Narrating the Nation: Colonial Memory and Citizen Attitudes in East and Southeast Asia
2025-10-30
The postcolonial world exhibits stark variation in how citizens of formerly colonized states view their former colonizers. Some harbor continuing animosity, while others view former colonizer countries favorably. We argue that this variation can be explained by the type of national narrative postcolonial states construct upon independence. We conduct a comparative historical analysis of three formerly colonized Asian countries—the Philippines under the United States, Korea under the Japanese, and Indonesia under the Dutch—and find that distinct founding national narratives lead to differing contemporary public opinion. The continuity narrative in the Philippines, emphasizing positive aspects of American rule, has led to positive public opinion towards the United States. Korea’s restoration narrative highlights an ancestral, precolonial identity and a revived Korean culture after Japanese colonialism, leading to negative perceptions of Japan. Indonesia’s “new nation” creation narrative casts colonialism as a negative yet peripheral episode in its national story, resulting in neutral perceptions of the Netherlands.