**At long last, my final paper that got me on to the Denver Journal of International Law and Policy. I sincerely hope this doesn't count as "publication." But I took the risk so all y'all can finally understand a bit about why I did what I did this summer.**
Introduction
While
September 11, 2001 is a day mourned as a tragedy for not only the U.S. but much
of the world, on a relatively tiny island thousands of miles away, it marked
the beginning of peace.
In the Poso region of Central Sulawesi, Indonesia, a four-year violent conflict
was brought to an end.
Environmental rights were a primary factor of the conflict, however, division
along religious lines was exacerbated by outside influences and became the
“face” of it.
Today,
though the situation has changed, perhaps the issue most likely to lead to
future conflict continues to be environmental rights.
Currently, many Indonesian citizens have little access to legal redress for
issues related to these rights.
Analysts of Islamic fundamentalist infiltration consistently recommend that an
accountable, credible legal system and better access to justice remain
absolutely essential to preventing the kind of vigilantism that radical groups
can manipulate.
This
article will advocate for an increased focus on access to justice and capacity
building, particularly for women, in areas vulnerable to violent conflict. Part
I will provide background on Poso’s history. Part II will describe the
fundamentals of Indonesian land and natural resource rights. Part III will
explain briefly Indonesia’s formal and traditional legal systems and access to
justice on both levels. Part IV will make recommendations.
1) Poso
history
a) Religious
relationships
Located
between Muslim-majority South Sulawesi and Christian-majority North Sulawesi,
Central Sulawesi seems like a logical place for religious conflict.
Yet, indigenous people had lived in harmony for generations prior to
colonization.
However, it
was under President Suharto’s regime, beginning in the 1960s, that tensions
really started to rise.
Under Suharto, Islam was favored as the national religion.
By the 1980s and early 1990s, there were increasing religious rivalries for
government favor and competition for jobs.
In
Central Sulawesi, many Christian groups lost some of their indigenous political
control.
Local
authority was removed from customary councils of elders and transferred to a
national bureaucracy.
Muslims were installed in high-ranking military posts, and Christians found it
increasingly difficult to get their local leaders elected.
Young Christian students began to feel that they did not have equal access to
government jobs and other economic opportunities, even if they were equally
well educated and qualified.
b) Transmigration
& lack of legal redress
Suharto’s
initiatives included a government-supported transmigration program to move
people from the overcrowded central islands to the less populated regions.
Central Sulawesi was chosen as one of ten sites for migration from crowded
cities.
New roads and highways attracted many Muslim
traders to the Christian-majority highlands to cash-crop cacao and to open
stores to serve the newly-wealthy cash-croppers.
Highland Christians also moved to the lowland Muslim-majority cities seeking
higher education and jobs.
As the government continued to fail in providing equal access to economic
opportunities, community groups became more entrenched in local, religiously
based alliances to solve their daily problems.
Suharto used the military to preserve stability for most citizens and foreign
investors.
Meanwhile,
citizens did not have local means to negotiate and solve underlying problems,
and access to national justice systems was very limited, so violence became an
effective solution to social problems.
c) 1998-2002
The
Asian financial crisis in 1997 ripened the scene for violence.
It worsened living conditions for most
citizens and created desperation for political change.
Citizen protests and military responses became increasingly violent.
When Suharto resigned in 1998, it left a political vacuum that inflamed local politics
throughout the country.
The
initial phases of the Poso conflict surrounded mayoral elections as Muslims and
Christians each battled to get their favored candidate in position.
Street fights ensued, inflammatory graffiti littered the streets, and hundreds
homes were burned.
The conflict continued in phases largely determined by which side was seeking
reprisal.
After a
group of alleged Christian ringleaders was sentenced to death in 2001, attacks
on Muslims increased.
In stepped Laskar Jihad, a newly formed Muslim militia.
They were able to gain influence in the region because local Muslim communities
has lost all faith in the security forces.
Their arrival in 2001 added several hundred experienced fighters to the Muslim
ranks, and coincided with a spike in violence.
Jamaah Islamiyah (JI), Southeast Asia’s largest terrorist organization, had
also infiltrated the region.
d) Sept
11, 2001 –the beginning of one war, the end of another
Laskar
Jihad's leader had fought alongside bin Laden in Afghanistan.
The Indonesian government long denied any link between Laskar Jihad and al
Qaeda, but in December 2001 the head of Indonesian intelligence finally agreed
that the two were linked.
JI also helped two of the September 11, 2001 hijackers and has confessed to
plotting and carrying out attacks against Western targets, including the 2002
Bali bombings.
In
the aftermath of the September 11
th attacks, reports of the violence
in Poso caught international attention.
The U.S. put pressure on the Indonesian government to put a stop to the
conflict and eradicate the Islamic fundamentalist groups.
On December 20, 2001, Muslim and Christian leaders, accompanied by 4,000
military and police, signed the Malino Agreement.
It took another year for the fighting to officially stop, in fact sporadic
attacks continue to this day.
The
four years of fighting in Poso left between 1,000-2,500 dead, thousands more
injured, hundreds of churches and mosques burned, and over 100,000 Internally
Displaced People (IDPs).
Part of the reconciliation process includes resettling these IDPs who may claim
land now occupied by other mobile citizens.
Part of the Malino Agreement included talks of returning property to
‘pre-conflict’ status.
2) Land
& Natural Resource Rights in Indonesia
a) Background
Land
disputes in Indonesia are consistently reported as the most frequent after
general criminal disputes, the most difficult to resolve, and the most likely
to trigger violence.
Ethnic/religious conflicts are reportedly low.
In Sulawesi, a 2006 World Bank survey found that 17.5% of reported cases were
over land disputes, (Sulawesi was the only region who’s land disputes were
higher than its criminal disputes), while only 3.4% were ethnic/religious
conflicts.
The
basis of modern Indonesian land law is Law Number 5 of 1960, also referred to
as UUPA (Basic Agrarian Law Act).
It was created under President Soekarno and the Old Order, the first regime
after independence.
The primary focus at the time was to protect Indonesian natural resources and
local property from foreign influence so that Indonesian economic development
could be fully cultivated and controlled from within.
This was due to awareness that the poverty of the majority of Indonesian people
had its roots in an access to natural resources.
When
Suharto became president in 1967 he upended those policies.
His natural resource management policies, under the New Order, are widely
acknowledged as having planted the seeds of conflict in many areas of the
country.
The New
Order opened Indonesia to foreign capital investment and made foreign debts the
prime source of development funding.
Development practices bluntly claimed poor people’s proprietary rights and
access to natural resources.
Most significantly, in the 1980s the government classified over 75% of
Indonesia’s total land area as State Forest.
Violence was used as the primary tool to impede those who demanded their
proprietary rights.
During this time there were many “forced evictions” that disproportionately
affected women.
The
legacies of the New Order laws and policies encouraged unbridled commercial
extraction of Indonesia’s natural resources.
The
1997 economic crisis forced President Suharto to step down amidst the
international community’s growing awareness of human rights violations that
were committed to defend the interests of private companies.
The Reform Era, which followed, is a clash between the ideologies of the two
previous regimes.
On one hand, the government issued a
new law for Agrarian Reform (although dismissing it in practice).
On the other hand, the regimes in this era continued the New Order’s practice
of accommodating foreign investors and debts, particularly by allowing the
privatization of natural resources.
b) The
Indonesian Constitution
Article
33 of the Indonesian Constitution reflects the focus of the Old Order. It provides
that “the land, water and their natural riches are controlled by the state and
shall be used to the greatest benefit of the people.”
However, this provision has served as legal justification for sweeping state
control.
Article
18 manifests the other side of a longstanding inherent tension in the
Indonesian Constitution between state control and community-based rights.
In August 2000, it was amended to include “the state shall acknowledge and
respect traditional societies along with their customary rights as long as
these remain in existence and are in accordance with the societal development
and the principles of the Unitary State of the Republic of Indonesia, and shall
be regulated by law.”
Since
Indonesia’s independence in 1945, this tension has been resolved almost always
in favor of Article 33 and unbridled state control.
However, properly interpreted, both articles indicate that the state holds the
land in an administrative capacity for the benefit of the people.
c) Present
day context
Although
the second half of the 20
th century had seen many of Indonesia’s
people lose rights to their land, the government has concurrently taken great
strides to address environmental legal reform.
It has introduced laws that specifically target strengthening local
environmental management institutions.
The Indonesian Center for Environmental Law conducts training courses for
members of the Indonesian judiciary in environmental law. The head of
Indonesia’s Supreme Court has indicated to the High Court that he recommends
only judges with this ICEL training be appointed to hear environmental cases.
Indonesia has also greatly diversified is environmental dispute resolution
mechanisms.
What
remains is for the average Indonesian citizen to be able to make use of these
reforms.
3) Access
to Justice
a) National,
formal legal system
Local
awareness of the importance of justice and legal empowerment is getting
stronger, yet access to the formal legal system for local community members
remains rare.
In a 2001
survey, 56% of Indonesians were unable to give a single example of a right to
which they were legally entitled; the percentage jumped to 66% for women, and
97% for those with no formal education.
Poor
people’s access to the formal legal system is limited by inaccessible language,
discrimination, corruption, and lengthy processes.
Indigenous people are consistently marginalized, uninformed, and even sometimes
considered “illegal” squatters on land they have settled for generations.
b) Local,
traditional justice system
Non-state
justice is the primary mode of dispute resolution in Indonesia.
Indonesians prefer to settle things locally.
Local customary law tribunals are well-established, but traditional community
and religious leaders also practice arbitration and mediation.
Research suggests that for small intra-communal disputes, non-state justice
operates rapidly and effectively.
High satisfaction rates reflect this
success.
But
one of the main problems with the traditional, local justice system is that
results are arbitrarily based on the decisions of “elites” and with the goal of
ensuring village harmony.
Harmony is often equivalent to maintaining the status quo or social norms.
The results therefore are not always “just” for individuals, especially
minorities or those underrepresented.
One of these categories is, of course, women.
Another problem is that local justice systems are not well connected with the
formal legal system and also lack the resources to handle complex cases, or the
“jurisdiction” over outside parties.
Many land disputes fall into these categories.
4) Recommendations
a) Increasing access to justice –grassroots
level
Access
to justice will not only provide citizens with an alternative to violence to
air their grievances, but will also allow them to advocate for changes in
policy at the national level to reflect their interests.
Grassroots programs working with communities can, and have, successfully
generate demand for institutional change at the national level.
The participation and the inclusion of women’s organizations in the formal
political peace process is crucial as they are generally the ones who work
with, help, and understand people at the grassroots level.
i) Women’s
empowerment
The
gender division of labor in Indonesia has changed
- women are increasingly generating income for the
family due to poverty and a lack of men’s mobility.
The killings of a large number of men in public spaces, including their farms,
during and after the conflict has limited men’s mobility to carry out
productive economic activities outside the home.
Women are also powerful actors during conflict.
They take on a variety of different roles to ensure their family’s survival.
They also take on roles as community organizers, distributing clothes, medical
care, and other basic needs to victims.
In Central Sulawesi, they are particularly active in IDP camps. In the Poso conflict, this meant that
women were able to point out that the conflict was not actually based on
religion. Women from Muslim and Christian communities helped each other and
disguised each other to escape raids during the conflict.
Such a connection with the realities of the conflict make women vital in the peace
building process.
For
many people, women are considered better peace builders because they are seen
as less threatening and more open to informal dialogue between Muslim and
Christian communities through their daily activities in the marketplace and the
community.
All of
these activities strengthen their understanding of community members needs and
realities, as well as establish their connections and influence within the
community.
Although women’s political
participation is still limited, it seems to be increasing, especially in the
village political arena.
Some women have become heads of the villages, neighborhoods and members of
village councils, in part as a result of their peace activism and humanitarian
work.
Yet, up
until this point, these roles are mostly ‘invisible’ as women have generally
been overlooked and marginalized in the context of the formal peace-building
processes.
b) Capacity building
Capacity
building should continue at both the national and local levels, but with an
increased focus on integrating women and getting them into decision-making
positions.
The
emergence of women in conflict and peace-related issues is a new phenomenon in
Poso and surrounding areas.
Generally these women have limited education, knowledge, organizational
experience and leadership skills.
Although many of the female peace activists in Poso were university student
activists or were actively engaged in the NGO activities before the conflict,
the older generation is less educated.
Some have not completed high school and others have only finished elementary
school.
A lack of
education prevents women’s organizations from understanding their rights or how
to enforce them, from engaging on constructive development, and from accessing
established networks.
Women’s
groups have identified a need for managerial and leadership skills, group and
community organization skills, fundraising skills, networking skills,
communication, information and dissemination skills including policy advocacy,
campaigning, lobbying, public speaking and presentation, monitoring and
evaluation skills, negotiation, mediation and conflict resolution, and women’s
political participation.
Since
women are generally not familiar with formal debate, dialogue and discussion
due to their marginal position in the decision-making and formal peace
processes, an affirmative action policy would help efforts in strengthening
women’s capacity.
This includes facilitating women’s participation in seminars, workshops and
conferences at the local, national, and international level. Graduate school
scholarship assistance would be beneficial, as well as long-term, sustainable
technical and financial support for women’s organizations.
c) An
expanding legal field –barefoot lawyering
There
are many Indonesian legal aid groups that have set up outposts, or
posko,
around the country to provide “barefoot lawyering” –educating rural citizens on
the basics of the Indonesian legal system, connecting them to resources, and
also representing individuals or communities in bringing suit.
But studies have shown that backing from organizations, individuals, or the
general international community often influence cases’ success.
A place exists, and continues to grow, for lawyers from the international
community to go do some non-traditional lawyering. Sharing of skills and
resources, educational tools, “witnessing” or accompanying cases, and advocacy
–representing individuals or communities at higher levels or connecting them
with available resources –are strong “soft skills” for many lawyers and are in
high demand by marginalized populations in Indonesia and other developing
countries.
Conclusion
Although
Poso today is relatively peaceful, developing means for community members to
address their environmental and other legal concerns is critical in maintaining
peace in the future. Low economic growth and unemployment can make
post-conflict areas more prone to slipping back into conflict.
Particularly for young men, helping them attain a stake in the local economy is
a critical factor for peace as they are the most susceptible part of society to
the frustration and resentment that can lead to violence.
JI and other fundamentalists groups continue to recruit in Central Sulawesi,
sending new students to South Asia and elsewhere for training. A steady stream
of Indonesians travel to India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh every year for
training, and Indonesian jihadists have well-established contacts there.
Economic
growth in Indonesia is strongly connected to access to natural resources.
It is critically important that local communities have access to the benefits
brought by foreign investors in these natural resources, and that their
concerns are part of the decision making process. This bridge will be forged
largely by a well-integrated legal system that even the most marginalized can
access. Peace in Poso, and in the rest of the world depends on it.
See, e.g.,
Int’l Crisis Group, ICG Asia Report No.
74, Indonesia Backgrounder: Jihad in Central Sulawesi (2004); Id. at 43.
Sidney Jones, Briefing for the New President: The
Terrorist Threat in Indonesia and Southeast Asia, 618 Annals Am.
Acad. Pol. & Soc. Sci. 69 (2008).
Daniel Barstow Magraw & Lauren Baker, Globalization,
Communities and Human Rights: Community Based Property Rights and Prior
Informed Consent, 35 Denv. J. Int’l L. & Pol’y 413
(2007).
Owen Lynch
& Emily Harwell, Ctr. for Int’l Envtl. L., Whose Natural Resources? Whose
Common Good? Towards a New Paradigm of Environmental Justice and the National
Interest in Indonesia 71 (2002).
See generally David Nicholson, Environmental Dispute Resolution in Indonesia
(2009); Environmental Law in Development
(Michael Faure & Nicole Niessen eds. 2006).
Zurstrassen, supra note 85.
Mawdsley,
supra note 53, at 6.