Response paper to Indonesia Accuse! (Theories of Religion and Society)

Soekarno’s concept of Imperialism and Capitalism is good thesis for recognizing the order of the world in the past and now. Soekarno said that there is an old and new imperialism in the world which has no difference because the aim is same, exploitation. The exploitation is the key for recognizing the same thing between imperialism and capitalism. In old imperialism, Many countries which do imperialism just use a way to colonize the land or country, but in new imperialism they will use not only to colonize the land or country but also mastering all of the resources there and try to master it as long as possible.

The condition of here and now is similar when the order of the world is just facing one side, a new capitalism. In this case, the imperialist is not only such as country, but wider than before like banking organization and Multinational Corporation who has many jobs and employs thousand of labors in the world. In other word, the new imperialism not only master our land or country, but also mastering all whole of our life.

Soekarno based on his argument from Karl Marx philosophy about materialism. One of the interesting analyses for Marx is about human alienation. Human has alienated from their environment, product, the others and themselves. Human does not know about their life at all. They are like a machine, who just work for their master, the imperialist. For me, this analysis is very useful now, when many factories arise, and mass media or TV has their own job to cheat human from their real life.

 Now, we can learn one thing from Soekarno’s speech that all of the order of the world are systematized based on one interpretation, an imperialism era. It will trigger us to make critical analysis and make a new movement for fighting back.