Global COE Program - Kyoto University - In Search of Sustainable Humanosphere in Asia and Africa

Record of Activity＞＞

Date:February 17 (Tue.), 2009  13:00 - 16:30
Venue:Inamori Foundation Memorial Hall, Room number 201


Speakers and Topics:

Dr Pierre Van der Eng (Australian National University)
Government Promotion of Labour-Intensive Industrialisation in Indonesia, 1930-1975

Dr David Clayton (University of York, U.K.)
The Political Economy of Broadcast Technologies in the British Empire, c.1945-1960


 

【Abstract】

Van der Eng
Growth of industrial output for domestic consumption during 1930-75 was significant, but not continuous; growth (1932-41) was followed by decline (1942-46), recovery (1947-57), stagnation (1958-65) and acceleration (1966-75). Protective trade policies triggered growth in the 1930s, when industry policy favoured a balanced development of capital-intensive large and medium-sized ventures and labour-intensive small firms and firms in light industries. The gist of this policy continued during the late-1940s and 1950s, but industry policies increasingly favoured large, capital-intensive state-owned enterprises. By 1960, policies no longer targeted small ventures and labour-intensive industrialisation. After 1966, economic stabilisation and deregulation rekindled the momentum of industrialisation. Although policy interest in the development of small industrial ventures revived in 1975, large-scale labour-intensive industrialisation did start until the mid-1980s.
Key words: Manufacturing industry, Indonesia, industry policy, technological change
JEL-codes: L50, L60, N65
Version 30 September 2008

Clayton
This paper investigates how in 1948 the British Government decided to fund the development of broadcasting in its colonies. It argues the motivations were primarily strategic and social reasons; economic considerations (improving the balance of payments) were secondary. The achievement of these aims was constrained by the Treasury. It refused to grant new money to implement policy; instead the Colonial Office used the existing aid budget to fund the transfer of capital and technologies overseas. This parsimony caused the supply-side shift initiated by 1948 to be slower to take effect, and to be unevenly felt across the British Empire. The distribution of aid finance, and the pattern of government expenditure on radio broadcasting, was skewed: ‘strategic’ areas got more capital.
The policy was a qualified success. Access to wireless radio broadcast technologies improved (the number of listeners rose) and there was now greater control: the main medium of transmission became wireless; Governments and public corporations owned and ran a greater number of radio stations; and there was more broadcasting per week. Core social and strategic aims had been achieved. This success, however, was far from universal. The level of access varied from low to middling to high. Economic aims were only partially achieved: we find that the British balance of payments mainly benefited in terms of capital rather than consumer goods.

【Record of Activity】

The first presentation discussed the degree of progress made in labour-intensive industrialisation in Indonesia from the 1930s to 1975, and promotional measures taken by the Indonesian government during this period. Using estimates, it showed that while policy measures for industrialisation intended to support small and medium-sized industrial industries had existed, for the most part they had failed to be effective, but that the size of small and medium-scale sectors was neither small nor in decline. It could therefore be argued that the basic conditions for the development of labour-intensive industries, which came into bloom after the 1980s, becoming a part of the “East Asian Miracle” (though biased by another factor, the soaring price of oil), had been laid during this long gestation period.

The second presentation, drawing on examples from India and Southeast Asia, discussed ways in which the dissemination of radio broadcasting was promoted in the British Empire, and considered its political, military, economic and social meanings. Behind the British government’s dedication to disseminate radio broadcasting lay a strong tint of political and military “information warfare”, in which the international competitiveness of the BBC was an important element. At the same time, the promotion of radio broadcasting by the British government unintentionally led to a post-war proliferation of local radio stations in Asian languages, as well as the startling increase in exports of radios from Japan. It was suggested that these new forms of “complementarity” contributed to the development of Asia’s infrastructure of communications.
 

(Kaoru Sugihara)