Leiden University Student Repository

Kamila, Raisa 2017

"The Disobedient Uleebalang: Sarekat Islam and Colonial Civil Rule in Aceh, 1918-1923"

Master thesis | History (MA)

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This thesis will argue that the collaboration between local elites in Aceh, the uleebalang, and the Dutch colonials after the establishment of civil governance in 1918 was an uneasy one. In...Show moreThis thesis will argue that the collaboration between local elites in Aceh, the uleebalang, and the Dutch colonials after the establishment of civil governance in 1918 was an uneasy one. In contrast with existing historiography that depicted the position of uleebalang merely as the henchmen of the colonial authorities, this thesis will examine a specific event, that is the involvement of several uleebalang in North Aceh into the mass organization Sarekat Islam (Union of Islam) in the 1920s, to provide new insight into the nature of the collaboration and the making of modern political life in Aceh. In brief, this case presented anxiety and distrust of Dutch officials towards their local collaborator, the uleebalang, due to their activity in Sarekat Islam. By focusing on 1918-1923, this thesis attempts to analyze how Aceh was integrated into the colonial administration of the Dutch East Indies by means of collaboration with its local elites, the uleebalang. Rather than looking at the selected events of Sarekat Islam in North Aceh merely as local dynamics as previous research has done, this thesis will discuss the connection between local events with wider networks of anti-colonial resistance in the Dutch East Indies between 1918-1923. In doing so, this thesis aims to fill the gap in the historiography of colonial Aceh in its early years of civil rule while also contributing to the historiography of colonial civil administration of the Dutch East Indies.Show less