The impact of modernization on the economy for fishermen in Makassar City

This paper discusses the impact of modernization on the economic development of fishermen in Makassar. In general, fishermen are considered as a group of people who are poor with a subsistence oriented economy. However, the fishermen in Makasar tend to show a more commercially oriented economy compared to those in other regions in Indonesia. More advanced living began to emerge as they started to use modern technology, such as actuator boats, fish preservation (cold storage), and trading networks. With modernization, the economic life of those fishermen developed significantly as seen from their income per capita, which is higher than that of the workers in the field of construction and those working at sugar and rice mills. With higher incomes, every family of the fishermen could afford to buy a ‘golden ringgit’ as a symbol of wealth in the Bugis-Makassar tradition. This research is a historical study using a qualitative approach. The data were obtained through interviews with fishermen and entrepreneurs of the local fisheries. Furthermore, the data were processed using the historical method, which includes heuristic, criticism, interpretation, and historiography.