Who is Balinese and who might not be?

Using the cultural definition of Bali, more than 87 per cent of the island’s present population is Balinese, categorised as Hindu in the 2000 census figures. There are minorities of Muslims (9.7 per cent), Protestants (1 per cent), Catholics (0.8 per cent), and Buddhists (0.5 per cent) concentrated in the urban centres of Denpasar and Singaraja, and in the west. The majority of Buddhists and some of the Christians are probably ethnic Chinese who, under Indonesian law, have been pressured to choose a recognised state religion.

Today a newly prosperous Bali is attracting migrants from other parts of Indonesia and beyond, drawn primarily by employment opportunities. Javanese migrant labour is harvesting rice in south Bali, Roman Catholics from Flores are driving taxis in Denpasar, and Indonesians of all kinds have found work in the tourist industry. In addition, despite the questionable legality of such practice, upscale expatriates are ‘buying’ land and houses in Ubud and elsewhere.

Muslims first came to Bali centuries ago as traders and as military mercenaries in the service of Balinese rulers. They were of diverse origins. There were Arabs from the Hadramaut in modern Yemen, often claiming descent from the Prophet with the title ‘Sheik’ or ‘Sayid’, who circulated throughout the archipelago trading and getting into politics. There were Buginese from Makasar who were both merchants and soldiers for hire. A few were Javanese who, like the father of Indonesia’s first president, Sukarno, were employed as clerks and teachers by the colonial administration. Muslims often formed their own communities, especially in trading centres and around the rulers’ courts. One of the oldest such communities is at Gelgel, the site of an important sixteenthcentury Balinese kingdom, a few minutes’ drive south of Klungkung.

Chinese were trading with Bali from an early period, although Ma-Li gets only passing mention in early Chinese sources. Recent archaeological discoveries suggest that India rather than China was the first and most important trading partner with pre-Hindu Bali. But well before the Dutch conquest the Chinese had established themselves as resident merchants, typically in the service of Balinese rulers or under their protection. They flourished under the Dutch and dominated local trade, but many were driven out of business or forced to operate with Balinese partners during the early independence period.

Strings of Chinese copper coins known as kepeng were the standard of Balinese currency until Dutch times. Today Chinese coins dating to the Tang dynasty and even earlier are readily obtained on Bali, and they remain important for certain kinds of offerings. Chinese influence on Balinese art is obvious, especially in some of the design features of temples and religious regalia, not least the lion-like Barong which manifests the forces of ‘good’ in opposition to the ‘evil’ sorceress, Rangda.

Well before the Kuta bombing in October 2002, the Balinese were nervous about the growing influx of ‘foreigners’ from other parts of Indonesia. But they remained proud of their traditional tolerance of the Chinese and Muslim minorities which have been with them for hundreds of years. Especially in the north, the degree of cultural mingling at the local level between Muslims and Hindus has been substantial and there has been considerable intermarriage. The Balinese relationship with the resident Chinese has been helped by the entrepreneurial aptitude of the Balinese themselves. By and large, and despite the sometimes harsh role of Chinese money lenders during the colonial period, the Balinese have never felt economically marginalised by the Chinese minority.

Christians, both Catholics and Protestants, are a third important and growing minority on Bali. Some are non-Balinese who have moved to the island, while others are Balinese converts whose numbers have increased modestly since the relaxation of Dutch restrictions on missionary activity. Christianity undoubtedly appeals to some Balinese who are offended by caste distinctions, but the cost of conversion, in terms of isolation from family and community ties, can be high.

The fact that many Christians are converts from Hinduism, not historically discrete ‘foreigners’, has no doubt been the main cause of some Hindu-Christian tension evident recently. But it is less significant than the ongoing debate over caste and priestly authority within the Hindu community itself, which is discussed in a later chapter.

There is a fourth important and often misunderstood social category, the Bali Aga or Mountain Balinese. Aga derives from a word meaning ‘mountain’ in the Old Javanese language. The Bali Aga are distinguished by their mountain environment and, in some cases, distinctive village style. They live mainly around the volcanic uplands, but also in the village of Tenganan, a popular tourist destination located near the seaside resort town of Candidasa in eastern Bali and famous for its unique double–ikat textiles.

Too often tourist guides and others depict the Bali Aga as an earlier, older substratum of the population who were conquered by a later wave of orthodox Hindus from the Javanese kingdom of Majapahit and their Balinese followers. In fact, there is no evidence that the ancestors of the Bali Aga arrived on the island earlier than other Balinese. However, there are important religious and kinship distinctions between them and other Balinese, above all the absence of caste.

In the 1930s, anthropologist Margaret Mead chose a Bali Aga village for her field work (Bayunggede, near Lake Batur) because she felt it represented a more essential version of Balinese culture than the wealthier, ceremonial-encrusted communities of south Bali. But in modern times some Bali Aga have come to feel that they are treated as less then wholly Balinese.

How did the distinction between Bali Aga and other Balinese originate? We do not know, but it probably occurred because the ancestors of the Bali Aga were closely associated with the kingdoms which existed before the Majapahit conquest and were never fully subjugated by the new Majapahit rulers and their Balinese heirs. Today the Bali Aga comprise between 2 and 3 per cent of the total population.

Taken from "A Short History of Bali" by Robert Pringle.

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Bali is an island and province of Indonesia. The province includes the island of Bali and a few smaller neighbouring islands, notably Nusa Penida, Nusa Lembongan, and Nusa Ceningan. It is located at the westernmost end of the Lesser Sunda Islands, between Java to the west and Lombok to the east. Its capital, Denpasar, is located in the southern part of the island.

With a population of 3,890,757 in the 2010 census, and 4,225,000 as of January 2014, the island is home to most of Indonesia's Hindu minority. According to the 2010 Census, 83.5% of Bali's population adhered to Balinese Hinduism, followed by 13.4% Muslim, Christianity at 2.5%, and Buddhism 0.5%.

Bali is a popular tourist destination, which has seen a significant rise in tourists since the 1980s. It is renowned for its highly developed arts, including traditional and modern dance, sculpture, painting, leather, metalworking, and music. The Indonesian International Film Festival is held every year in Bali.

Bali is part of the Coral Triangle, the area with the highest biodiversity of marine species. In this area alone over 500 reef building coral species can be found. For comparison, this is about 7 times as many as in the entire Caribbean. Most recently, Bali was the host of the 2011 ASEAN Summit, 2013 APEC and Miss World 2013. Bali is the home of the Subak Irrigation System, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. [wiki]