Making them Indonesians: Child transfers out of East Timor

This thesis is a history of Indonesian colonialism in East Timor told through the lens of East Timorese children transferred to Indonesia. During the Indonesian occupation of East Timor, between 1975 and 1999, individuals and institutions representing the occupying power transferred many East Timorese children and young people to Indonesia to receive an Indonesian education. Among them were approximately four thousand young, dependent children. The story of the transfers provides a rich and textured insight into the socio-cultural aspect of the Indonesia-East Timor relationship. This dimension is often missing in the academic literature on East Timor, which has been mainly concerned with the “big issues”—politics, security, international relations and human rights. The thesis is also a history “from below,” of the marginalised and weak whose perspective is often ignored in accounts of national histories. From the transfers we learn of East Timorese taking up the many generous educational opportunities offered by the Indonesians, opportunities denied to most East Timorese during the Portuguese colonial era. The transfers reveal Indonesians from all backgrounds showing compassion towards destitute and vulnerable East Timorese children, some of whom would have died had they not been taken in by Indonesians. Some of the children were adopted and lovingly raised in homes in Indonesia, while others were cared for in state-run or religious institutions. However, the transfers also expose the patronising attitudes of many Indonesians who regarded the East Timorese as backward and primitive. The Indonesians were so sure of their good intentions that they justified delivering development, including transferring children, often in breach of the rights of the East Timorese: some children were taken against their wishes; some parents were coerced or forced to hand over their children; some children were abused and neglected in their adoptive homes and in the institutions caring for them. Further, Indonesia’s proclaimed altruism in developing the territory was underpinned by other motives, as is exemplified by the transfers, in which political, ideological, personal, religious and economic motives, not humanitarian concern alone, were key factors. The refusal of the international community to recognise Indonesia’s claim over East Timor played a significant role in leading Indonesians to demonstrate their concern to develop East Timor, which included providing educational opportunities and caring for destitute children in their homes and institutions. However, the Indonesian authorities also hoped that these East Timorese students and children, raised in Indonesia as Indonesians, would contribute to affording legitimacy to integration. The thesis highlights the appropriation of vulnerable and dependent children in political projects of control; in themselves the children embodied the aim of the Indonesians for all East Timorese—namely, to make them Indonesians. The thesis is the first attempt to provide a detailed account and analysis of these child transfers. Besides providing a set of new data, it is an example of the multifaceted nature of colonial relationships and the ambiguities and complexities they embody. The story also continues to be important in this post-colonial era as it enriches our understanding of the new relationship that is developing across an entirely different border, between newly-democratic Indonesia and independent East Timor