As we noted in the previous Editor's Choice column, we will devote
this semester's columns to showing how anthropology, along with the use of the
Internet, can help us understand ourselves, particularly when our behaviors or beliefs
have the potential to do harm. For example, each day in the world hundreds, if
not thousands of people are killed in military attacks of one kind or another.
Generally we see such events as distant from ourselves, violence that is rooted in
conditions that exist in other parts of the world. Yet, often, the conditions for
these violent acts are not only rooted in our own behavior, but exist in order for us to
benefit. That's the case in the devastation of East Timor.
The History of East Timor (and here)
In 1975, immediately after a visit from American Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and
Vice-President Gerald
Ford, Indonesia, using weapons supplied largely by the United States, invaded the tiny
island of East Timor. During that war, and the occupation that followed, some
200,000 thousand East Timorese lost their lives. In 1999, the government of
Indonesia gave the East Timorese the opportunity to vote whether or not they would remain
a part of Indonesia or be an independent nation. On August 30, 1999, with the United
Nations monitoring the referendum, and with over 98% of the population voting, over
three-quarters of the voters choose independence. On the day after the vote a
militia, armed and trained by the Indonesian army, went on a killing and burning rampage,
literally destroying towns and cities, forcibly evicting hundreds of thousands from the
country and driving hundreds of thousands of others into the mountains. Of a
population of 800,000 people, only some 250,000 are presently accounted for. In
destructive fury the event rivals the killing of
millions in Cambodia in 1975-1979. Why did this happen? Moreover,
how can anthropology and the Internet help us understand why it happened?
The Culture of Capitalism
To begin it helps if we understand the culture of capitalism.
Capitalism as a system for the production, distribution, and consumption of goods is
unrivaled in efficiency. To maximize its efficiency, however, requires freedom of movement of capital (money) and goods from country to
country and region to region. Investors must be able to profit, manufacturers must
be able to buy raw materials and to sell their products. And consumers must be free
to purchase goods in whatever country and region they choose. The freedom of
movement of capital and goods, however, comes at a cost. This is where East
Timor comes in.
Nation-states, such the United States and Indonesia, exist largely
to regulate and promote trade. To accomplish this they need to do at least two
things: first, they must exercise a degree of economic, political, and social control over
those who inhabit their territory. They must, in other words, gain the allegiance of
the citizenry by either persuasion or, if necessary, by force. Second, they must do
whatever they can to keep international markets open for their investors, manufacturers,
and consumers. Thus Indonesia invaded East Timor largely to integrate a remaining
island (and Indonesia consists of hundreds of such islands) into its nation-state,
and, not coincidentally, because of the discovery of oil in the Timor Sea. And the
United States does everything it can to maintain good economic relations with Indonesia,
regardless of the actions of its leaders, to assure that its markets remain open for
American business people and consumers. Thus American business interests that
include Nike’s subcontractor factories, the mines of Freeport-McMoRan, Texaco,
Chevron, and Mobil have continued to profit because of our government's efforts to support
the Indonesian government. With this in mind you can begin to understand the why some
200,000 people have died, why another 500,000 are refugees, and why the entire
infrastructure of East Timor has been destroyed.
Why Should We Care What Happened?
First, these facts explain why the United States
has supported the Indonesian government, supplied arms, help train its military, and
sanctioned the invasion of East Timor. It was not until the massacre of more than 200 East
Timorese by the Indonesian military in 1991 that the United States congress demanded
that the government stop supplying arms and support to the Indonesian military.
Second, it helps explain why the Indonesian government wanted to
hold on to East Timor. It also helps to understand that governmental leaders and
members of the military controlled, as a result of the invasion, extensive
land and business holdings in East Timor, and were and remain reluctant to give them
up.
Third, it helps explain why the United States government was
reluctant to put pressure on the Indonesian government to control the militia or to stop
the destructive rampage, which, by all indications, it could have easily done. "We have myriad interests" in Indonesia, explained State Department
spokesperson James Rubin in one of his daily briefings, "and what our job is is to
try to balance those various interests." "We have a business interest,"
Rubin said in identifying competing U.S. interests in Indonesia. The general
approach of the United States government, even once the post-referendum rampage began was
to go
slow on East Timor.
Finally, it can begin to help us understand our own role in global
events, as well as our responsibilities in rebuilding
East Timor. The destruction of East Timor is not simply a remote event; it is an
act in which we, directly and indirectly, are involved. If we believe that we
live in a representative democracy, if we believe our elected officials are responsible to
us for what they do, and that we, also, are responsible for what they do in our name, then
this is our act. Furthermore, by doing business with and by buying the products of
corporations who profited, and continue to profit from the invasion, occupation, and
destruction of East Timor, we also have benefited.
None of this is understandable without some knowledge of how
anthropology can help explain how the culture of capitalism maintains itself, knowledge
that rarely
is accessible through the mass media, although it is available on the Internet, if you
know where to look.
You can get more information on anthropology and the culture of
capitalism at the editor's Web Site.
