Pekalongan
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Pekalongan is a city and regency on the northern coast of Central Java, Indonesia. The city is Central Java's most important port, and is known for its batik.
Pekalongan became a part of the empire of the Sultanate of Mataram through treaty and marriage alliances by the early seventeenth century. The area was on the geographic periphery of the empire, which was based in interior central Java. However, it was a wealthy area, and by the end of the seventeenth century, the substantial money and produce it sent to the center made it a key part of Mataram's realm. The area went into economic decline during the 1700s, and the Dutch East India Company began to gain substantial influence over the area's political and economic life. The Dutch built a fort in the city in 1753 which still stands.
From the 1830s, the Pekalongan area became a major producer of sugar. Sugarcane had been grown in the area before then, but production expanded substantially during the mid-nineteenth century due to Dutch efforts. Initially, production was boosted through compulsory corvée labor; the Dutch colonial government took advantage of longstanding Javanese expectations that the peasantry contributes a part of their labor to the state. Between the 1860s and the 1890s, this system was phased out, and workers were paid directly. The colonial sugar industry collapsed during the Great Depression of the 1930s, but sugar remains a key export of the area in independent Indonesia.
In late 1945, during the Indonesian National Revolution, the Pekalongan area was the site of a peasant rebellion, which ejected local government leaders that had cooperated with the Japanese occupation of Java, replacing some with former leaders of the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) of the 1920s. The rebellion was briefly effective, but short-lived; by the end of 1945, supporters of the Republican forces that eventually gained control of the independent Indonesian government forced out the peasant leaders.
The city is known for its batik. The dyed fabric is produced both by hand in small-scale shops, and printed in larger factories. A mainstay of the economy, the industry collapsed during Indonesia's economic crisis in 1998, but it has partially recovered since.
References
- Knight, G.R. (1995) Gully Coolies, Weed-Women and Snijvolk: The Sugar Industry Workers of North Java in the Early Twentieth Century. Modern Asian Studies 28(1):51-76.
- Ricklefs, M.C. (1986) Some Statistical Evidence on Javanese Social, Economic and Demographic History in the Later Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries. Modern Asian Studies 20(1):1-32.
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