The Social Organization and Customary Law of the Toba-Batak of Northern Sumatra. by J. C.

Vergouwen
Review by: Robert R. Jay
The Journal of Asian Studies, Vol. 25, No. 4 (Aug., 1966), pp. 803-804
Published by: Association for Asian Studies
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BOOK REVIEWS
Vietnamesecompounds-literary, official,and
technicalterms,especially-originatedin China.
The Chinese modes of compound formation
affected,therefore,the Vietnamesestructure.
One of the highlights of A Vietnamese
Grammaris its chapteron sentencestructure,
surelythe best treatmentof this subjectI have
seen. Another fascinatingsection,especiallyto
our colleaguesin anthropology,is the presen-
tationon termsof kinship and of,address(pp.
294-303). This is very methodicallydone, and
a good chart of kinship terms is included.
Less systematicis the final chapteron "Lexi-
cal Complexities."It is really a collection of
terms and grammaticalfeatures that did not
fit into the categorizationsof the other sec-
tions. Lastly, this text has a very serviceable
index, a particularlyvaluable adjunct to a
book of this sort.
In short,A VietnameseGrammaris a most
welcome contributionfrom a pioneer in the
studyof Vietnamesein America.
FRANK H. TUCKER
The ColoradoCollege
The Social Organizationand CustomaryLaw
of the Toba-Batakof Northern Sumatra.
By J. C. VERGOUWEN. The Hague: Mar-
tinus Nijhoff, I964. XV, 46I. Map, Ap-
pendices,Index. 38 guilders.
The branchof Dutch scholarlyliteratureon
the East Indies known as "adat-law"varies
widely in its value for social scientists.At one
extreme are those studies containing simply
the writer'sown codificationof local custom-
ary understandingsof how disputesshould be
resolved,from material often gathered by ill-
trainedassistantsor weary local officials.Such
studies were usually aimed explicitly at pro-
ducing legal codes that were reasonablyfaith-
ful to local ideas of justice and yet also useful
to European trained jurists. Such studies,
though carriedout for an admirableand diffi-
cult goal, can be used by present-daysocial
scientists only with the greatest caution and
difficulty.
The presentwork by Vergouwen,first pub-
lished in Dutch in I933, happily falls toward
the oppositeend of value. The author entered
Batak land, in I927, already an experienced
civil servantin the Indiesand moreovertrained
This content downloaded from 188.72.126.181 on Tue, 17 Jun 2014 00:29:06 AM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
803
in comparativesociology and law under Van
Vollenhoven at Leiden. He spent three years
among the Toba-Batakas the Europeanhead
of varioushigh courtsused by the Toba-Batak
to secure final judicial decisions on cases in-
volving Toba-Batakcustomarylaw. In addi-
tion, he carriedout personalinvestigationsin
various parts of Toba-Batakcountry to check
for variationand detail in their social organ-
ization and customarylaw.
He begins by analyzingToba-Batakkinship,
first through traditional genealogies, then
through territoriality, and finally through
forms of marriage.There follows a long sec-
tion on religiousconcepts,examinedwith care
and sophisticationin terms of glosses on the
Toba-Bataks'own terms and categories for
these concepts.Thereafterhe concernshimself
with the details of customarylaw on inheri-
tance and on matrimony.
Nowhere is he concerned to achieve uni-
form codification.He is as much interestedin
documenting variations as in pinning down
generallyvalid principles.It is indeed his con-
trol of these variationsthat most impressesthe
modern reader. He often suggests and in
many cases is able to show that these varia-
tions are regular responsesto regional varia-
tions in geography,past history and the dis-
tributionof political power. In his chapteron
"The Corporate Communities,"after distin-
guishing in Batak terms various bases for
corporatecommunity, shown as overlapping,
he fixes those locales where one kind of cor-
porateness predominatedover the others or
conversely where two or three main kinds
happened to coincide. These regional varia-
tions he then seeks to relate to apparentdif-
ferencesin settlementhistory,populationden-
sity and geography, and these in turn he is
able to argue link up with variationslocallyin
the organizationof chieflypower.A keen sense
for variationand for its value in drawing out
system from the diverse, rather confusing
Toba-Batakdata appearsconsistentlythrough-
out this work and unfolds promisinglines for
comparisonwith similar locales elsewhere in
SoutheastAsia, notablywith Edmund Leach's
Kachin of Highland Burma, where similar
patternsof kinship and marriageappearand
comparablevariationsin local social organiza-
tion and chiefly power have been correlated
 804
with differencesin geography,settlementhis-
tory, and ecology.
A concluding chapter on the settlementof
disputes, plus appendices giving additional
case historiestaken from local newspapersand
other contemporaryindigenous sources, serve
to place his earlier materialin terms of actual
process.The entire work representsthe Dutch
traditionof adat-lawstudies at its best, which
is very good indeed.
ROBERT R. JAY
London, England
Malaysia. A Survey. Edited by WANG GUNG-WU.
New York: Frederick A. Praeger, I964.
466. Maps, Charts, Bibliography, Index.
$I2.50.
The creation of an independent and sover-
eign Malaya on August 3I, I957, was the suc-
cessful culmination of a peaceful although
vigorous struggle by nationalist leaders and
organizations. It was also one more experi-
ment with parliamentary democracy in South-
east Asia. The new state had numerous liabili-
ties: traditional as well as colonial legacies of
authoritarian government, a large police force
with almost unlimited power, a plural society
of classic proportions, a communist rebellion,
and only a handful of men knowledgeable of
and committed to parliamentary practices. But
there were important assets, too: a prosperous,
efficient and expanding economy, a well estab-
lished and politically secure entrepreneurial
class, experienced and broad-minded political
leadership, a trained and experienced civil
service, a close and good relationship with the
former metropolitan power, and a high and
growing level of literacy. The first years of
Malaya's independence saw numerous achieve-
ments especially in respect to economic devel-
opment and the expansion of social services.
Malaya's success coupled with the need to
find a solution to the political problems of
Singapore as well as to provide for the disposi-
tion of the British Borneo territories led to the
creation of Malaysia on September i6, I963. It
was not the result of popular demand but
rather was an arrangement between the politi-
cal principals aimed at staking out a wider
and stronger claim for democratic institutions.
Internal political stresses and longer-term eco-
This content downloaded from 188.72.126.181 on Tue, 17 Jun 2014 00:29:06 AM
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JOURNAL OF ASIAN STUDIES
nomic problems complicated by Indonesian
opposition raised doubts in the minds of
some about the likelihood of Malaysia'ssur-
vival. The separationof Singaporeon August
9, I965, was the resultof inabilityto cope with
internalpolitical stress. It was a stunning but
not necessarilya fatal blow.
The idea that the formation of Malaysia
was an attempt to stake out a wider and
stronger claim for democraticinstitutions in
SoutheastAsia is one of the most important
observationsof ProfessorWang Gung-wu in
his excellentintroductionto the volume under
review. The twenty-six essays which follow
providean introductionto most of the political
and economic problems of what Professor
Wang calls Malaysia's"multistatesystem and
multiracialsociety."One can criticize this or
that articlefor having omitted some important
fact, for having failed to discussadequatelyor
boldly a particularproblem or issue, or for
lacking a clear style of writing. Nevertheless,
the book is on the whole a good one. Most of
the authorsare membersof the faculty of the
University of Malaya or the University of
Singaporeand thus they write with sympathy
and understandingas well as scholarlyexper-
tise.
The essays in part one, "Natural and Hu-
man Structure"and in part two "The His-
torical Background"are generally well done.
Most notable, either becauseof new informa-
tion providedor becauseof interpretation,are
articlesby Hamzah Senduton "Urbanization"
and Anthony Short on "Communismand the
Emergency."In part three, Victor Purcell's
article on the Chinese shows haste and a lack
of intimateknowledgeof recentdevelopments.
The essay by MohammedTaib bin Osman on
Malay literatureis particularlygood and use-
ful. It is one of the few essays in the book
which approaches an original contribution.
The five essaysin part four, "The Economy,"
provide an excellent statementof the present
conditionof agricultureand mining as well as
a brief statement on economic development.
Unfortunatelythe subject of industrialdevel-
opment is omitted and almost nothing is said
of the need for and problemsof ruraldevelop-
ment. Part five, "Politics and Government,"
taken as a whole is the best in the entire vol-
ume. Articles by R. S. Milne, K. J. Ratnam,