Nusantara: Difference between revisions
(Created page with "= used by the SEApunk movement, i.e. people like Sam Chua, Venkatesh Rao =Description= From ChatGPT: "Nusantara is an Indonesian and Malay term with historical and modern meanings: In the 13th-15th centuries, during the Majapahit Empire (based in Java), Nusantara referred to a vast archipelagic region under Majapahit's influence. It was a political concept describing territories beyond Java that were part of the empire's tribute system. The term comes from Old Java...") |
No edit summary |
||
| Line 1: | Line 1: | ||
= used by the SEApunk movement, i.e. people like Sam Chua, Venkatesh Rao | '''= used by the SEApunk movement, i.e. people like Sam Chua, Venkatesh Rao, to describe the 'the island world between the seas', i.e. South East Asia''' | ||
=Description= | =Description= | ||
| Line 20: | Line 20: | ||
In Indonesia, Nusantara is a patriotic term symbolizing the unity of the archipelago." | In Indonesia, Nusantara is a patriotic term symbolizing the unity of the archipelago." | ||
=Status= | |||
Chor Pharn: | |||
"Between the marble order of New Rome and the carnival decay of the Anglo-Atlantic, there lies a band of humidity and improvisation that the others mistake for softness. It is not soft. It is osmotic. | |||
Southeast Asia was never built to command. It was built to absorb. Its bureaucracies are light, its kinship heavy; its borders porous, its faiths plural. Empires washed through—Indian, Chinese, Islamic, European, Japanese and now Silicon Valley—and left behind not ruins but sediment. Layer on layer of technique, ritual, and adaptation, compacted. What survives here is not coherence or ideology, but a genius for metabolising contradiction. | |||
Southeast Asia works because it never trusted systems to last. When states were weak, people built networks; when markets failed, families and faiths filled the gap. The result is a civilisation that treats failure as routine, not crisis. | |||
In Indonesia, government programs stall, but small traders and cooperatives keep food and goods moving; resilience comes from improvisation, not policy. When Jakarta’s ports flooded in 2020, small traders shifted their goods through WhatsApp groups and motorbike fleets. Within hours, thousands of riders had built an unofficial logistics chain that kept the city supplied while the official one shut down. No one coordinated it; everyone understood what had to be done. | |||
In the Philippines, kinship and the church substitute for bureaucracy; loyalty and obligation move money faster than banks. | |||
Thailand survives on mood—fast bursts of protest, then negotiated calm; stability comes from knowing when to stop pushing. | |||
Malaysia keeps peace through constant balancing—ethnic quotas, coalition deals, quiet compromises. Nothing is permanent, but nothing collapses. | |||
Outsiders call this corruption or informality. Locals know it as insurance. When global shocks arrive—pandemics, automation, climate disasters—these social circuits absorb the impact. They waste energy, but they prevent total breakdown." | |||
(https://thecuttingfloor.substack.com/p/the-ocean-of-intelligent-infrastructure) | |||
[[Category:Network_Nations]] | [[Category:Network_Nations]] | ||
Latest revision as of 05:44, 12 November 2025
= used by the SEApunk movement, i.e. people like Sam Chua, Venkatesh Rao, to describe the 'the island world between the seas', i.e. South East Asia
Description
From ChatGPT:
"Nusantara is an Indonesian and Malay term with historical and modern meanings:
In the 13th-15th centuries, during the Majapahit Empire (based in Java), Nusantara referred to a vast archipelagic region under Majapahit's influence.
It was a political concept describing territories beyond Java that were part of the empire's tribute system.
The term comes from Old Javanese:
- Nusa = island
- Antara = between or across
Modern Meaning (Indonesia & Malaysia):In contemporary Indonesian and Malay usage, Nusantara broadly refers to the Malay Archipelago, which includes Indonesia, Malaysia, Brunei, the Philippines, Singapore, and sometimes Thailand's southern regions.
In Indonesia, Nusantara is a patriotic term symbolizing the unity of the archipelago."
Status
Chor Pharn:
"Between the marble order of New Rome and the carnival decay of the Anglo-Atlantic, there lies a band of humidity and improvisation that the others mistake for softness. It is not soft. It is osmotic.
Southeast Asia was never built to command. It was built to absorb. Its bureaucracies are light, its kinship heavy; its borders porous, its faiths plural. Empires washed through—Indian, Chinese, Islamic, European, Japanese and now Silicon Valley—and left behind not ruins but sediment. Layer on layer of technique, ritual, and adaptation, compacted. What survives here is not coherence or ideology, but a genius for metabolising contradiction.
Southeast Asia works because it never trusted systems to last. When states were weak, people built networks; when markets failed, families and faiths filled the gap. The result is a civilisation that treats failure as routine, not crisis.
In Indonesia, government programs stall, but small traders and cooperatives keep food and goods moving; resilience comes from improvisation, not policy. When Jakarta’s ports flooded in 2020, small traders shifted their goods through WhatsApp groups and motorbike fleets. Within hours, thousands of riders had built an unofficial logistics chain that kept the city supplied while the official one shut down. No one coordinated it; everyone understood what had to be done.
In the Philippines, kinship and the church substitute for bureaucracy; loyalty and obligation move money faster than banks.
Thailand survives on mood—fast bursts of protest, then negotiated calm; stability comes from knowing when to stop pushing.
Malaysia keeps peace through constant balancing—ethnic quotas, coalition deals, quiet compromises. Nothing is permanent, but nothing collapses.
Outsiders call this corruption or informality. Locals know it as insurance. When global shocks arrive—pandemics, automation, climate disasters—these social circuits absorb the impact. They waste energy, but they prevent total breakdown."
(https://thecuttingfloor.substack.com/p/the-ocean-of-intelligent-infrastructure)