Summary
ASPECTS OF THIRD WORLD DEVELOPMENT IN THE EARLY 21ST CENTURY
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Extract
Founding propositions unto a nation-state contrastings of Indonesia and Pakistan: a personal essay.
PREFATORY NOTE
In the first week of January 1957 I was on a Pan-American flight from Singapore to Djakarta seated next to a remarkable Indonesian scholar and nationalist, S. Takdir Alisjahbana, who was returning from a three week visit to Pakistan. I was undergoing transformation from a provincial Rocky Mountain American into a cosmopolitan Asian American, wearing the mantle of a U.S. Foreign Service officer of high middle rank in the U.S. Agency for International Cooperation (US/ICA) now the U.S. Agency for International Development (US/AID). My handler in Washington, D.C., a World War II veteran of Japanese military government, wisely scheduled stopovers in Far East and Southeast Asian countries where technical assistance projects in public administration were established. Included were Seoul, Korea; Manila, Philippines, and Bangkok, Thailand. I also spent time in Tokyo, Hongkong and Singapore. In this time of orientation my most valuable experience was the three hours seated next to a Minangkaban Indonesian of high birth, Professor S. Takir Alishajbana. He was near fifty years of age and spoke with confidence and authority. During our visit he stated that although Indonesia had grave problems, opportunities existed for the nationalists to write a new history resting on ancient greatness. In contrast he was not certain about Pakistan. Unlike Indonesia which had vibrant local histories, he could not find the same in Pakistan. He deplored the division of the British-Indian Raj with the great monuments of Islamic civilization resting under Hindu and not Muslim control. A society's future is vested in its culture, Professor Alisjahbana asserted. Move ahead a near five years. In August 1961 I departed Indonesia after an intensive learning experience. I gained a command of bahasa Indonesian, the national language, and a working knowledge of the Dutch language. I struggled with the Javanese language with its class/caste structure. To master its subtleties it would be necessary to become deeply immersed in the complex Javanese culture. That I tried. Nevertheless, there was too much cultural substance for me to gain mastery of the language. Besides there was the matter of birth, in spite of ascriptive limitation, I became somewhat a priyayi (aristocratic class) of high birth. After five years in Indonesia I was professionally drained dry. I was eager to return to the American academic world. Fortunately I secured a position with the School of Public Administration, University of Southern California (USC), part teaching and part director of the US/AID funded Pakistan project in providing technical assistance in public administration education. After three years on the Los Angeles campus in fall 1964 I went to Pakistan as Project Director assigned to Lahore and later became Chief of Party. From my first days with the Pakistan project I remembered my conversation with Professor Alisjahbana. In contrast with his negative view of Pakistan I gained a contrary one. Unlike Indonesian nationalists Pakistanis held with pride their British-Indian imperial past. In both the military and higher civil services Britishers were working side by side with Pakistanis. The imperial structure with its law and order and justice character was being retained. Move ahead nine years to September 1969. While in Pakistan in July 1967 I resigned from USC and rejoined US/AID as Chief of the Public Administration Division. In September 1969 I took a leave of absence from US/AID to intellectually renew myself as a Senior Scholar at the Institute of Advanced Projects, East-West Center, Hawaii. My primary intent was to undertake a compara...See the full content of this document
