An anatomy of worldmaking: Sukarno and anticolonialism from post‐Bandung Indonesia

Abstract

AbstractThis article analyzes the anticolonial worldmaking of postcolonial Indonesia's first president Sukarno, during Guided Democracy (1959–1965). Using worldmaking as a conceptual interface, the article offers three interconnected interventions. First, Sukarno's range of anticolonial activity allows for a conceptual advance by revealing three dimensions of worldmaking: discursive, institutional, and dramaturgical. This typology works towards arresting worldmaking's conceptual overextension without sacrificing its generative character. Second, it integrates Southeast Asian trajectories of worldmaking into scholarly discussion of anticolonial political thought. Contrary to other anticolonial figures, Sukarno's worldmaking revolved around a postcolonial vision of global order outside the United Nations. By analyzing Sukarno's contextually specific vision of the relationship between international organizations and decolonization, this article underscores the importance of sensitivity to situated understandings of anticolonialism. Third, this article reorients Sukarno scholarship by inter alia resituating him within the Third World. The article closes by laying out some contradictions of Sukarno's anticolonial worldmaking project.