Policies Affecting Indonesia´ s Industrial Technology Development

After Indonesia in the mid-1980s shifted to export-promoting policies after the end of the oil boom made a continuation of import-substituting industrialisation no longer feasible, it was able to achieve a rapid growth of its manufactured exports, and thereby decrease its traditional dependence on primary exports, particularly oil and gas exports.For this reason the World Bank study on 'The East Asian Miracle' classified Indonesia as one of the three East Asian 'newly-industrializing economies' (NIEs) along with Malaysia and Thailand (World Bank 1993).During the late 1960s and early 1970s Indonesia's rapid industrial growth was initially fuelled by the liberalisation of economic policies, particularly the liberalization of the trade and foreign investment regimes, and the return to normal economic conditions after the political turmoil and economic chaos of the early 1960s.During the oil boom period (1974-81) rapid industrial growth was also facilitated by the import-substituting policies which enabled domestic producers and foreign investment projects to replace imported light consumer goods and consumer durables.However, during the oil boom era the liberal economic policies were largely replaced by more interventionist policies, as the Indonesian government, flush with windfall revenues from the oil booms, initiated an ambitious, second phase import-substituting, state-led industrialization after the 'easy' phase of importsubstitution had been largely completed by the mid-1970s (McCawley