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Ruth McVey

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Ruth Thomas McVey (born October 22, 1930)[1] is an American scholar of Indonesia and Southeast Asia known especially for her writings on Communism and the Indonesian Communist Party.[2] With Benedict Anderson, she co-wrote the Cornell Paper, a 1966 work which examined the failed September 30 Movement in Indonesia. She has written and edited a number of books about Indonesian and Southeast Asian politics, including The rise of Indonesian communism (1965) and The Soviet view of the Indonesian revolution (1969).

Biography

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McVey was born in Allentown, Pennsylvania in 1930.[2] She attended Catasauqua High School, graduating in 1948.[3] She then did a Bachelor of Arts at Bryn Mawr College with a focus in Russian language, graduating in 1952.[3] She then got a Fulbright scholarship to study at the University of Amsterdam.[4]

She studied political science at Harvard University, finishing her Master's degree in 1954 as a specialist on the Soviet Union.[5] However, she soon switched the focus of her research from Russia to Indonesia, enrolling at Cornell University. McVey was part of a cohort of American academics who went to Jakarta to study the national politics of Indonesia starting in 1958; this included also Frederick Bunnell, Dan Lev, and Mary Somers.[6] In 1961, she finished her PhD dissertation at Cornell titled "The Comintern and the Rise of Indonesian Communism."[7] During that time she was also involved in the founding and operating of the journal Indonesia.[8]

In the fall of 1965, when the failed September 30 Movement coup changed the trajectory of Indonesian politics and initiated a violent retaliation from the Indonesian military, she was a researcher at the Cornell University Modern Indonesia Project.[9] Along with fellow Cornell scholar Benedict Anderson, and with research assistance from Fred Bunnell, she wrote one of the first major English-language analyses of the events, a 162-page report entitled A Preliminary Analysis of the October 1, 1965, Coup in Indonesia (more commonly known as the Cornell Paper).[10] They wrote the paper at Cornell by studying newspaper reports coming out of Indonesia, radio broadcasts, and communications with friends who were still in the country.[9] They finished the report in January 1966; although it was marked "confidential" and only meant to be circulated among colleagues, it was soon being widely reproduced and read by diplomats and even Indonesian army officers.[9] The paper caused a diplomatic stir; McVey was accused by anti-communists of being sympathetic to the Indonesian Communist Party and Anderson was banned from entering Indonesia.[9][10]

She later became increasingly disillusioned with the American role in the academic study of Southeast Asia and its focus on "development" in the context of the Cold War; she left Cornell for the SOAS University of London in 1969 due to her opposition to U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War.[5][11][12] She has since relocated to Montisi, Italy, where she lives on an Olive oil farm.[13]

Selected publications

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  • Bibliography of Soviet Publications on Southeast Asia (1959)
  • The rise of Indonesian communism (1965)[14]
  • Indonesia (1967, as editor)[15]
  • The Soviet view of the Indonesian revolution: a study in the Russian attitude towards Asian nationalism (1969)[16]
  • The social roots of Indonesian communism (1970)[17]
  • Southeast Asian capitalists (1992, as editor)[18]
  • Redesiging the Cosmos: Belief Systems and State Power in Indonesia (1993)
  • Southeast Asia Studies: Reorientations (with Craig J. Reynolds, 1998)
  • Money & power in provincial Thailand (2000, as editor)[19]

References

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  1. ^ McVey, John B. (7 May 2020). "Dr. Ruth Thomas McVey". Prominent People Tied to Hopkin Thomas. Retrieved 23 September 2021.
  2. ^ a b "Ruth T(homas) McVey.". Gale Literature: Contemporary Authors. Gale. 2001. Retrieved 2021-07-01.
  3. ^ a b "BRYN MAWR GRADUATE". The Morning Call. ALLENTOWN, PENNSYLVANIA. 1952-06-05.
  4. ^ "Young Catasauqua Miss to Study on Fulbright Scholarship Abroad". The Morning Call. ALLENTOWN, PENNSYLVANIA. 1952-08-17.
  5. ^ a b Bootsma, N. (1995). "The discovery of indonesia; western (non-dutch) historiography on the decolonization of Indonesia". Bijdragen tot de Taal-, Land- en Volkenkunde. 151 (1): 1–23. doi:10.1163/22134379-90003053. hdl:2066/28953. JSTOR 27864626. S2CID 73690272.
  6. ^ Anderson, Ben (1990). "Looking Back". Indonesia (50): 1–3. doi:10.2307/3351227. ISSN 0019-7289. JSTOR 3351227.
  7. ^ The Comintern and the rise of Indonesian communism. 1961. OCLC 18769487. Retrieved 1 July 2021 – via WorldCat.
  8. ^ Anderson, Benedict R. O'G. (2015). "Origins of Indonesia and the Sustenance of Its Excellence, 1966–2015". Indonesia (100): 5–8. doi:10.5728/indonesia.100.0005. ISSN 0019-7289. JSTOR 10.5728/indonesia.100.0005.
  9. ^ a b c d Kammen, Douglas (2017). "World Turned Upside Down: Benedict Anderson, Ruth Mcvey, and the "Cornell Paper"". Indonesia. 104 (1): 1–26. doi:10.1353/ind.2017.0008. hdl:1813/57118. S2CID 165882795.
  10. ^ a b Anderson, Benedict R. O'G. (1996). "Scholarship on Indonesia and Raison d'Etat: Personal Experience". Indonesia (62): 1–18. doi:10.2307/3351389. hdl:1813/54092. ISSN 0019-7289. JSTOR 3351389.
  11. ^ McVey, Ruth (2015). "Many Happy Returns". Indonesia (100): 25–27. doi:10.5728/indonesia.100.0025. ISSN 0019-7289. JSTOR 10.5728/indonesia.100.0025.
  12. ^ McVey, Ruth (1995). "Change and Continuity in Southeast Asian Studies". Journal of Southeast Asian Studies. 26 (1): 1–9. doi:10.1017/S0022463400010432. ISSN 0022-4634. JSTOR 20071696. S2CID 163051503.
  13. ^ Marchant, Valerie (3 December 2000). "MONTISI, ITALY". Time. Retrieved 1 July 2021.
  14. ^ The rise of Indonesian communism. Cornell University Press. 1965. OCLC 265254.
  15. ^ Herbert Feith (1967). Ruth Thomas McVey (ed.). Indonesia. New Haven: Hraf Press. OCLC 1071149863.
  16. ^ The Soviet view of the Indonesian revolution: a study in the Russian attitude towards Asian nationalism. 1969. OCLC 2605322.
  17. ^ The social roots of Indonesian communism. 1970. OCLC 211446.
  18. ^ Southeast Asian capitalists. 1992. OCLC 1037946794.
  19. ^ Money & power in provincial Thailand. 2000. OCLC 801412957.
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