Firas A.

ISM IB2 – A 06/07

IB Geography
Option: Globalization and Tourism

Impact of globalization on the indigenous population of

Ubud, Bali, Indonesia

This investigation about the impact of globalization on the indigenous population of Ubud,
Bali, Indonesia, will cover the following aspects:

 Economic
 Media
 Tourism
 Religious
 Political influences

The coverage of the above mentioned issues provides a detailed picture of which forces are
leading to changes in the indigenous population of Ubud and give sufficient information about
the balance of influences which cause these changes. Before going into discussing the impact
of globalization on the indigenous population of Ubud, I will put this report into geographical
context.

Ubud is a town in central Bali, Indonesia, considered the arts and culture centre of the island.
Ubud has a population of about 8,000 people, but it is becoming difficult to distinguish the
town itself from the villages that once surrounded it.

Ubud is the largest town in Bali to (try) to maintain traditional Hindu culture. It is a 'green'
town, with a profusion of flowers, plants, palms, and the occasional rice field. Fauna include
green tree vipers, pythons, coconut snakes (widely believed by the Balinese to eat coconuts),
and the odd lumbering monitor lizard.

The main street is Jalan Raya Ubud, which runs east-west through the center of town. Two
long roads, Jalan Monkey Forest and Jalan Hanoman, extend south from Raya Ubud. Puri
Saren Agung is a large palace located at the intersection of Monkey Forest and Raya Ubud
roads.

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 Firas A. ISM IB2 – A 06/07

The home of the last "king" of Ubud was also one of Ubud’s first hotels (dating back to the
1930s), his descendants currently live there and dance performances are held in its courtyard.
Monkey Forest Park is a small nature reserve located near the southern intersection of Jalan
Monkey Forest and Jalan Hanoman. It houses a temple and over 200 monkeys, mostly
macaques.

Nearby Ubud is the Ayung River, home to many upmarket hotels like the Four Seasons. Ubud
is located at 8°31′12″S, 115°15′36″E.1

This is a map showing Ubud, Bali, Indonesia from the NASA satellite

Ubud used to be one of the least affected places by globalization within Asia. This changed
significantly over the past 15 years. All the above mentioned factors (economic, media,
tourism, religious, political influences) are strongly linked and resulted together in major
changes in Ubud. I am lucky to be able to tell most of the following from my own experience
and from what I got to know while talking with the people of Ubud during my vacation in
Bali last summer.

One can say that everything started with tourism. After Ubud, which used to be really
beautiful, got “discovered” by some tourists, it did not take long until the word was spread
1
Retrieved from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ubud
2
Google Earth

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 Firas A. ISM IB2 – A 06/07

and Ubud found itself drowning in foreign tourists, foreign consultants, money-launderers and
developers. All of a sudden the breathtaking beauty wasn’t just something to enjoy and look
at, but also something you could invest in. Former native places turned into privately owned
assets, commodities or simply into an opportunity for expanding business, in order to make
enormous profits.3

As in the late 1990s Ubud became a major place to be as an artist, art critics from London and
New York were ever increasingly present in the just established international cafes, which
started to replace the old and traditional ones. As they were consuming imported wine from
Australia and munching on vegetarian snacks, the prices slowly began to climb. Form this
stage a major change in the street of Ubud took place: quiet places which used to help real
artists to relax and get inspired started to be turned into modern pubs and noisy discos. When
the royal family in Ubud realized this, they didn’t just watch all this happening. They did put
up some resistance: for example did they refuse to give the permission to American fast food
restaurants to open up in the area. Another step towards “limiting” the damage done to the
culture already was the refusal to accept requests for building large buildings in the area. 4

The economic factor became increasingly important as Asia suffered a financial crisis in
1997. 5As violent public disorder in Jakarta brought down the “American-backed” military
dictator Suharto, the local currency collapsed entirely. All the masses of tourists, being afraid
of violence and scared to death by the instability of the situation started to leave Ubud. Only a
short time later all the foreign tourists had disappeared. As a consequence most of the locals
lost their jobs “overnight” and ended up on the street, because almost the whole population
lived from the tourism.6

Some time later a new wave of “migrants” entered Ubud. Here the really bad part starts. The
only thing they had in mind was money, disregarding architecture, lifestyle and most
important: the culture of Ubud. As they began setting up all these fancy shops/restaurants and
making well known brands available, the streets began to become extremely crowded and
pollution was only one of the major side effects. That’s also were up-market spas began to
offer “treatments” for over one hundred dollars, a price which a local could hardly imagine to
3
Source:
http://66.249.93.104/search?q=cache:wXVBK3_ZpO0J:www.g77.org/Docs/Bali%2520Declaration.htm+globali
zation+bali&hl=de&gl=de&ct=clnk&cd=8
4
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indonesia
5
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asian_financial_crisis
6
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indonesia

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 Firas A. ISM IB2 – A 06/07

be raised for this kind of service. 7The little world of Ubud began to change faster and faster,
reaching the point where nothing was for free anymore. Everything got commercialized: for
example to watch music performances one had to pay around seven times the entrance fees of
ten years ago. In only three years, the general prices of land in Ubud quadrupled.8

Now the contrasting comparison between how Ubud was 10 years ago and how it is today
comes just right: around then years ago one could live an extremely comfortable life on 10 to
15 dollars per day, this includes lodging and food. By this time nobody in Ubud had heard
about the “travel industry” or any “extravaganza”, which was absolutely fine.

After the local people were forced to sell their land to Javanese and foreign developers, all the
locals turned into normal employees who are receiving wages, just enough to survive. Here
one can see again that those who suffer the most from the current trend are the inhabitants of
Ubud themselves. In the old days, all the money spent by the travelers went straight into the
local people’s pockets. They were doing the cooking and doing the laundry, while renting
rooms in their own compounds. They ended up being so poor that they had to give up all their
hopes to buy back their land.

And at the time all the foreign investors entered the country, the whole media sector changed.
Today Ubud’s youngsters love watching MTV, listening to Pop Music and prefer it over local
music and dances, this I figured out during talks with young locals. Even the older generation
is caught by all the movies on the television. The American movies are visibly influencing the
local community, the way the style themselves – from hair to their shoes. Where just a few
years ago a traditional straw hat was, a white Nike baseball cap is shining now.

At the same time the car became, just like it has been in the western countries for a long time,
a status symbol. Ubud is now full of motor vehicles, bought with the money locals earned by
selling their land. If I think a few years ahead, all these cars will be worthless and the people
in Ubud are with absolutely nothing left… nothing to sell anymore: no land, no cars and no
money.
Walking around in Ubud, one quickly notices that most of the artists, local as well as foreign
ones left for ever. The culture was irreversibly damaged. All this plastics replaced noble art

7
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tourism_in_Indonesia
8
Source: http://66.249.93.104/search?q=cache:rDSXw4Dd1zgJ:switch.sjsu.edu/web/v5n3/A-
1.html+globalization+ubud&hl=de&gl=de&ct=clnk&cd=2

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forms; paintings which used to be painted by real artists just get copied for the masses in
masses. 9In my eyes the entire town looked like one bazaar gone out of control.

The only places where real local Hindu culture can be found are the countless temples during
religious ceremonies. The religion seems to be something that still exists like it did many
years before. Not much change here. That’s one positive thing among too many negative
things.

To conclude one can say that Ubud is another small town “killed” by globalization. The
economic aspects lead to increased tourism fuelled by the media led by corrupt politicians,
resulting in irreversible damage done to the culture. It even seems like the local population
won’t be able to afford to live in their own town as time passes by…

THIS is becoming rare… Balinese boys in Ubud, dressed traditionally! 10

9
Source:
http://66.249.93.104/search?q=cache:8J59Xrb5UgwJ:www.ubudwritersfestival.com/about.php+globalization+ub
ud&hl=de&gl=de&ct=clnk&cd=3
10
Source: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/4/45/Ubud-Kids.jpg