Talk:1961 Indonesian census/GA1

GA Review
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Reviewer: Llywrch (talk · contribs) 00:02, 12 January 2023 (UTC)


 * @Llywrch you picked up this review 3 months ago and despite actively editing since, have not touched it. Do you intend to take any action on it whatsoever? &spades;PMC&spades; (talk) 01:46, 20 April 2023 (UTC)
 * PMC I do intend to work on this. Unfortunately, personal business has been distracting me from completing this review. I regret that happening, because I want to promote this article to GA status. I will take the time to complete the work so it may be promoted. -- llywrch (talk) 18:08, 20 April 2023 (UTC)


 * Review by llywrch

I apologize again for the irresponsible delay in completing this. Having a family & a full-time job tends to encourage me from promptly completing tasks on Wikipedia.

First off, to repeat what I said above this is a strong article that covers most aspects of the subject. In fact, after my first read I felt this should be used as a model for future articles on national censuses. (Of course someone will eventually write a better one that will reach FA status, but not only is that inevitable, it will require a lot more work than was put into this article.) I appreciate that you provided background to this census; not only are many readers unaware of the motivations & efforts required to undertake a national census in non-Western countries, but covering that enlivens an otherwise dull topic.

I do have a couple of thoughts, none critical to rating this article, but I felt I should share them.
 * First, you might consider using abbreviations for some terms in this article that are often repeated. Most important would be "Central Bureau of Statistics", which at one point you provide the Indonesian name -- Biro Pusat Statistik. At the first appearance, put the Indonesian name in parentheses after it with an abbreviation, either "CBS" or "BPS". But I would at the very least move the Indonesian name to the first place where the name appears in the article: it currently appears at the second.
 * Another thought about style -- less important than the first -- would be to use  to make sure numbers are not separated from the relevant value, such as 31 October.
 * One detail that I wondered about: was the census done in person or by mail? I only ask that because the last few US Censuses I had to respond to were done by mail, & some readers might assume that was the case then. Not answering this would not prevent me from giving this article a pass, but if you decide to make this a Featured Article, I would encourage you to answer this question.
 * Another detail that is not critical to passing this article, but you would need to address for this to become a Featured Article: why was the raw data (or returns) lost between the enumeration & the final tabulation? I would expect someone had provided the answer to this question, although that would require some research.

Now for some further suggestions if you want to turn this into an FA:
 * More extensive comparison with the censuses of 1930 & 1970. I expect that the 1930 census was not as complete as this one was, but it would provide a baseline to show how the population of Indonesia -- & its constituent parts -- changed between those 31 years. And as I presume the 1970 was at least as thorough as the 1961 one was, comparing this with the next would help the reader show the continuing trends.
 * Also some comparison with neighboring countries, such as Malaysia & The Philippines, would provide further value to the reader. This would be more selective, but I suspect that this work has already been done for you, & you would then be mostly citing secondary sources.
 * One issue, which I don't expect you to solve but needs to be mentioned, is that the figures in articles about national censuses need to be protected from vandalism somehow. Something like revision-protected tables. One hope was for numeric information like this to be stored on Wikidata, but I think even Wikidata's advocated would admit that at this present time doing that would only be moving the problem from here at Wikipedia (which provides some control over vandalism) to another site (which has less control). Again, this is a problem out of yours & my hands, but it needs to be mentioned.

So I'll wait for your responses to these thoughts, before taking further action. -- llywrch (talk) 23:20, 25 April 2023 (UTC)


 * First of all, thank you for the thorough review, Llywrch. I very much appreciate the endorsement in using this article as a model for future census articles. I'm fortunate that there is a substantial amount of literature on this census, more than I initially expected. There was clearly great interest among western scholars in the development of Indonesia during this period.
 * To respond to your comments and questions:
 * I've moved the first mention of Biro Pusat Statistik. Where possible, I've opted to use "the bureau" rather than the BPS abbreviation as subsequent mentions. I feel the name of the agency isn't actually mentioned very much, so I thought it was appropriate to repeat the full name after big gaps in the prose rather than using the abbreviation throughout. Let me know if you think otherwise.
 * I've added non-breaking spaces to dates, percent figures, and large numbers in the millions. MOS:NBSP doesn't seem to indicate that a non-breaking space is needed to figures like "95 males" or "100 working individuals", so I didn't use it there.
 * To my knowledge, there was no mail component to this census. No contemporary source I have seen mentions a mail option, let alone discuss the absence of such option. Is it possible that an in-person census was the general expectation of that time period, such that mail isn't even considered?
 * I suspect the answer to why much of the data was lost might go beyond the scope of this article. I recall one source (it's been a few months, so I don't remember which specifically) saying that it was a combination of poor record-keeping and "political reasons" without elaborating specifics. Those who are familiar with Indonesian history know that the Guided Democracy period of the 1960s was a turbulent one, but explaining it succinctly with finesse is difficult without detracting from discussing the census. I can certainly attempt for FA.
 * I can understand the desire to see a comparison with 1930 data, but I felt a comparison with 1971 data might be better served in the future article of that census. Instead of discussing the 1971 data, I contemplated adding further information on the population projection models developed based on the 1961 census. Do you think that would be a better approach for FA?
 * — Arsonal (talk + contribs) — 05:13, 28 April 2023 (UTC)
 * I wouldn't worry about the last two criteria; they were meant more as suggestions if you want to promote this to FA status. Hmm. It appears you missed a few conversions to "the bureau", where I replaced Central Bureau of Statistics with "BPS". Go ahead & change those if you wish.But otherwise, this is a pass. -- llywrch (talk) 23:07, 3 May 2023 (UTC)