Abstract
At the 1955 Asia-Africa conference held in Bandung, Indonesia, Indonesian President Sukarno actively promoted the concept of Afro-Asian solidarity. Until he was ousted in 1966, Sukarno was a leading figure in efforts by developing nations to chart a third way in the polarisation of the Cold War. Sukarno suggested postcolonial nations would be a new and important voice in world politics and would become the foremost critics of imperialism and global inequities. Although there is a growing literature on the Bandung conference (Mackie 2005, Tan & Acharya 2008, Finnane & MacDougall 2010), scholars are only beginning to examine the connections formed across Asia and Africa in the 1950s and 60s beyond the level of elites (see Lee 2010). Perhaps due to the contemporary emphasis on regional blocks and the tendency to study national history the new networks forged during the critical decade of 1955-65 between political activists from Asia, Africa and Middle Eastern committed to full decolonization and opposition to imperialism have not been fully appreciated. In this paper, we re-examine the ideals of Afro-Asian solidarity articulated at Bandung and trace how the conference inspired renewed grassroots campaigning for decolonization. Drawing on interviews and archival research, we analyze how organizations founded in the wake of Bandung, such as the Afro-Asian People’s Solidarity Organization and its affiliates, took up the ideals of Afro-Asian solidarity and the involvement of Indonesians in these organizations.
Original language | English |
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Title of host publication | Bandung, Global History, and International Law |
Subtitle of host publication | Critical Pasts and Pending Futures |
Editors | Luis Eslava, Michael Fakhri, Vasuki Nesiah |
Place of Publication | United Kingdom |
Publisher | Cambridge University Press |
Chapter | 9 |
Pages | 161-176 |
Number of pages | 16 |
Edition | 2017 |
ISBN (Electronic) | 9781316414880 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - 2017 |