Throughout history and throughout most major regions of the world, the expansion of agricultural land has served as a tool of population redistribution and has also played a key role in the formation and consolidation of States. This appears particularly true in twentieth-century Southeast Asia, as can be observed from case studies of the Philippines, Indonesia, Vietnam and Thailand developed in this article, and may contribute to the originality and dynamism of State formation in the region.

This article documents the shifting identity over time of a single Malaysian ethnic minority, the Portuguese Eurasian community of Malacca. Through a close examination of three pivotal historical moments (1952, 1969, and 1995), it shows how cultural phenomena (in this case, music and dance) play key roles in the projection of new public images.

Throughout Sukarno's long and colourful political career, China constituted one of the central objects in his construction of the outside world. What did the PRC stand for in his intellectual and political imagination? How relevant was Sukarno's China perception to the evolution of his own socio-political thought? This paper suggests that Sukarno's favourable view of the PRC reflected more of his predispositions about Indonesia than it did Chinese realities. China as seen through Sukarno's eyes became the point of reference for both intellectual judgement and political thinking. Furthermore, Sukarno employed his perception of China as a cultural metaphor, social symbol, and political model in his drive to establish and consolidate the Guided Democracy regime.

This article describes the communal associations of the “Dayak” communities in Sarawak, and their functions of relating to the state and articulating local interests of the indigenous minorities. The significance of communal associations to the ethnogenesis of indigenous peoples is considered as well. Overall, communal associations are useful for projecting the presence of indigenous peoples in a communally stratified nation-state.

The popular interpretations of the end of Spanish colonial rule in Negros Occidental, Philippines, are closely intertwined with Masonic-related imageries that suffused the colony's export-oriented economy in general and the province's sugar industry in particular. Through an investigation of folklore as a bearer of historical consciousness, it is argued that the elite-led one-day uprising that led to Spain's downfall in the province contained a mythical dimension that helped solidify the dominance of the local sugar planter class.

The recent rebuilding of the house of the clan from which a “king” of Manggarai was chosen during direct Dutch rule on the island of Flores in the Indonesian archipelago has brought to light several different histories of that clan's rise to power and the meaning of the house in those histories. This paper explores the contestation over both time and place in Todo, Manggarai, relating them to people's present-day concerns.

Drawing upon data from the Seram Laut and Gorom archipelagoes, this paper examines how contemporary rulers legitimate their rights by asserting links with sources of traditional authority. In particular, it is argued that archaic titles remain important because the colonial period stabilized the relationship between domains, and because such titles thus provide a means of validating claims to resources, combating state incursions and competing for influence. The possession of old documents supports such claims by confirming them in writing, but also by being old “things” linked to the person of the ruler.

This study of the Agricultural Bank of the Philippine Government, which was established in 1908 to provide agricultural loans to local fanners, describes the background of bank, focusing on the active role of the local elite. Then, it discusses to what extent the bank served the needs of landlords, and why it stopped operations in 1916, facing a shortage of capital.

The article reassesses the economic role of the late colonial state in Malaya. It seeks to dispel the view that the colonial government served British business interests, and that broad-based development policies only followed independence in 1957. Rather the developmentalist orientation of the state began earlier in the 1940s, and was not fully in accordance with existing economic interests.

This paper examines the main factors behind the rise and decline of the Japanese fisheries based in Singapore before the Pacific War, and shows that, as the fisheries contributed greatly to the Singapore economy, they did not constitute a foreign economic enclave in the British colony. It also describes how the Japanese and local fishermen conducted fisheries during the period from 1942 to 1945, and argues that the legacy of the Japanese fisheries outlived the Japanese occupation.

The dominant indigenous community of Sabah, East Malaysia, came late to the process of imagining itself as a modern political community. Its difficulties in identifying an acceptable name, boundaries and symbols for itself since entering Malaysia in 1963 provide an interesting case study of identity formation without the benefit of a long written tradition.

Holy men were respected leaders in early Thai and Lao society. As Thai society became more complex, traditional holy men disappeared, to be replaced by modern charismatic monks. But, in Southern Laos and the Khorat Plateau, holy men found a new role as leaders of protest movements.

An examination of Japanese efforts to gain the cooperation of the intrinsically hostile, but economically vital Overseas Chinese community in Thailand, this article also focuses on the impact of the Japanese wartime presence on the troubled relationship between the Chinese and the Thai authorities, and the success of Chinese entrepreneurs in turning adversity to advantage.

This article traces the development of Gaullist and British policies with respect to Indo-China from the fall of France in 1940 to the end of the Far Eastern war five years later. Directed toward restoring imperial influence in Southeast Asia, these policies were sophisticated and complex, but they bore little fruit owing to the relative strategic insignificance of Indo-China during this period, and the imperatives of Anglo-American relations.