Misleading Icons of Communal Lands in Indonesia

Implications of Adat Forest Recognition From a Model Site in Kajang, Sulawesi

Bibliographic Data

ID2987014
AuthorsMicah R Fisher (0000-0002-8246-2318), Willem Van Der Muur
Year2020
Volume21
Issue1
Pages55-76
Publication date2020-01-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueCanberra Anthropology (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0314-9099 • E-ISSN: 1740-9314
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/14442213.2019.1670244
OpenAlexW2986792332
LanguageEN
Citations received11
References cited22

Rural development advocates are increasingly favouring policies that recognise community land rights in Indonesia, suggesting that recognition will protect forests and support livelihoods. In this article, we examine the effects of recognition by asking who benefits, and to what extent recognition impacts on livelihoods. Our case study focuses on an iconic site, the Kajang community of South Sulawesi, because advocates often point to that community as a model case. Based on over three years of field research on tenure and conflict among the Kajang, we highlight the discrepancy between the effects of recognition and existing livelihood realities. We show that communal territory in Kajang is a site of contestation, entangled in conflict over who can claim cultivation rights. We thus argue that representation of Kajang as harmonious forest communities governed by communal tenure is misleading. As advocates continue to promote similar policies elsewhere, we show that this kind of misrepresentation serves to further obscure the lingering land insecurity of rural Indonesians

Agriculture · Economic growth · Economics · Geography · Land tenure · Livelihood · Misrepresentation · Political science · Asian Studies and History · Conservation, Biodiversity, and Resource Management · Law · Southeast Asian Sociopolitical Studies

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