ABSTRACT
This chapter aims to provide a new understanding of the practice of federalism, specifically in the State of East Indonesia (nit). Historians have tended to regard the nit as merely a Dutch initiative to re-establish their position and influence in Indonesia after the proclamation of independence. This chapter, by contrast, highlights the role of those Indonesian elites – nit officials and parliamentarians – who principally had one ultimate goal, namely the unitary state of the Republic of Indonesia. Far from seeing federalism as inherently anti-nationalist, they saw it merely as an initial form of statehood. It was not surprising, therefore, that at various state events they insisted on singing the Indonesia Raya as their national anthem and flying the red-and-white flag as their state flag.
