Hamengku Buwono IX of Jogjakarta: From Sultan to Vice President

Abstract

Hamengku Buwono IX (1912–88), regarded by most Indonesians as one of the great founders of the modern Indonesian state, was a cautious pragmatist who used his status as sultan not only to support the republic during the Indonesian Revolution but also to preserve his principality. He showed much political acumen at several key moments throughout his long and complex career. Perhaps his greatest failure, however, was his underestimation of the forces opposing his defence reforms in 1952. Hamengku Buwono leaves a positive but in some ways ambiguous political legacy. His greatest achievement was the survival of hereditary Jogjakartan kingship, and he provided rare stability and continuity in Indonesia's highly fractured modern history. Under the New Order, Hamengku Buwono helped to launch the economy on a much stronger growth path. His position, however, became increasingly equivocal as the repressive and anti-democratic features of Suharto's New Order came to contradict much of what Hamengku Buwono originally stood for. A study of his life helps to illuminate aspects of modern Indonesian history, including the ways in which Indonesian identity was constructed, the relations between major leaders during and after the revolution, and the early phases of the New Order government.1