of it as offering a strong challenge to the social
ideals of status-bound societies traditionally unprepared to
recognize the existence of conflicting interests. One thinks of
the social dislocation caused in some areas by extreme campaigning-
intimidation, promises of land and the like—of the many areas of
great psychological tension, and of the effects of some types of
campaigning in raising hopes for rapid economic and social improve-
ment. It would be difficult to^ssess the congruence of these
various effects with the ends for which elections were intended by
Indonesian nationalist leaders. Yet any assessment of what has
been achieved with the holding of elections must take these import-
ant effects into consideration.
Again it is almost impossible to make any assessment of one
election. For elections are a part of the machinery of a system
of parliamentary government. Whether they are able to exercise
their important control function depends largely on whether one
election is to be followed by another.
The elections of 1955 showed that Indonesia faces a number of
special problems in attempting a fruitful adaptation of the elec-
tions technique. Mention has been made above of great electoral
advantages accruing to parties which are in occupancy of government
power in the period of campaigning. The great difficulties in-
volved in keeping the regional and local apparatus of government
above party politics constitutes a related factor. A further
important way in which the Indonesian elections of 1955 differed
from elections in most Western countries is in the great extent of
the differences between national issues on the one hand and village
level campaign appeals on the other, in the low degree of the
electorate’s sensitivity to political developments at the national
level. Under circumstances like these election results can
scarcely be regarded as representing a verdict from the people on
its government, particularly inasmuch as no one government had been
in office for any considerable length of time and as issues were
seen from the village level as being between a variety of parties
rather than between a government and an opposition.
Again the village situation in which the great majority of
Indonesians live and the fact that these were Indonesia's first
elections made it difficult to achieve secrecy of voting choice,91
particularly on September 29th. Indeed the nexus of binding social
obligations which characterizes most Indonesian villages makes it
misleading to regard voting choices as free in an individual sense.
But there is no fundamental difference here with village situations
in European countries.
The elections have distributed parliamentary strength in a
way which does not accord with the reality of effective power rela-
tionships in Indonesia. They have given parliamentary power to
the parties, or the leadership of the parties, which were able to
establish organizational machinery at the level of the village.
But they leave without parliamentary representation proportionate
to their actual power, and so forced to assert this power in
extra-parliamentary ways, such groups as the army, Chinese
business interests and the army-veteran-business leaders of the
strong exporting areas in Sumatra and Sulawesi. This too has
its parallels in Western countries, but the power of groups such
as these in relation to parliament is greater in Indonesia. The
Indonesian parliament reflects the balance of actual political
strengths in the country hardly more than the veto-less U.N,
General Assembly reflects actual strengths in the world community.
It changes this balance to a certain extent. But extra-parliamentary
political bargaining continues to play a major role.
For all of these reasons the functions of elections in Indo-
nesia must be seen in a different light from that in which they
are seen in the West. But this does not mean that under Indo-
nesian circumstances elections cannot be an effective part of a
system of responsible government. Keen disappointment is felt
in many Indonesian groups because the 1955 elections have not
created political stability. But this could not properly be
expected. Elections could not possibly be the panacea for Indo-
nesia's political ills which many government and party propagandists
claimed they would be. For the central features of Indonesia's
political dynamics are left unchanged by the existence of an
elected parliament. However such a parliament, regarded as a
first step in the nation’s evolution as a democracy, represents
an important achievement.