When the City Forest is Ours: Urban Environmentalism and Youth in Bandung, Indonesia
Meredian Alam MPhil (Univ. of Oslo), MA (UGM), BSocSc(Hons.) (UGM) Student Number: 3197024
Thesis submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for award of the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Sociology and Anthropology
School of Humanities and Social Science Faculty of Education and Arts The University of Newcastle NSW 2308, Australia September 2017
This research was supported by UNIPRS and UNRSC 50:50 Scholarship Declarations Statement of Originality The thesis contains no material which has been accepted for the award of any other degree or diploma in any university or other tertiary institution and, to the best of my knowledge and belief, contains no material previously published or written by another person, except where due reference has been made in the text. I give consent to the final version of my thesis being made available worldwide when deposited in the University’s Digital Repository, subject to the provisions of the Copyright Act 1968.
Signed
Meredian Alam
Published Material Portions of this research thesis have been published in the following journals and conference proceedings: Alam, M. and Nilan, P. (2015) Urban growth, youth and environmentalism driving Local Initiatives in Bandung,Indonesia, in T. Petray and A. Stephens (eds) Proceedings of The Australian Sociological Association Conference, Cairns, 23-26 November 2015. ISBN: 978-0-646-94798-3 Parts of this paper appear in Chapter 1 Alam, M. (2016) Politicised space and contentious youth in urban environmentalism in Indonesia. Komunitas: International Journal of Indonesian Culture and Society 8(1), pp.1-12. Parts of this paper appear in Chapter 11
ii Glossary
‘Ayo Lawan’ : Let’s fight.
‘Melawan atau Mati!’ : Resistance or die.
Abah Baksil : The term for the leader of the Babakan Siliwangi Residents Forum.
Backsilmove : Back to Babakan Siliwangi Movement
Camani : Black feathered cock.
Forum Warga Peduli Babakan Siliwangi : Babakan Siliwangi Residents Forum
Gedung Sate : The parliament building in Bandung.
Grindadráp : Faroese term for the pilot whale killing festival.
Hayu Ulin di Babakan Siliwangi : Trees in Babakan Siliwangi.
Hutan Kota : Urban forest.
Iman dan taqwa : Belief in and submission to God (Islamic term).
Jowo : Java or Javanese.
Jumpa Militan : Meeting of militants.
Juta : Million.
Kabupaten : Regency.
Kafe : Café.
Kawasan Bandung Utara : North Bandung region.
Kawasan Strategis Propinsi : Strategic region at provincial level.
Kerakyatan : Sense of being at grass roots level.
Kota : City
Lebak Gede : The original name for Babakan Siliwangi.
Lingga-Yoni : Standing stone which depicts symbolic
iii male and female genitalia.
Milyar : Billion
Ngalokat Hahalang Babakan Siliwangi : To purify and protect Babakan Siliwangi forest.
Nongkrong : Chilling out with friends in a café or public space without doing much.
Pedagang kaki lima : Street vendors
Pembangunan Tanpa Mata : Blind development.
Perahu Doa : ‘Prayer Boat’- title of Tisna Sanjaya’s artwork.
Rupiah : Currency of Indonesia.
Sanggar Mitra : Arts Curatorial Workshop situated near the entrance of Bandung Zoo.
Sanggar Olah Seni : Arts Workshop situated in Babakan Siliwangi forest.
Sawit : Oil palm, or palm oil plantation.
Siraman moyang : Traditional flower showering.
Rencana Tata Ruang Wilayah/RTRW : Spatial Plan of Bandung.
Penghayat aliran kepercayaan : Sundanese spiritual collective.
Yayasan : Foundation (NGO).
iv Acronym
PT EGI Perseroan Terbatas. Esa Gemilang Indah (EGI)
BCCF Bandung Creative City Forum
ITB Institute Teknologi Bandung (Bandung Institute of Technology)
Unpad Universitas Padjajaran (Padjajaran University)
Sabuga Sasana Budaya Ganesha (SABUGA)
UNIKOM Universitas Indonesia Komputer (Computer Studies University in Bandung)
Eling Pendidikan Lingkungan (Environmental Education Program)
AMDAL Analisis Dampak Lingkungan (Environmental Impact Analysis)
IMB Ijin Mendirikan Bangunan (Construction Licence)
GP Greenpeace
KPK Komisi Pemberantasan Korupsi Indonesia (Corruption Eradication Commission)
NTF The North Face
CND Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament
Pramuka Praja Muda Karana (Indonesia’s Scout Movement)
FHB Forum Hijau Bandung (Bandung ‘Green’ Forum)
NVDA Non-Violent Direct Action
WALHI Perwalian Lingkungan Hidup Indonesia (Indonesia’s Friends of the Earth)
v Timeline of Events- Babakan Siliwangi Year Event(s) Until1930 The history of Bandung records that Babakan Siliwangi was originally seven hectares of rice paddy fields, called Lebak Gede until 1930. The rice fields were cultivated by farmers who worked for a Dutch colonialist until 1942, when the land came under the ownership of the municipal government. 1940 A local residential complex was built to the west of Lebak Gede. 1990 The local state university ITB developed part of the original forest area following the granting of a lease from the government. Extensive sports facilities were established in the 1990s, using a block grant from the World Bank. 1991-1980 Bandung municipal government began to commercialise the Lebak Gede area. They also granted legal clearance for local restaurants to operate. 2003 A restaurant – called Babakan Siliwangi Resto - caught fire, allegedly due to an electric sabotage. The name stuck. 2002 The Bandung municipal government appointed PT EGI as the executor for re-planning and further development of the Babakan Siliwangi forest area. 2003 (August) There was a dispute between senators during discussion of the submitted landscaping plan for Babakan Siliwangi in the regional parliament. 2008 The mass media began to broadcast the plan for the new commercial landscape development of Babakan Siliwangi. As this plan spread across the region, disagreements and outbursts amongst local environmental organizations and collectives emerged. 2011 (September) A campaign for Babakan Siliwangi to be declared as a World City Forest was launched.
2011 The municipal government issued Bandung City Regulation number 18 of 2011, which legislated Babakan Siliwangi as green open space. 2013 (1 January) The Babakan Siliwangi Residents Forum was officially established. Tisna Sanjaya was appointed as Abah Baksil, the coordinating chair of the forum. 2013 (12 February) Backsilmove was officially created as a conservation movement to promote the sustainability of Babakan Siliwangi
vi forest. 2013 (13 May) PT EGI held a press conference to state that they held a work permit for infrastructure development (Ijin Mendirikan Bangunan) and announced the construction work would commence in the following months. 2013 (14 May) Bandung community activists along with environmental activists and groups held a meeting to consolidate their collective action against development in Babakan Siliwangi forest.
2013 (20 May) Babakan Siliwangi Residents Forum along with Backsilmove successfully organised a creative festival of protest culminating in a long march from Babakan Siliwangi forest to Bandung Town Hall (Balai Kota Bandung). Throughout the parade, activists carried the graffitied zincalum fence that was erected by PT EGI to close off the forest.
2013 (25 May) An art exhibition was opened at the Cultural Centre Foundation building (Gedung Yayasan Pusat Kebudayaan) as part of the creative festival of protest. Tisna Sanjaya was the coordinator. Local artists performed. It was attended by WALHI (Indonesia Friends of the Earth), the elders of the Aliansi Keluarga Sunda Nusantara and Paguyuban Sundawani. In addition, the new mayoral candidates for Bandung signed a banner containing their pledges and commitments to terminating the private development of Babakan Siliwangi if elected.
2013 (5 June) A traditional art performance was conducted by local artists like Nanu Muda, and there was Sundanese poetry reading. National geographer and Bandung basin explorer Dr. T. Bachtiar called on all Bandung residents to plant Babakan Siliwangi forest with Lebak Siliwangi indigenous trees. 2013 (11 June) The Chairman of Commission A and the Secretary of the Regional House of Parliament issued a joint statement that the cooperation agreement between the municipality and PT EGI was contrary to Law no. 26 of 2007 on Spatial Planning and Regional Regulation No. 18 of 2011 on Spatial Planning, since PT EGI had not delivered on its financial responsibility to the city government of Bandung.
2013 (14 June) Tisna Sanjaya representing the citizens of Bandung read the petition against commercialisation of Babakan Siliwangi forest before the Regional House of Parliament senators. 2013 (27 June) Bandung municipal government revoked the infrastructure construction work permit (IMB) from PT EGI.
vii 2013 (28 June) Newsheadlines about the revocation of the building permit and commercial development land for Babakan Siliwangi were widely spread by media in Bandung and across West Java. The forest was preserved for the community to enjoy.
viii Abstract In 2013 Backsilmove, a youth-led environmental organisation, engaged in the reclaiming of the Babakan Siliwangi urban forest movement located in Bandung, the capital of Indonesia’s West Java province. Despite the fact that Bandung city authorities still tightly control political activism and do not provide much space for political dissent, these young people surfaced as youthful environmental activists who used diverse movement repertoires to convey an environmental safeguarding message to the public. By framing the Backsilmove case with a Bourdieusian approach to analyse that environmental movement, I aim, in this doctoral thesis, to show the way young activists gravitated towards public protest, which, notably, could put them at risk of arrest. To critically evaluate the elements of their at-risk involvement, I interviewed in depth and observed ethnographically 26 ex- Backsilmove activists from November 2014 to May 2015 in Bandung and Jakarta, to answer the overarching question of how environmental activist habitus and ecological dispositions were formed, defined, and negotiated within the family, school, and organisational milieux, leading activists to embark on the Backsilmove campaign.
Analysis of narrative interview data depicted early interaction with nature in the realm of school and family where young activists first began to embrace a strong support system for ecological conservation. This ecological predisposition was evidently shaped by family and school influences. It was primarily developed through active interaction with the natural world, reading relevant textbooks as well as fiction and non-fiction literature, and further efforts to better understand natural phenomena. Findings of this study suggest that ecological habitus is not only developed, but also contested and fought for through habituation of ecological awareness and/or environmental activism. Furthermore, it appears that social capital that encourages ecological habitus formation and predisposition are also important. It seems clear that the relevant cultural capital of the study participants was prefigured through previous active participation in the environmental organisation Greenpeace, which allowed the young activists to maintain their position within the environmental movement as a field of struggle. This was identified as the encouragement phase for them to develop their radical habitus. This radical habitus became a basis for later structuring new models of activism. Their Greenpeace experience equipped the young activists with a broader structure of personal development that helped them to transfer their embodied radical cosmology and repertoires of resistance to Backsilmove. This was the foundation for the subsequent success of the Backsilmove campaign. To create this movement, they relied upon the particular worldviews and perceptions about environmental phenomena they had already experienced. Keywords: Backsilmove, urban forest, environmental movement, habitus, Bourdieu.
ix Acknowledgements
2014 to 2017 has been one of the most beautiful periods in my life. It enables me to dug into the intriguing political phenomena of Indonesian young people’s involvement in an environmental protest through this intensive doctoral study. There are indeed two extraordinary figures behind this intellectual trajectory—Professor Pam Nilan and Dr. Terry Leahy. Pam has always been a mentor, a colleague and a best friend who kept me well encouraged to think ‘out of the box’ and beyond boundaries to find out solutions to every given problem, whilst Terry was very helpful throughout my pace of writing. This intellectual journey also recognises input from the ARCDP project on Environmentalism and Environmentality in Indonesia. For that, I thank Professor Lyn Parker, the leading Chief Investigator. I also thank the University of Newcastle for their generosity in awarding me with a scholarship and for providing seminars, workshops and funding to attend international conferences.
Before coming to Australia, Dr. Muhammad Najib Azca introduced me to Professor Pam Nilan. I thank him for his assistance and moral support prior to my departure to Newcastle. I am also grateful to have colleague Dr. Oki Rahadianto Sutopo for discussion on youth transition topics, which was enlightening to me in 2016. Additionally, my thanks go to Dr. Suharko who had involved me in an incredible role as a field coordinator in his fantastic postdoctoral research commissioned by the University of Agder, Norway and the Embassy of Norway through the scheme Search-In-Balance in 2012–2013. In that project I led all research assistants, communicated with over 90 local environmental communities and non-state actors, prepared his whole research proposal and internationally published articles, and provided bridging communication with the Royal Norwegian Embassy in Jakarta. Since my initial entry into Sociology at UGM, he has inspired me to learn and explore Environmental Sociology.
I would like to dedicate this thesis to my wife Peta Puspita Dewi who had accompanied me over my three-year struggle period of this intellectual journey. Another dedication is made to my mother Dwi Djumiati and my father Mudji Hartono, whose prayers and wishes gave me much-needed strength. I am very thankful to have my parents-in-laws Suprihno and Harmiyati; they have always listened to my worries. Without their patience, I would not have been so motivated. I also acknowledge my very little son, Taresh Alam, who had passed away in November 2015 when I had nearly completed chapter 9. Nevertheless, I am greatly thankful for his short-lived presence that taught me the meaning of love and patience throughout this intellectual journey: May you always be happy in Heaven now and everafter.
x
The new friends I made in Australia along this wonderful journey have shaped my everyday into inspiring moments that I have shared in this study. For that, I would like to thank my friends in PPIA Newcastle: Yodi Christiani, Novi Herawati Bong, Rachel Wulan, Fransisca Fanisari, Franklin Supit, Stefa Yuwiko, Florence Theograsia P, Yulita Eva Setiawan, Gregorius Setiabudhi, Sri Hastuti P, Astija Surya, Verawati and Muhammad Ilyas. I am grateful for being assisted by the administration officers at the School of Humanities and Social Sciences—Michelle Allan, who helped me navigate the administrative maze and Amanda Hall-Griffin who organised a set of fantastic FEDUA seminars, workshops and training. I would also like to thank my fellow PhD students in Postgraduate Rooms 338 and 215: Bill, Deb Amas, Jacob Mugumbate, Emma Quilty, Sabrina, Eleonora, Phuong Thai Lan, Jai Cooper and Michelle Mansfield, Pearl Nunn, Joshua Kalemba, Gupteswar Patel and Samuel Arion, who brought in new aspirations for me during the writing of this doctoral thesis. I thank Fendi R. Widianto at the University of Queensland and Sidiq Madya at Stockholm University for their helps in arranging the thesis layout.
Personally, writing and conducting research for this thesis has been a remarkably memorable journey. Then last but not least, I would also like to appreciate the examiners who will have taken the time to critically evaluate this doctoral thesis and open a new path for this document, increasing the standard of this thesis to a higher level through their constructive comments and feedback.
xi Table of Contents
Declarations ...... ii
Glossary ...... iii
Acronym ...... v
Timeline of Events- Babakan Siliwangi ...... vi
Abstract ...... ix
Acknowledgement ...... x
Table of Contents...... xii
Chapter 1. Introduction ...... 1
1.1 Research Aim ...... 1
1.2 Background and Research Questions ...... 2
1.2.1 Activism in Public Space ...... 2
1.2.2 Using Bourdieu to Study Activism ...... 4
1.2.3 Framing the Research Questions ...... 6
1.2.4 Research Questions...... 6
1.3 Context: Indonesian Youth and Symbolic Violence in the Arena of Formal Politics .. 7
1.4 Contextualising Youth Activism in Bandung ...... 8
1.5 Research Significance ...... 11
1.6 Organisation of the Thesis ...... 12
Chapter 2. Literature Review ...... 15
2.1 Introduction ...... 15
2.2 State Politics ...... 16
2.2.1 Authoritarian States Dealing with High-risk Activism ...... 17
2.2.2 Democratic States Dealing with High-risk Activism ...... 18
2.3 The Organisation of Social Movements ...... 20
2.4 Family ...... 25
2.4.1 Family Political Orientation ...... 25
2.4.2 The Shaping of Environmentalism within the Family...... 26
2.5 University as Pedagogical Space for Activism ...... 27
xii 2.6 Biographical Availability ...... 29
2.6.1 Family Commitments ...... 30
2.6.2 Individual Social Responsibility ...... 30
2.6.3 Unemployment ...... 31
2.6.4 Deep Connection to Nature ...... 32
2.7 Conclusion ...... 33
Chapter 3. Theoretical Considerations ...... 34
3.1 Introduction ...... 34
3.2 Habitus, Cultural Capital, Social Capital and Field...... 34
3.2.1 Habitus ...... 34
3.2.2 Cultural Capital and Social Capital ...... 36
3.2.3 Field ...... 39
3.2.4 Feel for the Game ...... 40
3.3 Radical Habitus...... 41
3.4 Ecological Habitus ...... 43
3.4.1 Ecological Habitus Leading to An Environmental Movement ...... 46
3.5 Conclusion ...... 48
Chapter 4. Methodology ...... 49
4.1 Introduction ...... 49
4.2 Researching the Development of Habitus ...... 50
4.3 Research Design ...... 51
4.3.1 Biographical Trajectory and Narrative Interviews ...... 51
4.3.2 Focus Group Discussion ...... 53
4.3.3 Participant Observation ...... 54
4.4 Data Analysis ...... 57
4.5 Research Ethics ...... 58
4.6 Conclusion ...... 58
Chapter 5. Setting the Scene - Babakan Siliwangi City Forest ...... 60
5.1 Introduction ...... 60
5.2 The Impact of Economic Decentralisation on Bandung ...... 61
xiii 5.3 Babakan Siliwangi Forest as Public Space in Bandung City ...... 62
5.3.1 Evolution of Usage and Recognition ...... 64
5.3.2 Ecological Significance ...... 64
5.3.3 Cultural and Artistic Significance ...... 66
5.3.4 Significance for Young People ...... 71
5.3.5 Significance for Children ...... 75
5.4 Urban Protest ...... 77
5.5. Conclusion ...... 79
Chapter 6. ‘Being’ an Environmental Activist ...... 80
6.1 Introduction ...... 80
6.2 Educational Profile ...... 80
6.3 Family Life ...... 81
6.4 Distinction – Going ‘Green’ ...... 82
6.4.1 Ethical Consumption ...... 82
6.4.1 Mobility ...... 85
6.4.2 Leisure and Fashion ...... 86
6.4.3 Participating in Public Space Events ...... 87
6.5 Conclusion ...... 89
Chapter 7. Childhood Experiences in Family and School ...... 91
7.1 Introduction ...... 91
7.2 Parents’ Pro-Environmental Behaviour ...... 91
7.3 Outdoor Activities ...... 95
7.4 Parents’ Political Engagement ...... 98
7.5 Participating in the Scouts ...... 100
7.6 The Early Influence of Books ...... 102
7.7 Learning about Nature from Science Subjects ...... 105
7.8 Negative Experiences ...... 106
7.9 Conclusion ...... 110
Chapter 8. Pre-University Activism ...... 111
8.1 Introduction ...... 111
xiv 8.2 Science Courses ...... 111
8.3 Dealing with Nature and Wilderness ...... 114
8.4 Literature that Shapes Activism ...... 118
8.5 Music ...... 126
8.6 Movies that Re-invigorated an Activist Attitude ...... 131
8.7 Volunteering for Disaster Relief ...... 132
8.8 Conclusion ...... 134
Chapter 9. Getting into Radical Activism ...... 135
9.1 Introduction ...... 135
9.2 Greenpeace ...... 135
9.3 Entering the Field of Activism: Getting into Greenpeace Activism ...... 137
9.4 The Learning Path to Activism ...... 141
9.4.1 Non-Violent Direct Action Bootcamp ...... 141
9.4.2 Learning in Jumpa Militan (Meeting of Militants) ...... 143
9.5 The Formation of Backsilmove ...... 145
9.6 Creative Arts Repertoire ...... 153
9.7 Conclusion ...... 155
Chapter 10. Backsilmove’s Repertoires of Resistance...... 157
10.1 Introduction ...... 157
10.1.1 Prior Solidarity Forged in Greenpeace Indonesia ...... 157
10.2 The Long March and Pantomime as Symbolic Resistance ...... 159
10.2.1 The Long March ...... 159
10.2.2 Pantomime ...... 161
10.3 On the Day of Protest ...... 162
10.4 Narrative Behind the Symbolic Resistance ...... 172
10.4.1 Getting Political Rights Back ...... 172
10.4.2 Breaking the Image of Youth as the Politically Marginalised Group ...... 173
10.5 Conclusion ...... 175
Chapter 11. Synthesis of Findings...... 177
11.1 Introduction ...... 177
xv 11.2 Emergence ...... 179
11.2.1 Childhood ...... 179
11.2.2 The Local Context ...... 181
11.2.3 Political Pre-Socialisation ...... 182
11.2.4 Science Learning ...... 184
11.3 Encouragement ...... 185
11.3.1 Gravitating to Greenpeace ...... 186
11.3.2 The Formation of Radical Activist Disposition ...... 187
11.4 Consolidation ...... 190
11.4.1 Gaining Movement Capital ...... 190
11.4.2 The Appropriation of Cultural Capital for Backsilmove ...... 191
11.4.3 Space of Resistance for Regaining Youth Power ...... 192
11.5 Conclusion ...... 194
Chapter 12. Conclusion and Recommendation ...... 195
12.1. Conclusive Findings ...... 195
12.2 Theoretical Implications ...... 197
12.3 Limitations of the Study ...... 197
12.3.1 Gender Differences amongst the Activists ...... 198
12.3.2 Linguistic Habitus...... 198
12.2.3 Research Timeframe ...... 199
12.3 Implications for Further Study ...... 199
References ......
Appendix 1 List of Respondents ...... 224
Appendix 2 Human Research Ethics Document ...... 226
xvi Table of Figures
Figure Description Page 1.1 Bandung city in Indonesia 1 5.1 Babakan Siliwangi urban forest landscape 62 5.2 Different tree species enrich the ecological function of 64 Babakan Siliwangi 5.3 The walkway which was constructed in 2011 65 5.4 Arts Workshop (Sanggar Olah Seni) in Babakan 66 Siliwangi urban forest 5.5 Lingga-Yoni stones in the forest 67 5.6 Goat Fighting Festival 68 5.7 Ngalokat: A Sundanese ritual 69 5.8 Sunday Smile Picnic 71 5.9 Colour Run organised by Indonesian Computer Studies 72 University (UNIKOM) students 5.10 REGIA: The Story of the Urban Forest 73 10.1 A Backsilmove poster publicising the Long March in 156 2013
xvii CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTION
1.1 Research Aim This doctoral study explores how young people gravitated towards environmental activism to advocate the saving of the city forest Babakan Siliwangi in Bandung, Indonesia. The evolution of the successful struggle is summarised in the timeline at the start of the thesis. It is important to grasp the location of the city of Bandung. The following figure shows the location of Bandung in Indonesia and the location of Bandung in West Java.
Figure 1.1 Bandung City in Indonesia
Source: Tarigan, A.K.M, Sagala, S., Samsura, A.D.A., Fiisabiilillah, D.F., Simarmata, H.A., Nababan, M. (2008)
In Bandung, the government's decision to open the heritage-valued city forest Babakan Siliwangi to commercial development in 2009/2010 (see the timeline) threatened the viability of one of the few remaining public arenas in the city where young people gathered and
1 exercised their creativity. That government decision directly threatened the public social participation of young people in Bandung. However, when this development plan for Babakan Siliwangi became public knowledge among social activists and creative artists in Bandung, protest groups quickly emerged. Later the organisation known as Backsilmove was formed in early 2012 to create well-planned direct resistance to the alliance of the Bandung city government and the development company PT EGI. In 2013 the campaign proved successful and the Babakan Siliwangi city forest was saved from developers. This thesis project is dedicated to the courage of Backsilmove activists in fighting to successfully preserve the urban forest for the future of young people in Bandung. Data for the project were collected from activists using the methods of interviewing and participant observation.
1.2 Background and Research Questions
1.2.1 Activism in Public Space Occupying public space for activism occurs when political pressure is applied by urban citizens against a regime whose policy is in contrast with their collective ideals. In the past five years, the political map of the world has been shaken by a variety of protests carried out by young people operating as activists. For example, the Umbrella Movement in September 2014 marked one of the biggest political battles in Hong Kong. Here street activism was undertaken by the majority of young people in the city (Chan, 2014; Lee & Chan, 2016; see also Ortmann, 2015). The active protest phase lasted for more than two weeks. Through boycott action, long marches, sits-ins and street campaigns, the Umbrella Movement demanded the suspension of the political grip of authoritarian Beijing on Hong Kong in the Legislative Council. Despite taking place peacefully and without violence, more than 200 activists were arrested by police (Lee, 2015; Mak & Chan, 2016; Fung & Su, 2016) for allegedly provoking the people and inciting other groups to form alliances. So, in spite of it being a peaceful movement, the young activists were at risk. Being arrested in those circumstances can be categorised as high-risk because it exposed the young activists to unprecedented consequences and potential losses on the charge that they had participated in an anti-social movement (Almeida, 2008). Moreover, after they were arrested, they might unexpectedly be prone to physical assault in later detention as committed by the authorities (see Einwohner, 2004). In this thesis, the term ‘high-risk activism’ refers to public protest on the street or in any place where protestors are likely to be arrested. It may be contrasted with low-risk activism, where members of social movements carry out activist actions that do not
2 expose them to such high risks. Of course, both forms of activism are necessary for a social movement to survive and succeed.
Bäck, Teorell and Westholm (2011) propose that the participation of young people in high- risk activism worldwide has already refined the discourse of activism in the global arena. This is because it is significantly marked by their appearance in occupation of public space, which they appropriate as political space to express their views to the government. Despite public space being accessible to all citizens from all walks of life (in principle), it nonetheless remains politically dangerous in many countries for activists to enact acts of resistance as a peaceful movement against a ruling party or regime. They are at risk of being arrested by the police. They endure the threat of random physical abuse on the spot or in the form of continued state surveillance after the event (Almedia, 2008). Such risks are unavoidable when someone puts themselves in public space for resistance. This hold true regardless of the form of the state, be it authoritarian or democratic (Dixon & Roscigno, 2003; Romanos, 2014).
Activism is adopted as a strategy when a government policy or state constitution does not find favour with a section of the citizenry. It may be guided by radical ideology to create political pressure (Whiteley, 1995). Yet individuals embark on high-risk activism for multifaceted reasons. For instance, some previous studies have argued that activist participation in attitudinal terms is prefigured by their previous participation in activism (Tindal, 2002; Nepstad, 2009). On the other hand, possession of relevant resources and capital can also specify ways to access a movement that is seen to represent collective interests (Almedia, 2008). According to Shriver & McAdam (2009), biographical availability and other allied life-course factors may develop their behavioural disposition for being engaged in a specific social movement (see also Wiltfang & McAdam, 1991). In summary, those people who have spare time and available opportunity, no dependents, financial stability and internal motivations, are believed to participate more readily in activism in the public space. Thus, well-educated young people are involved more often. External structures such as a crisis political situation in a country can also play a role (Goldstone & Tilly, 2001; Meyer, 2004; Nepstad, 2004; Stotik, Shriver & Cable, 1994; Wilfgang & McAdam, 1991).
However, there is not much literature on the participation of individuals in high-risk activism according to structural as well as attributable forces. It seems sociological scholars rarely
3 frame discussion about how individual motivation and social structures combine in the decision to conduct activism. Accordingly, this doctoral study contributes to building knowledge about the social processes through which some young people gravitate to high- risk activism. Bourdieu’s notions of ‘habitus’ (1984), ‘social capital’ and ‘cultural capital’ (1986), as well as ‘field’ and ‘feel for the game’ (Bourdieu, 1985) provide a cogent theoretical framework to anchor the interpretation of data in this thesis.
1.2.2 Using Bourdieu to Study Activism Although it is not often mentioned today, Bourdieu’s close observation of the revolutionary movement in May 1968 in Paris prompted him to try and understand the emergence of an activism culture in that period. Thus, over 50 years ago, Bourdieu undertook observations of police actions against the young activists and university students who joined the Paris street revolution in May 1968. He observed that those who gravitated into high-risk activism demonstrated particular social traits. First, they had grown up in educated, middle class families. Second, there was a powerful social network among activists (Bourdieu, 1999). Moreover, the intense cultural inequality in France, which derived in large part from the education system, conditioned them to join the revolutionary movement in Paris. This suggests that the embodiment of political and cultural identity involved in becoming an activist by the individual cannot be separated from the collective effects of the surrounding social structures (Sherkat & Blocker, 1994). The prevailing social structures are represented not only by governments and institutions, but by families, communities and organisations. These entities influence both attitudinal propensity and preferred choice (Bruni, 2013). Through this conceptual assumption about the dialectical relationship between the individual and social structures in making activist choices, this doctoral study applies Bourdieu’s concepts of habitus, social and cultural capital, field, and feel for the game, to consider how young people might be attracted to join an inclusive group of environmental activists.
In the Bourdieusian approach, becoming an activist in hazardous terrain may be seen as a winding journey filled with stormy challenges (Schultz, 2007). It is not attractive to everyone. From the lens of habitus (Bourdieu, 1984), becoming an activist may begin with a political disposition in the family milieu that is influential during childhood. Overall, middle class families are considered most viable in nourishing the necessary ‘cultural capital’ (Bourdieu 1986) in order to compete in the field of contentions (Taylor, 1989). Not only that, Passy and
4
Giugni (2001) found that the institutionalised cultural capital of middle-class families and education can equip young people with specific abilities to compete that can be converted into productive capital that favours the activist recruitment process. Later, in the moment of an emergent crisis, they are well equipped to mobilise their advantageous cultural and social capitals to build a movement repertoire for creating change. This is enhanced by the learning experience of prior work in activism (Haveman, Rao, & Paruchuri, 2007). Thus, becoming an activist is a journey that involves a set of particular trajectories, articulated in part by class position.
A Bourdieusian approach is also cogent in other ways to support this doctoral project. In terms of understanding social life, Bourdieu proposed the concept of the logic of practice (Bourdieu, 1990). In this notion, he considers the generative schemes underlying social action, productive schemes of understanding that are experienced by every member of the group. Bourdieu regards habitus as driven by the logic of practice. Habitus is not static, but a dynamic path of individual self-construction that involves further changes as life unfolds. Bourdieu claimed that orchestrated improvisation as a part of generative disposition development is shaped through the collective enterprise of inculcation and deployment in the cultural milieu of individuals. The collective inculcation process produces a habitus that is capable of generating practices without express regulation or any ‘institutionalised call to order’ (Bourdieu, 1977, p. 17).
Bourdieu’s ideas have been used to develop the framework of ecological habitus, a durable yet changeable system of ‘ecologically relevant dispositions, practices, perceptions, and material conditions’ (Kasper, 2009, p. 319). Haluza-Delay (2008) claims ecological habitus is embedding sustainability as lived habitual practice, an ingrained ‘mental disposition’ (Swartz, 2002, p. 65). Notably, ecological habitus points to a ‘a feel for the game’ of environmentalism (Gäbler, 2015, p. 78). The disposition of ecological habitus generates particular social practices to ‘fit the field’ of local circumstances (Gäbler, 2015, p. 81), including the ability to play out strategies in local politics. This important concept is used throughout the thesis to consider the data collected about Backsilmove activists.
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1.2.3 Framing the Research Questions This doctoral study seeks to explore multilayer trajectories that young people in Bandung took through their decisions to join a local environmental movement called Backsilmove, which campaigned to save the Babakan Silwangi city forest from the incursion of developers. Kalland and Person (2013) point out that the environmental movement is a setting full of political contestation between activists and developers, as well as the government, so pro and anti-government actors might become involved. Specifically, the right of political expression in public has been recognised in Indonesia since 2000. Yet, even so, threats to activists against injustice always occur in metropolitan Bandung (Hoediyatno, 2012). In regard to that political context, activism in the public sphere cannot be isolated from risks to activists themselves.
This doctoral study looks at the risky social trajectories of young activists aged 19-30 years who joined Backsilmove, the movement described above. The focus of investigation is on how they developed the socio-cultural values of activism from the family and school context. It is proposed that from families and schools they inculcated a habitus that valued not only activism, but affinity with the natural environment. The study looks at the forms of cultural capital that they got in the family, school and in relevant organisations that moulded their pro-environment attitudes and encouraged a strong desire to defend the environment. The facility of environmental organisations to act as learning environments for activism will be scrutinised in this thesis. Early experiences of activism may frame the young activists’ later thinking and their collective acts in high-risk street activism. It is hoped that this doctoral thesis can map the complexity of interactions between habitus and cultural capital which shaped young activists’ logic of practice within the movement to save the city forest.
1.2.4 Research Questions As stated above, the aim is to explore how young people gravitated towards environmental activism to advocate the saving of the city forest Babakan Siliwangi in Bandung Indonesia. The specific research questions are:
1. What was the process by which an environmental activist habitus was formed in their early life experiences in the family and in the school, and in relation to the development of cultural capital?
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2. How did the young people develop pro-environmental values in their early social milieux and later organisational memberships that fostered a sense of affinity to the environment and a desire to actively defend it in the field? 3. What was the nature of the social learning that many of them experienced during earlier training and activities with Greenpeace Indonesia, which served as a pedagogic agent and gave them a feel for the game of public activism?
1.3 Context: Indonesian Youth and Symbolic Violence in the Arena of Formal Politics Young people in Indonesia have experienced symbolic violence in the context of formal politics. In mainstream discourse about young people in Indonesia, they are often seen as an unstable group, immature and delinquent (Sen & Hill, 2006; Holzner & Oetomo, 2004), especially if they take to the streets to protest. White (2007) records that Indonesian youth, even in the post-1998 reform period, were still seen as a wasteful deviant group that did not contribute to the political achievement of Indonesia. Policy makers in the country treat them using a deficit approach, without even considering their merits (White, 2007). Indonesian media also significantly contribute to constructing young people as a vulnerable group, yet which conversely jeopardises the social system as it stands (Juliastuti, 2006). The weakening of political participation by young people since 1998 has been exacerbated by the absence of public spaces as arenas where they can actualise their talents, mobilise their generation, show the results of their creativity and build networks (Kustianingrum et al., 2013; Wicandra & Angkadjaja, 2006). This is exactly the situation that occurred in Bandung in 2009/2010 when city developers and government ministers colluded to push for commercial development in the Babakan Siliwangi city forest, a favoured place for young people to gather and express themselves creatively.
Although Indonesia experienced a new turn of democracy following 1998, the cultural position of young people in the political map of Indonesia remains at the periphery. Earlier, the authoritarian era of Suharto constructed young people as an immature political group, whose members could be a threat to political order (Azca & Sutopo, 2012). Later, through the Act of 40/2009, issued by Indonesia’s Ministry of Youth and Sports, young people’s rights were recognised when the government acknowledged their existence in the state legislation. However, the Act of 40/2009 was not scaffolded to educational reform so as to inculcate a logic of practice for Indonesian youth to gain the crucial power of defending their political rights (Azca & Sutopo, 2012). The decline in youth participation in Indonesian politics is
7 possibly due to economic globalisation, which prompts them to secure decent employment rather than working in the field of politics. Commercialisation of the education sector, the formalisation of politics and the lure of a trendy lifestyle mean that young people are stepping away from the world of political movements (Sujito, 2011, p. 41).
On the other hand, Sutopo, Nilan and Threadgold (2017) assert that there is more recognition now of youth politics, even if it is in a nascent form. The idealism of Indonesian youth for environmental and political change still exists. Nowadays, many kinds of social movements are evident and they are more inclusive. Significantly, there are members of study groups and intra and extra-campus organisations working on political alliances for various issues such as anti-corruption, enforcement of human rights, democracy and environmental conservation. They have become resistance forces against social injustice in the country (Rosser, 2015). The means of resistance that is adopted is no longer conventional. It has a more transnational appearance due to network leveraging and social media (Sujito, 2011, pp. 41-42). Nevertheless, in the national discourse about youth in Indonesia, young peoples’ political participation is still less regarded. The creative side of their political engagement, their distinctive logic of practice based on youth culture, has been little explored in formal studies.
1.4 Contextualising Youth Activism in Bandung The risk of urban development does not gain much attention from experts and social scientists in Indonesia. The risk of urban development points to potential vulnerabilities that community members may experience. In contrast, the risk of natural disasters has been academically scrutinised through ‘hard’ sciences such as climatology, meteorology and biology. Yet, disasters caused by human activities (anthropocentric acts) rarely gain so much attention in academic studies (Diley, 2006; Guha-Sapir, Hoyois & Below, 2013). However, the risks of urban development are significant for local populations. In Indonesia, substantial urban development risks emerge as a result of social, economic and political changes in the country and they pose a threat to various groups or communities (Wisner, 2008). The Sundanese city of Bandung is one such example. Like other provincial and city governments, the government of Bandung gained considerable autonomy after the political crisis in 1998. Decentralisation Law UU No 24 1999 (and numerous later amendments to this legislation) distributed decision-making power away from the central government, which had made all decisions under the authoritarian regime of President Suharto.
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Following decentralisation, local governments were supposed to implement regional autonomy missions. The goal was to foster more transparent governance, free from corruption. While decentralisation was intended to expand economic growth and improve good governance, it was also supposed to protect and maintain the natural environment. However, the new powers of decentralised local government were considerably abused in some cases (see Mietzner, 2014). Local government officials were not always to be trusted. Various high profile cases of corruption that emerged from the period 2000 to 2016 indicate that, at the municipal level in Indonesia, decentralisation practices are at the very least uneven. The case of the opening of Babakan Siliwangi city forest to commercial development is one example, since Bandung government officials stood to potentially gain from the endeavour. Using the promise of economic growth to leverage domestic revenue, the municipal government under the leadership of city mayor Dada Rosada distorted its authority to cooperate with the development company PT Esa Gemilang Indah (PT EGI). The covert plan was to privatise Babakan Siliwangi urban forest. Notably, Dada Rosada promoted himself in his role as a devout Muslim leader. Yet, he abused the theological ruling of iman dan taqwa (faith and submission to God) in his mission to serve the people of Bandung. He created the impression through his profession of faith that he was creating good governance and avoiding corruption. Yet Dada Rosa twisted his mandate as city mayor of Bandung at that time by involving himself in the PT EGI contract. Finally, in May 2012 he was arrested by the Indonesian Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) on charges of corruption and embezzlement of the public budget (Martokusumo & Zulkaidi, 2015). Backsilmove played a role in bringing him to justice by attracting so much public attention to the city forest commercialisation proposal.
As the example demonstrates, local leaders such as governors and mayors do not take sufficient account of the presence of civil society networks consisting of critical young people and political activists. These networks are important; they become local epistemic communities that conduct surveillance on urban governance. Reflecting on the collapse of the Babakan Siliwangi urban forest commercialisation plan, the municipal government seemed to be locked into the New Order way of thinking that supervision and control of the people can be maintained because civil society is weak and silent. Yet, actually the fall of the New Order regime in 1998 created freedom for civil society organisations in Indonesia to extend the political support of the masses in monitoring the government. In recent times, concern for the
9 environment has been a crucial conduit for civil society organisations to gain powerful oppositional power against the government.
In Indonesia, cities have grown exponentially, offering few green spaces. Pro-growth urban planning and fast-tracked development have reduced physical public urban space. Where they exist, urban spaces are littered and polluted cement wastelands. There is little regulation of polluting activities and minimal public consciousness of uncontrolled building and industrial development. Decentralisation has accelerated the flow of investment into urban areas (Aritenang, 2013) and the consequences of untrammelled development have been disastrous. A recent study reveals rapid land use changes, unmanageable traffic conditions and uncontrolled population (Arifwidodo, 2014, p. 243). Lack of regulation, accountability and proper planning have caused recurring problems that the local government has not been able to control. Nevertheless, environmental groups, often founded and led by young people, try to raise the consciousness of the population to bring about the greening and recuperation of inner city spaces (Nilan, 2015).
That kind of process is certainly happening in Bandung. Pro-environmental initiatives by NGOs in Bandung are primarily driven by the educated middle class, which is critical of uncontrolled urban development. In the inner-city area of Bandung, where the research project was conducted, there were at least 20 identified environmental organisations led by young people up until 2013 (Suharko et al., 2014). The nexus of environmentalism in Bandung is intertwined with the establishment of the Bandung Creative City Forum (BCCF). BCCF enables accessible networking and exchange for young people to start up creative entrepreneurial works. BCCF facilitates exchanges of information and knowledge amongst young activists and environmental organisations including Forum Hijau Bandung (Bandung Green Forum, founded in 2010). Bandung has been fortified by the establishment of environmental groups such as Bandung Berkebun (Bandung Urban Gardening), Green Map Bandung, Yayasan Biosains (Bioscience Foundation), U-Green of Bandung Technological Institute, Culindra, Bird Watching Foundation, Greeneration, Green Youth Coalition and Universitas Padjajaran Green ID (Suharko et al., 2014). Some of these organisations have extended their affiliation to other cities to create alliances and reach out to young constituents. For example, in collaboration with Greenpeace Jakarta, Greenpeace Bandung has endeavoured to revive the natural course of the Citarum River, which flows between Jakarta and Bandung. For environmental activists in Bandung, it seems that through their
10 experience of nature and their early community awareness, a merging of the self with the environment occurs such that a motivation towards and commitment to environmental activism emerges. In short, they share a collective ‘green’ identity (Alam & Nilan, 2015).
In this context, it is suggested that Backsilmove emerged as a transformative player, shifting the consciousness of the urban citizen to alternative acts for making the city sustainable. Backsilmove itself emerged from the struggle for public space advocacy. The young activists who founded Backsilmove used resistance acts deliberately derived from their previous experiences with Greenpeace Indonesia (Suharko et al., 2014). Compared to the other environmental organisations headquartered in metropolitan Bandung, Backsilmove appears more distinctive, particularly when it comes to activist strategies, which were developed in global environmental campaigns targeting matters such as waste impacts in the Pacific Ocean, the extinction of endangered species, and the expansion of palm oil plantations in Indonesia. The Backsilmove repertoire of protest actions aimed at provocative mass mobilisation in several public spots in the city area. It was also noted during fieldwork for the doctoral project that the young activists of Backsilmove were more left-wing minded or radical than members of other pro-environmental organisations in the city. It seems that their activist disposition – as a component of habitus – was informed by the strategies and stances of their previous political activities (Hung, 2011, p. 578). Previous activism experiences included campaigning, activist boot camp, direct civil actions and other events offered by Greenpeace to new recruits. From this viewpoint, it seems that becoming an activist rested on a collective effort that involved knowledge acquisition and initiatives made by local environmental action groups (Li, 2007).
1.5 Research Significance The introductory discussion above has charted out some major concerns regarding urban development, with special emphasis on Bandung. This research project on youth involvement in urban environmentalism is significant for Indonesia, where urban development is still not properly planned to benefit local populations and ecosystems. Urban development projects often offend the senses, perspectives and idealism of people at the grassroots level. In this research project, environmental movements are considered as alternative radical pathways for preserving forest space within cities. Green areas such as city forests provide not only physical space for residents, but offer socially interactive spaces for all members of the
11 society who want to get close to nature, especially young people who need the opportunity to gather, socialise and be creative. When massive commercialisation threatens to destroy a city forest, urban residents risk the loss of their spiritual involvement with nature, which often embodies solid ties with cultural symbolism and traditions. Once the green space is gone, they will no longer have access to the varying social advantages offered by a city forest (Dwyer, Schroeder & Gobster, 1991). One of the key environmental movement themes for an urban revolution is to reorient urban space management away from the government towards the active and creative supervision of urban space by the public (Lefebvre, 2003). Young people have every reason to feel concerned, since they will literally inherit the earth. We know that the period of youth and emerging adulthood is an important time of transition to adult roles and responsibilities, including civic engagement (Arnett, 2006).
Due to their strong idealism and energy, pro-environmentalist youth organisers seem to be effective in reaching out to other young people and members of their communities (Riemer & Patterson, 2009). Viewing the progressive involvement of youth in the Save Babakan Siliwangi Movement, it seems that young people could, despite small numbers, make a great contribution to city forest conservation. In the global context, young people remain subject to marginalisation because of their youth and what could be considered their inappropriate manners. They are often deemed to be troublemakers and are generally disconnected from societal norms, using their own ways and means to create disobedient space. The findings of this research project will inform our knowledge about reclaiming community life and the political sphere through the involvement of young people (see Wyn & White, 1997).
Academically, there has been an increase in the number of publications discussing Indonesian youth, particularly in the domains of sexuality, cultural practices, religion, globalisation and hybrid culture, violence and mobility. However, few studies so far have traced the trajectory of young activists in environmental movements. Also, that same topic does not yet enjoy much attention from international youth scholars, hence, young Indonesian environmentalists seem to be under-researched. This doctoral thesis hopes to fill that gap.
1.6 Organisation of the Thesis Chapter Two offers a review of the literature. It considers previous studies on a variety of conditions related to institutional structures, personal motivations, and mode of political
12 participation. There is a focus on factors that trigger individuals to embark on high-risk activism or radical social movements in various parts of the world. It is concluded that individuals participating in high-risk activism have been influenced by the social milieu surrounding them such as family conditions, critical education, and previous intense interaction with a wider group of activists.
Chapter Three provides discussion of the theoretical framework of the thesis. It covers the use of Bourdieusian concepts such as habitus, cultural and social capital, the field and the feel for the game. Bourdieu’s ideas were chosen as the main theoretical framework based on extensive review of previous studies about youth involvement in high-risk activism.
Chapter Four elaborates on social constructivism as an inquiry approach to analyse the experiences from narratives given by Backsilmove activists in interviews. The chapter also outlines the ethnographic fieldwork with young activists in Bandung.
Chapter Five sets the scene for the subsequent substantive data analysis chapters by looking at the context of Babakan Siliwangi forest from the colonial period to the present day. In addition, the chapter covers the social significance of this urban forest as a conservation arena for Sundanese culture. The significance of the forest as a location of youth networking in Bandung is detailed.
Chapter Six describes the habitus of Backsilmove activists involved in the study. These profiles explore the economic and social background of the activists, including education, parents’ occupations, peer socialisation, ownership of books at home, access to information technology and the use of social media to communicate with parents. The emphasis is also on inherited and acquired cultural capital.
Chapter Seven explores the formation of pro-environmental attitudes and action through education in the family and at primary school level. For activists, family served to form a great sense of affinity with nature through daily co-experience with parents and siblings. Meanwhile, the school helped to develop their love for the environment through science lessons and outdoor activities that stimulated their imagination.
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Chapter Eight reviews the environmental activities of the activists under scrutiny, while they were still at secondary school. This chapter explores their subjective views developed through outdoor activities held by schools and groups. It also considers the cognitive benefits of reading inspirational non-fiction and fiction books.
Chapter Nine considers the active participation of activists before forming Backsilmove. Their stories point to campaign activities in public spaces and NVDA boot camps organised by Greenpeace. In this chapter we take a closer look at the activation of habitus in the radical formation process and the feel for the game in activism through internalisation in the radical community. Moreover, before being invited to join Greenpeace, the activists experienced close friendship with members. Later they campaigned on social media and had intense interaction with senior activists. When they were first exposed to Greenpeace environmental issues, this connected with the ‘ecological habitus’, which they had started to develop in the family and at school.
Chapter Ten describes spatially the creation of multiple repertoires of resistance that attracted much public attention to the campaign. This includes the long march from Babakan Siliwangi urban forest to the Gedung Sate parliament building in Bandung. This chapter also elaborates the philosophical framing behind the choices of repertoires of Backsilmove.
Chapter Eleven synthesises the project findings. By pulling the threads together through this chapter, the main concepts of habitus, cultural capital and field produce a conceptualisation of activist habitus formation that led to successful protest actions, and in the end, saved the Babakan Silwangi city forest for future generations in Bandung. Synthesis of findings takes place under three headings: Emergence, where their ‘ecological predisposition’ was evidently nurtured by family and school influences; Encouragement, which saw them connecting with significant others who were involved in the environmental movement; and Consolidation, marked by the creation of Backsilmove as a new movement and an organisation with a very specific local goal. In developing distinctive repertoires of resistance, their ecological habitus was consolidated by group action and success.
Chapter Twelve concludes the thesis. In this chapter, the author summarises the findings in relation to the research questions and discusses opportunities for further research.
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CHAPTER 2. LITERATURE REVIEW
2.1 Introduction The environmental movement has different characteristics from social movements in general, firstly in relation to the issue being advocated, and secondly in relation to constituency. The following definition is useful: An environmental movement may be defined as a loose, noninstitutionalised network of informal interactions that may include individuals as well as groups who have no organisational affiliation and organisations of varying degrees of formality that are engaged in collective action motivated by a shared identity of concern about environmental issues (Rootes, 2007, p. 723). Although in practice any environmental movement involves broad social justice issues, a primary focus is on making demands of authorities and corporations that they terminate their actions seen as damaging to the environment, and that threaten the lives of local communities who depend on sustainability of natural resources (Dryzek et al., 2003). Moreover, since the environmental movement has such defined targets of resistance, actions often involve a high- risk repertoire so that the pro-environmental demands are quickly presented to the authorities through media coverage (Manning, 2014). Finally, in order to carry out effective and targeted resistance, the environmental movement invites the active involvement of individuals as activists with a collective identity, reflecting their shared concern for environmental issues.
The strength of any environmental movement lies in its logic of practice, including orchestrated efforts and internal cooperation within the organisation. Smooth and effective operation is necessary to beat competing goals launched by authorities and uphold productive external disruptions (Rootes, 2007). Internal cooperation in this case cannot be separated from the significant roles of its activists, who volunteer and dedicate themselves to the achievement of the movement’s goals. However, the development of a specific environmental movement: the formation of the identity of its environmental activists, is rarely examined by environmental scholars. This thesis project considers the activist background profile for the successful efforts of Backsilmove. That environmental movement undertook some high-risk strategies. The repertoire of protest actions was staged by a group of young people in public space. The context was a precarious outpouring of resistance
15 against the corruption practised by elite groups in Bandung. It is therefore appropriate to group previous relevant studies under the following headings: State politics, organisation of social movements, family, university education, and biographical availability.
2.2 State Politics Individual political practice is a reflection of the political system in that country. In other words, political ideology inherent in the government of a state can determine the forms of political participation of its citizens. A social movement would then shape its repertoire of resistant actions in the given political and cultural setting (Meyer, 2004; Roscigno & Danaher, 2001). The nature of the political context and culture influences the forms of repertoire of social movements. This is a dialectic in which the structure itself may lay out choices for resistance acts as well as mobilisation strategies for the movement (Almeida, 2010). Yet at the same time, social movements can renew, or give birth to, a political system that is more acceptable to the community (Goldstone & Tilly, 2001). The question then is, how does a specific political system trigger the emergence of high-risk activism? Previous studies reveal that democratic and non-democratic regimes have different likelihoods of provoking high-risk activism (Almeida, 2005; Viterna, 2006). The consequences suffered by activists in these different kinds of regimes are heterogeneous. High-risk activism is likely to be dealt with by legal means in a democratic country. For instance, an activist may face trial to account for their actions after being called in by the authorities for an interrogation. On the other hand, they may be released without charge after questioning if there are no legal grounds for charging them. However, in state-authoritarian, non-democratic countries, activists are treated in more extreme ways. They often experience police harassment, physical assaults and death threats because they are seen to threaten the political stability in the country (Almeida, 2010). Accordingly, we need to critically evaluate the opportunity and constraint structure of activism so as to understand what individuals face when they are encouraged to participate in high-risk activism, since this is the phenomenon examined in this thesis.
The political system in each country mandates that a group of state institutions will ensure the cultural development of the nation and ensure that the rules on state welfare are enforced in accordance with the goals and ideology of the state. However, the context of enforcement varies greatly between democratic and non-democratic states. An early case study on
16 authoritarian states (Gordy, 1999) found that every citizen is pressured to appreciate the importance of cultural development, which can only be expressed through a single state institution. They are not allowed to channel different ideas and complaints through other institutional forms, the way it happens in democratic states. Furthermore, the single institutional apparatus of authoritarian states insists that citizens must be nationalistic and patriotic. Such states will use coercive action to carry out panopticon surveillance over the participation of the citizenry in the political sphere (Bilić, 2012). Yet the pressure creates resistance. High-risk activism is often encountered in a non-democratic state precisely because the state is run through the dominant political hegemony of a particular group. When this occurs, civil disobedience and acts of resistance may be visually performed as a set of actions that is beyond the conventional political system of the country (DiGrazia, 2014). In other words, a set of actions expressing radical opinions constitutes the high-risk activism. Such a form of activism matches the expressive opportunities is typically committed in a democratic state through the distribution of opinions through the people's representatives. However, in some cases, even countries that fully guarantee democracy increase the risks for activists. In Finland, for example, there was one case of high-risk activism when young people fought a campaign to protect forest ecosystems. A study assessing the involvement of youth in the Finnish environmental movement reported that 90 per cent of the youth members felt pressure when they protested against the government to halt a development that threatened the lives of forest animals (Paloniemi & Valnio, 2011). The pressure they encountered was demonstrated by threats sent to the court that conducted their legal trial. They were threatened because as young protesters they had disrupted the Nordic country’s harmonious life.
2.2.1 Authoritarian States Dealing with High-risk Activism Authoritarian states offer no flexibility for citizens to actively participate in monitoring the development progress of their own country. Hence, activism becomes a last resort for concerned individuals to voice their outrage over a government’s deficit in transparency. Disciplinary institutions have usually been prepared by authoritarian regimes to carry out repressive measures through arrest and police surveillance against those who act in opposition to the state. Studies outlining the relationship between social movements and the state in authoritarian settings suggest that when oppositional acts and popular contentions increase in number, then there is a rise in oppressive measures during that same period
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(Goodwin & Jasper, 2006; Goldstone & Tilly, 2001). In many cities in the world, oppressive measures have spawned the backfiring effect of even larger clashes between an activist movement, and the government and its supporters. Thus Goldstone and Tilly (2001) argue that both opportunity and threat need to be treated as collateral factors in decision making by resistance groups. Although a group may be aware of the possible collateral costs of an action, that group may decide to risk conducting a protest if the ideological costs of not acting seem too great in comparison (Goldstone & Tilly, 2001, p. 183). In the context of environmental movements in authoritarian states, members often advance contentious action and even increase their activities, to bring media and public attention to the matter at hand.
2.2.2 Democratic States Dealing with High-risk Activism Democratic regimes allow the creation of socially diverse civil society organisations, or NGOs (non-government organisations). NGOs allow citizens to articulate their discontent on outcomes in the political sphere and on problems caused by government action and inaction. However, despite the fact that NGOs are given freedom of expression, the democratic state often sets boundaries on what expressions can be made and how complaints ought to be articulated (Chandhoke, 2002). If the state perceives that an NGO is derailing the legitimacy of the state and provoking people to progressively engage in actions that threaten unity, the state may resort to exerting subversions to protect the citizenry as a whole, and to limit the scale of a resistance movement (Pleyers, 2010; Cunningham, 2003).
Yet nevertheless, the condition of democratic countries - characterised by openness and freedom of the press - is able to mediate the emergence of high-risk activism without punitive crackdowns. This mediation of high-risk activism happens when the mass media scales up public outrage based on the level of environmentalist concern (Connor, 2012). For example, Connor (2012) argues that exposure to information about the threat of devastating environmental loss can instigate new forms of action that gain wide support. In that situation, young people engage performatively in public spaces to tackle the crisis, and their actions are covered by the press. Currently, rapidly emerging environmental issues include climate change-associated disasters such as floods and landslides. Globally widespread information exchanges in the mass media actively shape young people's environmental awareness by revealing the contemporary hazards generated by climate change. Mass media exposure is a primary means through which youth are exposed to information about environmental threats
18 and risks. Risk perceptions are influenced by the mass media, which makes young people aware of the future environmental challenges. It has been claimed that the global narrative about the ecological crisis has rendered young people more aware of environmental risk and other forms of devastation. Such awareness comes side by side with global learning about other risks such as war, poverty, social equity, injustice and overpopulation (Clintron- Moscoso, 2010). All these problems are omnipresent in the media and other means of communication, especially online media and social media, with which youth are very familiar in their everyday lives. The impact of such news creates widespread concern about the future of coming generations and the environment. That kind of news shapes beliefs about future livelihoods and thus drives youth to politically engage themselves and navigate reviews of their actions towards societal problems (Strandbu & Skogen, 2010). At least one study suggests that young people join environmental organisations to enable them to take radical actions which are rooted in their distrust of politicians portrayed in TV media (Vukelij & Stabojevic, 2012).
Regardless of the regime, whether democratic or authoritarian, inner urban areas are locations that have high visibility, so they are usually chosen by activists to mobilise the masses. In addition, inner urban areas more readily attract the attention of the media because they are more accessible when activists mobilise to defend their campaign. According to Uitemark and Nicholls (2013), location choice for collective resistance prioritises high spectator access and visibility to the public. For Pleyers (2010), these are ‘spaces of experiences’ (p. 86) that enable ‘”occupation” and “reappropriation” of the streets which generally last a couple of hours’ (p. 87). The city is often selected as the main space of experience for activists, as it offers ‘places to experiment with new relationships and where alternatives are put into practice’ (Pleyers, 2010, p. 89). The central issue spearheaded by the activists in central civic space touches upon the public good, for instance, environmental crisis, racism, immigration and discrimination, health inequality, rights to education, rights to land for indigenous communities and water access for impoverished communities. An issue will win political support from the public at large if it reflects a livelihood problem that citizens experience in their day-to-day lives (Eddy, 2011; Viterna, 2006). When a crucial issue gains high public interest it can be incubated in the broader social movement and politicised through actions of resistance.
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2.3 The Organisation of Social Movements Organisational climate contributes to the formation of a spirit of activism for individuals who become involved in a social movement. A long time ago it was pointed out that active engagement in high-risk contention may be crucial in shaping political identity between the organization and its activists (Jenkins, 1983). To create a solid radical identity of individuals who volunteer for high-risk activism in the social movement, the organisation itself equips them with resources, space and communication networks (Bruni, 2013). Legitimacy in the context of activist mobilisation in public space is determined by the activists’ competence, not only in skills but in the development of critical political views.
Recruiting activists prepared to take risks is deemed effective for achieving the goals of a social movement (Bilić, 2012). In any organised act of resistance, the social movement itself must be able to effectively mobilise activists who can be relied on to comply with the movement goals (Shriver & Adam, 2009). Particularly in high-risk activism, movement organisation functions to ensure that the repertoire performed at risk in an urban physical space conveys a succinct message to the media and to the public (Almeida, 2005). Hence, social attachment and the network of member ties are expected to facilitate and sustain participation in high-risk activism (Dixon & Roscigno, 2003). With solid social ties, the actualisation of a radical self by activists will be easier to accomplish.
In one previous study, it was claimed that a sense of active engagement is advantageous for the volunteering activist, as they receive better rewards, privileges and incentives through dense interaction in the social movement (Bäck, Teorell & Westholm, 2011). The study also found that those members who claim to be radical activists will be granted more chances of expressing their political opinion within the organisation. At that point, expression of radicalisation became a space for consolidating in-group collectivism amongst the activists. Collectivism also served as an epistemic community for activists to strengthen their motivational orientation (Bäck, Teorell & Westholm, 2011). Mutual appreciation between likeminded members ensured their continued presence in the movement and was recognised as important by the movement organisation. Jost et al. (2009, p. 23) articulate this collective solidarity in terms of elective affinities. Elective affinities were claimed to constitute an existential motive for continued membership, where the radical activists felt protected by the wider community of activists. Equivalent findings emerge in Bilić’s study (2012), where the anti-war campaign activists also embodied a positive feeling of being engaged in the
20 intensive close network of activism. In order to maintain and strengthen the social affinities of activists, radical movement organisations sometimes conduct rites of passage and offer tangible material support (Nepstad, 2004).
The character of the environmental movement means that it relies heavily on the formation and maintenance of trust networks (Sønderskov, 2008). In an early study, it was found that young activists joined an environmental organisation expecting to lobby against the government, using the resources of the organisation to do so (Guha, 2002). Other studies suggest that ties to activist networks provided convenient mobility across different geographical locations (Bruni, 2013; Tarrow, 2005). Moreover, the social connections gained through joining a social movement allow a young activist to sustain motivation and intensify a stronger sense of engagement (Corrigall-Brown, 2012).
Existing environmental activists are certainly prominent in influencing and persuading potential activists to get involved in the movement (Tindall, 2004). Social networking with experienced activists plays an important role in the recruitment and self-involvement of new activists (see McAdam, 1986). Similarity of identity between potential and experienced activists affects the degree of subsequent self-involvement in environmental activism. For instance, when a new environmental issue arises, existing environmental activists will grow the network by contacting previously experienced activists, who used to be involved in earlier campaigns (Matsuba et al., 2012). This happens through various networks, including affinity groups, neighbourhood groups, meeting peers and environmental conferences (Arnold, Cohen & Warner, 2009; Flowers & Chodkiewicz, 2009).
It seems the effect of the rising growth of the movement is crucial for recruitment (Nepstad, 2004. This is probably because, during the inception phase of a radical new movement, organisers prefer those with prior experience of conducting high-risk activism. For example, Bilić’s findings (2012) indicate that activists who joined the anti-war campaign had previously participated in acts of enforcement of civil rights involving fights with the police. In the case of the environmental movement, high-risk activism is often performed as an alter- negotiation (see Pleyers, 2010) for the government or the company to quickly terminate the operation of the industry that damages the environment. Just like other acts of resistance, an environmental movement operates within the frames of time, location and setting (Staggenborg, 2011). These frames are intertwined with mobilisation of manpower as an
21 agentive resource. During rallies, individuals who are committed to the cause dedicate their energy to a successful end. So biographical availability is an important concept for understanding why some people get actively involved in an environmental movement, while some do not (Tindall, Davies, & Maubuoles, 2003).
The concept of ‘institutional centrality’ (Besharov & Smith, 2014, p. 369) is useful for understanding some cases where activism is re-born within institutions where it has potential proximity to the current social circumstances. ‘Institutional centrality’ refers to ‘the degree to which multiple logics are each treated as equally valid and relevant to organizational functioning’ (Besharov & Smith, 2014, p. 369). In the case of emergent activism, educational institutions may offer social learning for individuals to explore multiple ways of resolving contemporary social problems that occur at the local level. The logic of problem solving is very much defined by co-learning spaces such as student clubs or environment-related study groups in that institution. The knowledge practiced to tackle social problems is derived from everyday practices. The organisational functioning of educational instiution becomes nascent for the growing emergence of activists whenever intellectual institutions such as universities are located in the immediate area. Thus, an institution close by may play a role in the birth of a new activist movement (Berdegué, Bebbington & Escobal, 2015). Institutional centrality can be found in major cities in Indonesia, including Bandung in West Java. There are large universities like the Bandung Institute of Technology, Padjadjaran University, Telkom University and Parahyangan University that all stand in the central business district (CBD) of Bandung. As intellectual institutions, they contribute to supplying student members to local environmental causes (Suharko et al., 2014). In Indonesia, one study explored the rise of youth-based environmental organisations that target climate change, plastic waste, river contamination and water preservation (Suharko et al., 2014). It was shown that the rise of environmental activism initiated by Indonesian youth was closely linked to solid networking with notable universities like the University of Gadjah Mada and the University of Indonesia. Such universities provide a gathering space and opportunities in terms of access to membership in environmental and nature science study clubs and activity funding as well as affiliations with government sectors and non-government organisations. The universities themselves nurtured students’ practical skills in tackling environmental problems (Suharko et al., 2014; see also Nilan, 2017). In Bandung, the strategic centrality of key universities enabled students to engage in collaborative environmental work with non-government organisations, to build environmental entrepreneurship, and to establish idea-exchange
22 forums for working on local environmental issues (Alam, 2016). For researchers working on youth and environmentalism in Indonesia, these studies demonstrate the ways in which cities interconnect with educational institutions and non-government environmental organisations to become a fertile ground for the rise of youth-based environmental movements and also allow local environmental problems to become the focus of concerned groups. Thus educational institutions can play out as a form of informal learning pedagogy, as pinpointed by Crossley and Ibrahim (2012). The authors suggest that networks and clubs surrounding a university or campus are viable for the emergence of campus-based activism. This is because an educational institution operates as a tightly integrated political world within which information, rumours, resources and directives are likely to pass very quickly (Crossley & Ibrahim, 2012, p. 603). Networks of activists may function as incubators through identifiable foci such as student unions and student forums, which organise political discussion within the campus grounds (Crossley & Ibrahim, 2012). Thus, this doctoral study will contribute to the claim that university proximity is a fertile ground for the growth of the environmental movement (Fenton, 2013; see also Guha, 2014; Altbach, 2007).
The subjective expectation of individuals who engage in environmental activism is that they will learn about not only the paradigmatic practices of activism, but more about the goals of the movement itself. In the case of the global environmental movement, various studies deal with this subjective expectation. For example, in the anti-climate change movement, young people expect to get some previously hidden knowledge from the environmental movement (Sasser, 2014), despite the fact that environmental knowledge production is a complex process. This, however, remains a challenge for some environmental groups in Indonesia (Alam, 2015; Alam & Nilan, 2015; Suharko et al., 2014), in part because they are located in the arena of youth culture, and it is that aspect that draws young people in. For example, a study was conducted by Suharko et al. (2014) on the group Greenpeace Youth Bandung. As a Greenpeace-affiliated, semi-independent, youth environmental organisation, the group commonly used musical instruments while staging protests at a road blockade. Moreover, during the pre-movement launch, they held a concert of hip-hop music and screened environment-themed movies (Alam, 2015), which they promoted through social media. These features demonstrate the development of new forms of environmental activism in Indonesia. It seems that participating in a climate change advocacy-based environmental organisation is matched up to certain aspects of contemporary youth culture in the last decade (see Nilan & Wibowo, 2015; also Parker & Nilan, 2013).
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Environmental movements in several countries have included local issues as a way of recruiting their constituency. Localisation of environmental issues can pragmatically lead local community members to be more environmentally damage-conscious but it also creates long-lived engagement in some cases. Nilan and Wibowo (2015) described this through their ethnographic study of community mobilisation around environmental issues in Central Java. For example, the Tanam Merapi (Planting at Merapi) NGO worked to prevent extensive deforestation by encouraging narratives about the mystical side of nature. We planted banyans there. The villagers have a celebration called Mertibumi every year; it means thanksgiving from the society and blessings on the earth. So those trees we planted were later surrounded by crops. In the lead up to the celebration they are fenced with funeral fabric so it’s mystical and flowers are put there. Incense is burned in front of that tree, so it’s a mystical thing. This is a technique of using local wisdom to conserve water. The residents will not cut down those trees because the banyan is believed to contain spiritual energy while the tree itself actually conserves water (Informant, quoted in Nilan & Wibowo, 2015, p. 66). The quote above indicates that local narratives can be successful in mobilising public support for an environmental campaign. In the traditional context of Central Java, the mobilisation of sacred stories encouraged wide community participation. Nevertheless, it is also the case that appealing to people’s logic and rationality is also important in mobilising mass support for environmental campaigns (see Gibson-Wood & Wakefield, 2013). In some cases, the two are combined. For example, in their ethnographic research in Central Java, Nilan and Wibowo (2015) described the Kampung Hijau project – a long-term riverside greening endeavour. They detailed the lengthy process of teaching local people about littering as a cause of river flooding. It is hard to change the mentality of society that says just throw it in the river. To say ‘Do not put waste in the river’ is incredibly hard. And to make a movement to clean it is not easy either, but until now we have continued to press ahead. Now it’s okay as only about two per cent of them put waste in the river. It’s different than it was at first. But at first they just went back and forth putting waste into the river. The river itself was jammed full. (Informant, quoted in Nilan & Wibowo, 2015, p. 67). Examples from that 2015 Indonesian study illustrate how a strategic alliance with the local community to create public environmentalism is crucial for the sustainability of the environmental movement (see also Gibson-Wood & Wakerfield, 2013; Mol, 2010).
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2.4 Family The family is the place where young children learn models of political ideology in the first place, through practices informally taught by parents and relatives (Gaiser & Rijke, 2008). Their cultural and political socialisation involves the absorption of specific values and also of ideological practices which will later be developed as the children become adults.
2.4.1 Family Political Orientation In the childhood period, the family milieu performs a political socialisation role for the younger generation (Quintelier, 2015), through a variety of joint activities, both indoor and outdoor. The contribution of the family in instilling a left-wing ideology is apparently quite subtle (Uitemark & Nicholls, 2013). Yet at least one previous study established a positive correlation between parenthood and the tendency of individuals to participate in a social movement (Shriver & Adam, 2009). This positive correlation suggests that the children internalise how to think critically. They develop this facility through the provision of books in the home as well as the creation of a dialectic egalitarian space between children and parents (Miller, 2007). The findings of Kaplan and Shapiro’s early study (1998) on Vietnam anti-war activists in the United States highlighted that activists who were raised by left-wing leaning parents in the 1950s gravitated to high-risk activism. Moreover, they took up important leadership roles in the mobilisation of the anti-war movement in the 1970s. However, this holds true not just for left-wing political orientation. Right-wing activist socialisation is also rooted in the family environment. As children, right-wing activists were found to have grown up to embed a radical identity and attitude in accordance with the tradition in their families (Linden & Klandermans, 2007). Politically fanatical parents apparently condition their children to undertake particular things that are exactly similar to what they will later do inside and outside the home. Therefore, Klandermans (2013, p. 64) asserts that the family is an ideal cradle to nurture a subculture of radical right-wing beliefs, particularly in countries such as France, Italy and Belgium, where right-wing extremist movements emerge. For example, it has been claimed that in France, the family is used by the State to pass right-wing ideology to the younger generation (Bizeul, 2003). Some families created early exposure to activism by taking their children picketing whereas for others more general inspiration came from the significance of right-wing activism in their family history. In either case, it is clear that early political socialisation in the family equips activists with a
25 political disposition that gives them a head start for taking on activism opportunities later in life (Hensby, 2013).
However, early experiences in the family can also produce social dissonance in the adult life of the individual. Social dissonance appears as a form of resistance to socialisation by the individual’s family. Klandermans (2013) found that left-wing activists who had earlier been rejected by conservative family members or relatives were more intent on joining civil disobedience actions at their own risk. They defied the cultural expression of disengagement from significant others who had not supported their left-wing political ideology. As the level of stigmatization increasingly develops over time through engagement in high-risk activism, that person will actively seek other like-minded people, which favours the formation of a cohesive group for creating resistance to the status quo (Smith et al., 2011; Stockemer, 2014; Uitemark & Nicholls, 2013).
2.4.2 The Shaping of Environmentalism within the Family An orientation to environmentalism is likely formed in childhood. Environmental values and a sense of respect for nature may develop throughout the process of childhood development. Childhood is the period of time in which someone initially learns about their environment through direct observation and parental education by bringing them into nature-embodied activities (Prabawa-Sear & Baudains, 2011). The significance of a child’s exposure to nature cannot be neglected in understanding the inspiration for future environmental activism. At least one study shows that the environmental self is shaped through early experiences in nature (Matsuba & Pratt, 2013). Other studies on early exposure to nature in childhood also conclude that a young person can be socialised in environmental stewardship before they are grown up and have the opportunity to be involved in locally conducted environmental actions (Palmer, 2006). It has certainly been noted that exposure to, and experience of, environmental destruction has an impact on the possession of pro-environmental values (Kollmus & Agyeman, 2002).
The direct role of parents in shaping youth attitudes towards environmentalism primarily occurs when the child is aged 17 years and below. At this stage of life, parents may influence their views by giving examples of environmental catastrophes (Allen, Wicks & Schulte, 2013). As parents are living closely with the young person, they are ideal agents of cognitive
26 change for youth. Studies have strongly indicated the role of parents in future environmentalism by demonstrating how role models at home transfer knowledge about how to act as an activist against environmental threats (Arnold, Cohen & Warner, 2009; Petrie, 2004). For example, a generation of western parents saw massive youth rallies against industrialisation in their own youth in the 1960s. Such rallies were partly inspired by Rachel Carson’s book Silent Spring, which is estimated to be one of the greatest influences in propelling young people to take part in 1960s environmentalism (Arnold, Cohen & Warner, 2009). Earlier, Sherkat & Blocker (1994) argued that some environmental activists emulate the path of their parents, who were themselves engaged in activism. In summary, all social actors surrounding youth in their daily interaction, such as parents, relatives, teachers and older friends may act as role models for environmentalist identity construction (Kollmuss & Agyeman, 2002).
In the case of the development of an orientation to high-risk environmental activism, a person’s family can pass on strong values of the environment through practices of everyday life. Schreiner, Henriksen and Hansen (2005) elaborate that such environmental pedagogy is intertwined in the family through repeated conservation practices. On the other hand, an older-aged child requires a formative period to absorb those kinds of experiences (Hobbie, McLaren & Jackson, 2011; Kollmus & Agyeman, 2002; Matsubo & Pratt, 2013; Vallentyne, 2011). In a study conducted by Cianchi (2015) concerning the memories of anti-forest privatisation and anti-whaling activists, in one case, the long-term memory of living on a forested island was transformed into an urge to join the resistance movement when the forests were nearly demolished by the government.
2.5 University as Pedagogical Space for Activism A university is more than an institution for formal learning. It is a broad pedagogic space; a moral incubator; a critical thinking incubator. Moreover, the university is quintessentially a social place, shaping individuals and groups for the future, as explained by Stevens, Armstrong and Arum (2008, p. 132). Those authors point to the university as a social platform for individuals; a place that facilitates them in defining a cultural identity as desired. Engaging in university-based education can prefigure the person’s social process of self- identification,
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Selective four-year colleges and universities have been especially important both substantively and theoretically because they exemplify many other social processes such as legitimating, incubation and institutional interconnection that sociologists have found worthy of examination (Stevens, Armstrong & Arum 2008, p. 128). Incubation within the context of radical activism recognises the university as a space to explore and promote critical thinking for its students (Stevens, Armstrong & Arum, 2008). This happens through everyday interaction with varied discourses, peer networks, local social issues and communities within the campus (Cantini, 2016, p. 35). The university is therefore instrumental in creating social actors in the broadest sense, ‘a distinctive kind of social actor i.e. the legally and normatively autonomous, rights bearing, and rationally cognizant citizen of enlightenment modernity' (Stevens, Armstrong & Arum, 2008, p. 134). Social actors who later engage in activism explicitly demonstrate the development of their autonomy and critical consciousness, The hiatus between reality and the world imports the possibility of critique. Critique emerges from individuals immersed in the world, where they have experiences which contradict the institutionally produced reality, making it fragile (Boltanski, 2011, p. 58-9). Through university, the young activist develops critical thinking. Universities informally provide a form of political education by emphasising critical thinking and dialectical teaching (Barkan, 2004). This may later manifest in seeking spaces of resistance to the status quo or the government (Cantini, 2016). For that reason, the university is seen as crucial in ‘breeding’ new activists. This was confirmed in a study of high-risk activists who struggled for the movement of forest defenders in Tasmania. One had a background as a biologist. There was also a qualified veterinarian and a botanist (Cianchi, 2015). Intellectual influences shape the form of the forest defence movement. Universities are influential in instilling an intellectual worldview for potential activists. Later, their environmental radicalism may be enriched beyond academic influences (Rowe & Carroll, 2014).
However, even in that case, earlier academic influences better enable them to network later with likeminded activists, who are in a similar field of study or research interests. In general terms, critical idealism fostered through education at university level can broaden the perspective of students towards world-changing events such as environmental crises, which always have political implications. For example, in one study, well-educated individuals who entered social movements as adults confirmed that milestone events such as the nuclear
28 catastrophe at Chernobyl, the fall of the Berlin Wall and the invasion of Iraq, had prompted them to join political civil disobedience actions (Redclift, 2010).
If we look at young people’s repertoire of high-risk activism, such as occupying buildings, creating roadblocks and public space sit-ins, it is evident that such actions draw upon a student activist ideology. For example, Uitemark and Nicholls (2013) studied the political ideology of squatting in 1990 in Paris, France. That study confirms that students who squatted were keen on supporting the far-left political parties, so they placed themselves at risk as a marginal group (Uitemark & Nicholls, 2013). For those students, providing support for the actions of a left-wing political party is a reflection of their dream to achieve social integration and social cohesion in society (Uitemark & Nicholls, 2013). A similar situation of youth activism occurs in Indonesia. Here specific actions of civil disobedience and resistance since the 1960s have been extraordinarily crucial in determining development practices and enforcing accountability by the government of Indonesia (see Widjojo, 1999). Indeed, the shift to democracy was due to the struggle of students through their protests on the streets (Maxwell, Santoso & Gayatri, 2001; Prasetyantoko, 2001; Parker & Nilan, 2013). In Indonesia as elsewhere, political pressure created through street protest by young people is a partial culmination of the learning process on campus. For activist youth, the city is a living laboratory and the university serves as an incubator for ideas that challenge governmental rationalities, technologies and institutional methods of control (Uitermark & Nicholls, 2013, p. 2). In short, higher education institutions structure styles of thinking and ideologies for the students, which may favour later orientation to activism.
2.6 Biographical Availability Biographical availability (Aunio & Staggenborg, 2011) must be taken into consideration when examining the pathways of young people into environmental activism. Biographical availability may be defined as ‘the absence of personal constraints that can enhance the individual's movement participation’ (McAdam, 1986, p. 13). In other words, those carrying less of a social burden are more likely to get involved in activism (Hensby, 2013). How biographical availability shapes an individual’s commitment to high-risk activism participation is elaborated by Almanzar and Herring (2004). They relate it to the individual’s subjectivity in terms of perceptions of possible risks. There are risks, costs and goals associated with any specific activist engagement. So those people who have high levels of
29 resources (social, political, economic) will likely perceive the risks/costs of activism as worth it simply because they are in a position to absorb or pay the risks/costs associated with activism (Almanzar & Herring, 2004, p. 115). In short, those who are resource rich in terms of economic, social and political assets, as well as time, are biographically available for engagement in activism. It is no surprise then that environmental movements worldwide attract primarily young, middle class, well-educated people.
2.6.1 Family Commitments Family commitment is an embedded attribute relative to whether or not individuals join high- risk activism. This commitment can be translated as the time and energy that people allocate to the benefit of the family (Corrigal-Brown et al., 2009). It is suggested that individuals who are unmarried or single will be more capable of being active in high-risk activism (Bunnage, 2014). Young people who are involved in rallies, protests and other events tend to have particular characteristics such as: no children; are unmarried; have few employment hours; and few family responsibilities. Their independent status as single, yet educated, enables them to compromise their economic needs for the sake of the successful movement (Matsuba et al., 2012). They are, therefore, appealing to the organisers of environmental groups who seek potential new recruits for the movement.
2.6.2 Individual Social Responsibility Encouragement of individual responsibility towards social justice issues may be influenced by the intangible reward expected by the individual in the future. Tilly (2008) states that perceived worthiness at the individual level is key to effective movement engagement. In short, individual social responsibility could mediate the decision to join high-risk activism. A study was conducted of university based-activists demanding a termination of increases in tuition fees in the UK (Hensby, 2013). The conclusion was that individual social responsibility was turned into collectivism as all participating students felt the same outrage and were affected by this educational policy. In the phenomenon of high-risk activism, the majority of activists are aged 25-35 years and are likely to be experiencing a generational sense of injustice on a specific issue. The study by Jennings and Stoker (2005) suggests that the index of civic engagement of young people is higher than for older cohorts in a social movement. It seems that idealistic young people have strong sensitivity to current inequality in the government provision of public goods.
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Individual social responsibility to some extent, especially in the environmental movement, is also pushed by post-materialistic ideology. According to Inglehart’s (1995) post-materialism thesis, when individuals view themselves as having sufficient for their basic needs and have no other significant desires to fulfil, they might seek action that promotes the sustainability of the environment in which they live. The post-materialism thesis is of interest for research on youth environmentalism and how it may create certain behaviours towards the environment. A related study by Schreiner, Henriksen and Hansen (2005) highlights the view that contemporary youth tend to hold a worldview with less materialistic values in comparison to earlier generations because they are raised with a better quality of life. Thus, youth are more interested in democracy, social values, caring for others, national politics, environmental problems and participatory decision-making (Schreiner et al., 2005).
For example, those who get involved in defending the environment may express post- materialist values (Paloniemi & Valnio, 2011). First, they may exhibit deep belief and concern about a specific environmental crisis (Connor, 2012; Schreiner, Henriksen & Hansen, 2005; Strandbu & Skogen, 2010; Wray-Lake, Flanagan & Osgood, 2010). Second, they may idealise the human/nature relationship (Matsuba & Pratt, 2013; Mifsud, 2012; Schreiner, Henriksen & Hansen, 2005; Tzou, Scallone & Bell, 2010). Third, they may be attached to a local setting and cherish a sense of place (Alkaher & Tal, 2011; Barton & Tan, 2011; Crosby, 2013; Ruiz-Junco, 2011; Tzou, Scallone & Bell, 2010; Hobbie, McLarren & Jackson, 2011; Kudrayaytsey, Krasny & Stedman, 2012; Rogers & Bragg, 2012). Yet others might develop their involvement from active engagement with outdoor activities (Cupers, 2008). The ownership of cultural capital (Strandbu & Skogen, 2010), knowledge relevant to the environment, and reflective experience in pro-environmental education (Davies & Mauboules, 2003), can also be instrumental.
2.6.3 Unemployment Unemployment positively affects the likelihood that individuals will be in the ranks of high- risk activism. In terms of time, flexibility in high-risk activism is a necessity, which means a full-time job will be out of the question. Beyerlein and Hipp (2006) observed that time commitment is one key to successful mobilisation of social protest. It is because, with the
31 unforeseen conditions in the protest site, the timing of mobilisation may change at any time in line with the progress of the action (Putnam, 2000) and external events.
2.6.4 Deep Connection to Nature Almanzar and Herring (2004) argue that biographical availability is inherent in people developing a sense of the activist self, but should not be taken for granted. For example, biographical availability may be achievable for individuals through sacrifice or voluntary acts based on merit. Moreover, biographical characteristics exercised through social power have implications for a person’s participation in high-risk activism, A person’s biographical characteristics may affect or influence the perception of the risks, costs and the goals of activism. Social statuses have a number of dimensions beyond those considered earlier (available time, social responsibilities) including cognitive and power dimensions that may affect high-risk/cost activism. These other dimensions may impact high-risk/cost activism in a variety of ways (Almanzar & Herring, 2004, p. 116). Especially for environmental activists, connection with nature and intimate relationship with nature may bring them to make themselves available for activism beyond street protest. In practice, experience and greater exposure to nature occurs through outdoor activities. For example, the leisure practice of camping can become interwoven with the project of youth nationalism. Through contact with nature, camping enables youth to work with plants and creatures. This can craft sympathy for the natural world and develop a sense of care for nature (Cupers, 2008). In relation to this argument, one relevant study found that youth living in recently deforested areas have stronger concerns about their future livelihood in comparison to those living harmoniously in forested areas, even though both groups had an equal sense of connectivity to the natural environment in which they lived (Mifsund, 2012). We may, therefore, propose that frequently occurring environmental threats become contextualised into the lives of those experiencing those conditions (Schreiner, Henriksen & Hansen, 2005). Mundane artefacts in contemporary society can emphasise this connectivity. For example: the maps and compasses used by nature lover groups may positively affect spatial attachments and cultural co-existence (Tzou, Scallone & Bell, 2010). Youth environmentalism in many countries is imbued with a sense of human ethics, meaning that the human moral obligation to conserve nature is recognised and manifests as pro- environmental consciousness. Studies confirm that environmental actions and practices are
32 manifestations of the relationship between an individual and nature, an interdependent connection (for example, Matsubo & Pratt, 2013). The feeling that nature is struggling with an extrinsic threat is then more likely to develop into activism when young people strive to make themselves more available.
2.7 Conclusion The studies considered under the various headings above indicate the need for more knowledge about the pathways of young people towards high-risk activism of the kind represented by the Backsilmove campaign in Bandung. If they do indeed develop an ecological habitus then we need to know how it happens. The literature review has established the interconnected layering process of identity as young people are socially prepared to become active in the environmental movement. Yet the findings of previous studies cannot be generalised to all forms of high-risk activism. As stated by Staggenborg (2011), each movement has its own trajectory, which needs to be seen as culturally and historically specific, as occurring in a geographical and political space like no other. The clue is to look closely at activists’ micro worldview, which is prefigured before they get into the movement. As Bourdieu argued, culture cannot be constricted to tradition that makes up the individual. Rather, culture is a space where people can unite themselves, where they can come to feel that this is the ‘right culture and the right way of relating to it’ (1967, p. 350). The next chapter examines Bourdieu’s work in relation to the theoretical framework of the thesis.
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CHAPTER 3. THEORETICAL CONSIDERATIONS
3.1 Introduction The previous chapter reviewed the structural factors and interconnections that encourage neophytes to high-risk/cost activism. It was suggested that each individual is positioned by differences in cultural and political conditions in the broader social milieu. In addition, activists bring their own personal resources to their interventions in social structure. Concurrently, the social structure shapes an individual’s attitude and behaviour as an actor who develops a social relationship with other social actors in the movement setting. Accordingly, the relationships built between activists and social structures is dialectic.
To understand the complexity of these relations, I have applied Bourdieu’s concepts of ‘habitus’, ‘social capital’, ‘cultural capital’, ‘field’, and ‘feel for the game’ to understand how internalised dispositions unfold through the organisation of everyday social practices. The concept of habitus is used to explore the effect of social practices in families, organisations, and environmental activities on identification as an activist. The concepts of cultural capital and social capital allow me to explore the association between resources used to engage in environmental confrontations and establish the environmental movement. Environmental activists are seen as participants in a field of struggle, with unequal power relationships and with the different parties vying for dominance. The Backsilmove activists participated in this field by continually attempting to achieve public recognition.
The concept of ‘radical habitus’ coined by Crossley (2008) is very appropriate in this context and helps to explore the emergence of an environmentalist identity. In addition, the concept of ‘ecological habitus’ developed by Kasper (2009) and Haluza-DeLay (2008, 2010) has been used to frame the analysis of the internalisation of environmental values and practices in the habitus of everyday environmental activists.
3.2 Habitus, Cultural Capital, Social Capital and Field
3.2.1 Habitus Bourdieu articulates the notion of habitus to grasp the process through which people relate to social structure in their social milieu. The habitus of a social actor is considered to endure for
34 and to be constituted through the undertaking of consistent social practices. Bourdieu explains habitus as follows: Systems of durable, transposable dispositions, structured structures predisposed to function as structuring structures, that is, as principles of the generation and structuring of practices and representations which can be objectively ‘regulated’ and ‘regular’ without in any way being the product of obedience to rules, objectively adapted to their goals without presupposing a conscious aiming at ends or an express mastery of the operations necessary to attain them and being all this, collectively orchestrated without being the product of the orchestrating action of a conductor (Bourdieu, 1997a, p. 72) The habitus emerges through a series of regularities and adapts social goals to expected social structures. It also solidly sediments in agents’ cognition through unconscious but deliberative acts. Habitus as an orientation to practice leads actors to participate in social structures in a social setting related to the locality of the agent. Habitus is constituted as ‘the system of structured, structuring dispositions, the habitus, which is constituted in practice and is always oriented towards practical function’ (Vladiv-Glover & Frederic, 2004, p. 52). Habitus creates a ‘system of cognitive as well as motivating structures’ (Vladiv-Glover & Frederic, 2004, p. 53), and consequently, the individual’s actions will establish new cognitive patterns as a part of the social reproduction process. Bourdieu and Passeron (1990, p. 156) assert that ‘dispositions are internalized, preconscious, and largely determine the reactions social agents take’. In Distinction (1984), Bourdieu talks about habitus in relation to social position. People are likely to develop a habitus that corresponds to the objective possibilities of social action for someone in their position. He calls this the ‘taste of necessity’ (Bourdieu, 1984, p. 20). Habitus provides adaptability for an agent who will enter into a new social situation based on the tacit knowledge coming from their previous experience. At the same time, habitus will equip them to be reflective in negotiating old values in relation to the novel ones of any new social system surrounding them (Robins, 2000; Vladiv-Glover & Frederic, 2004). This ensures the active presence of past experiences, which, deposited in the form of schemes, thought, and action, tend to guarantee the ‘correctness’ of practices and their constancy over time, more reliably than formal rules and explicit norms.
Habitus can be transmitted from one generation to another and the family is a key social location in which this process takes place. The construction of habitus is made possible, and developed, in the circle of friends and family; in the context of education, race, and gender
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(Threadgold & Nilan, 2003). The distinctiveness of group members who have lived in a particular habitus is demonstrated through the specific way in which a group displays social values and performs attitude through their social practice. A pedagogic effort initiated in the family has a significant role in the formation of childhood dispositions that ‘act as the scaffolding of habitus’ (Wacquant, 2000, p. 6). Bourdieu (1984) suggests that intergenerational transmission precipitates through family dispositions. For example, parents in higher managerial and professional employment are likely to have higher status networks themselves, which in turn can be directly passed on to their children. It is also probable that they would transmit highbrow tastes, as well as inculcate valuable cultural dispositions (Bourdieu, 1984, p. 107). It may be concluded that the habitus is a blend of social, cultural, and economic dispositions but that none of these dispositions are primary to determining the configuration of the others. This is because action informed by habitus appears to be random to a certain extent while at the same time it moves within predetermined parameters.
Thus becoming an activist in the environmental movement is not an instant process but involves a series of habits and practices that have been earlier socialised in the family and the schooling milieu for extended periods. In this regard, ‘habitus’ frames this study as an analytical tool to explore the process of habituation that was initiated in the families of social activists and continued into other settings, such as schools and surrounding communities.
3.2.2 Cultural Capital and Social Capital As indicated above, habitus guides any individual’s cultural choices. When individuals are successful in mobilising the assets deposited in the habitus, they will be able to occupy a particular advantageous social position. However, occupation of that valued location will depend on their possession of various forms of capital. Bourdieu (1984) argued that each individual may deploy a set of capitals to strategically take a new position.
In Bourdieu’s (1986) The Forms of Capital, he theorised the idea of capital to explain power relations between social classes. He moved beyond the idea of economic capital to explore other types of capital that people possess which give them an advantage over others. Bourdieu states, ‘it is in fact impossible to account for the structure and functioning of the social world unless one reintroduces capital in all its forms and not solely in the one form recognised by economic theory’ (1986, p. 242). Capital can emerge in three fundamental guises. The first is economic capital, which is ‘immediately and directly convertible into
36 money and may be institutionalised in the form of property rights’ (1986, p. 242). The second is social capital, which is made up of social obligations or social connections. The third is cultural capital, which is what people know. Cultural capital inheres in possessing assets that allow people a degree of social mobility within the fields that are significant in their lives. Social and cultural capital can be convertible on certain conditions into economic capital. Cultural capital can exist in three forms. The first form is the embodied state of cultural capital, in the form of long-lasting dispositions of the mind and body. The second form is the objectified state of cultural capital, in the form of cultural goods. Finally, there is institutionalised cultural capital, a form of objectification such as educational qualifications.
In general terms, cultural capital is understood as a ‘wide variety of resources, such things as a verbal facility, general cultural awareness, aesthetic preferences, information about the school system, and educational credentials’ (Swartz, 1997, p. 75). Wacquant and Bourdieu (1992) propose that cultural capital can be mobilised to enable the development of economic or social capital. The current world economic system makes cultural capital a necessity for establishing the economic and political power of nations, groups and individuals. We trade the value of cultural capital within the economic system in order to improve our position within that system, but our personalities are not modified by the nature of the coins, which we use, only, instead by the quantity of our possessions and by the fact that the economic system operates by esteeming quantity (Robins, 2000, p. 32). In Robins’ (2000) view, the economic system is attached to cultural capital in that individuals can convert cultural capital into other forms of capital. As previously, Bourdieu (1986) sees cultural capital as taking three states: the institutionalised state, the objectified state, and the embodied state.
The institutionalised state of cultural capital takes the form of an education qualification that can be gained through participation in educational institutions. Individuals get a legitimate social position and are able to take advantage of this cultural capital beyond the context of the educational institution itself. This is a form of cultural capital which has ‘a relative autonomy vis-à-vis its bearer and even vis–a-vis the cultural capital the actor [sic] effectively possesses at a given moment in time’ (Bourdieu, 1986, p. 51). Aside from being able to locate themselves in a competitive field, institutionalised cultural capital enables individuals to transform it into other forms of productive outcome in a social process of succession. Individuals also acquire bargaining power through it. As Naidoo explains, the ‘education
37 system, therefore, designates those endowed with cultural capital, which is generally inherited as a result of social origins, as “academically talented”’ (Naidoo, 2004, p. 459). Therefore, knowledge produced by individuals from an educated background distinguishes them from the working class and appreciation of this knowledge becomes a variety of social taste. For example, to further their cause, Backsilmove activists successfully deployed information based on science such as specific knowledge about forest conservation. Some kinds of knowledge are endowed with the credibility of cultural capital, which is established by those who engage in certain valued practices. Knowledge of science can only be accessed by people who have undergone education in culturally respected practices. According to Bourdieu, intellectuals are individuals with high cultural capital and less material capital (1994). In this regard, the doctoral study investigates the mobilisation of this knowledge in the movement of resistance to the threatened destruction of the Babakan Siliwangi forest.
The embodied state of cultural capital is attached to the body of the individual and refers to the particular social origins of habitus. The idea of embodied capital refers to the bodily hexis of a person’s habitus, the place and strata from which they came. For example, it is the accent one develops, the manners one employs in social situations, the way one presents oneself to the world through attire, deportment and the tastes one develops and exploits. The body, therefore, cannot be referred to as a fixed entity but it is partially constructed by the medium of the habitus, It follows that body is the most indisputable materialization of class taste, which manifests itself in several ways. It does first this first in the seemingly most natural features of the body, the dimensions (volume, height, weight) and shapes (round or square, stiff or supple, straight or curved) of its visible forms, which express in countless ways a whole relation to the body, i.e., a way of treating it, caring for it, feeding it, maintaining it, which reveals the deepest dispositions of the habitus (Bourdieu, 1984, p. 190). The embodied state of cultural capital is cultural capital embodied in the very personhood of those who have cultural capital. It is their taste, body, and gesture, and the appearance of their body. This bodily hexis permits those with the same kind of cultural capital to readily bond together in a particular social group, representing a form of social capital. In this doctoral study, the embodied state of cultural capital was found to manifest through activists’ manner of speaking and their rhetorical styles, their facility with writing and preparing textual material to promote the movement and so on.
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Finally, the objectified state of cultural capital in this study refers to cultural goods in the broad sense. It provides a crucial frame to investigate the ownership of goods/capacities that activists mobilised to support the success of the collective needs of the Backsilmove movement. For example, expert use of the internet, digital equipment such as mobile phones and laptops, the access to university libraries for finding scientific data and so on. Objectified cultural capital is also manifest in the radical paraphernalia that activists wore such as carabineers for climbing, a mountain backpack, a movement or campaign sticker from Greenpeace, and similar attire. In summary, this doctoral study will explore the ways in which the possession of cultural capital in all these three forms (or states) strengthened Backsilmove activism and sharpened the sense for activists of belonging together.
3.2.3 Field Power relations in any social system are inexorable, and a space to test the degree of an individual’s social capacity. Bourdieu coined the term field to explain the space of struggle in which an individual can exercise their various forms of capital. In the field, there are a variety of standard conventions that regulate the competition between groups or individuals within a social structure. Bourdieu asserts that a ‘field is not simply sets of rules but rather principles and criteria’ (Bourdieu, 1998, p. 83). Although not everything is written and coded, each individual understands the ‘fundamental laws’ of a field (Bourdieu, 2000, p. 96) through internalisation within their habitus. A ‘field’ is a space of objective relations that are specific and irreducible to those that regulate other fields (Bourdieu and Wacquant, 1992, p. 27). The distribution of resources and the diverse positioning of the agents constitutes heterogeneity in a field and concurrently agents are mutually contesting their positions. Crossley (2005, p.25) affirms that ‘a field is a heterogeneous ensemble. An unequal distribution of resources positions agents relative to one another, constraining and enabling action in relatively predictable ways’.
The idea of field is useful for analysing some of the high-risk activism that was conducted in the Backsilmove campaign. For example, the activists enacted a Long March from Babakan Siliwangi forest to the gates of the Gedung Sate parliamentary building. In that action they co-opted public space to convey a political message about conserving the forest to the public and the government. Before the event was organised, the young activists created a rigorous
39 plan. These processes were actions to seize and compete within the ‘field of struggle’. Success in the ‘field of struggle’ is evidenced by Backsilmove as the one and only youth-led environmental organisation that marched on parliament during the Babakan Siliwangi crisis. Despite the constant flux of political contestation in Bandung, these young activists remained persistent in maintaining and continuing their activism. With this in mind, the thesis takes ‘public space’ itself to be a field in which the activist struggle is situated.
3.2.4 Feel for the Game To gain success in any field, social agents act according to their ‘feel for the game’. The sense of how the ‘game’ is played comes from their habitus and the game itself corresponds to the distinctive play of capitals in a given field. Habitus is claimed to be able to lead people to have a pre-reflexive ‘feel for the game’. This ‘feel for the game’ is based on the fact that those who have internalised a feel for the game as an aspect of their habitus are those who have invested in the various ‘stakes’ that playing the game makes possible. In the data assembled for this project, the ultimate stakes of the game were, first, the control of public space by the protestors, not the government; and second, control of the Babakan Siliwangi forest by the people. The Backsilmove activists brought their distinctive ‘feel for the game’ – developed through previous activism - to that field of struggle. They strongly believed that the game was worth playing. As Bourdieu pointed out, we need to be conscious of, The fact of being in the game, of being invested in the game, of taking the game seriously. Illusio is the fact of being caught up in and by the game. That is what I meant in speaking of interest: games which matter to you are important and interesting because they have been imposed ad introduced in your mind, in your body, in a form called the feel for the game (Bourdieu, 1998, p. 76-77). For Bourdieu, illusio is not just the collective belief that the ‘game’ is worth playing but acknowledgement of the stakes of the field. To this end, social actors accumulate resources, both actual and symbolic that will help them play to win. For the Backsilmove activists, their nurturing of illusio was signified through symbols or markers in their everyday campaign activities. Illusio manifested in the extent of their participation in the in-group identity of Backsilmove. There they daily acknowledged the importance of the stakes of the particular game of advocacy. In summary, their ‘feel for the game’ allowed activists to develop courage and confirm belief in the significance of their actions. With the general theoretical background as described so far, the thesis project explores the journeys of the Backsilmove
40 movement activists and the shaping framework which enabled them to develop their ‘feel for the game’ of high-risk activism. It is now appropriate to move onto the specific theoretical concepts that guide the analysis in the thesis.
3.3 Radical Habitus The findings demonstrated the expertise of young activists in designing protest aimed at the Gedung Sate. The protest plan was built through the experience of the activists in previous campaigns with Greenpeace and in bootcamp, which instilled in them a preparedness in the face of resistance during the direct action. They had developed a ‘radical habitus’, which served to maintain the ethos of the resistance movement throughout the action. Although the radical habitus is a relatively novel idea in social movement studies, the concept is crucial to understanding the process of formation of habitus embodied in the activists’ selves. Radicalism itself can be interpreted as an act of resistance against the establishment, in the public space as well on the property of the establishment itself. Considering a model of direct action, the establishment is expected to receive a political message from activists which will bring the establishment’s unwanted actions and policies to a halt. In this case, the radical movement was non-violent. The activists’ bravery in plunging into radical action is not an arbitrary act; they must share specific characteristics or dispositions to support the creation of a durable attitude or ‘radical habitus’.
As above, Bourdieu uses the term ‘illusio’, which refers to ‘interest “to be there” to participate, to admit the game is worth playing and the stakes created in and through the fact of playing are worth pursuing’ (Bourdieu 1998, p. 76). Individuals who as act as activists must feel strongly that the movement that they follow gives them satisfaction and has valuable outcomes for themselves. Activists must be able to conceive this meaning and present it in their narratives. Being involved in activist resistance may be risky. A radical habitus allows activists to evaluate the risks that may arise.
As Crossley explains, radical habitus is transferred between one activist and another, even though this process always alters the content of the habitus. Nevertheless there is an element of continuity in this transfer which explains the coherence of social movements, Schemas and dispositions are subject to continual change, not least as they are transmitted from agent to agent, but they are transmitted, they do move in this more
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literal sense, and it is this movement which accounts, at least in part, for the continuity of the movement (Crossley 2005, p. 22) The persistence of habitus also explains the continuity of a social movement across times and places and the translation of one activist moment into another one, as a move across different political contexts, It is this movement of habitus which allows us to see activists who are widely dispersed across either time, space or both, having no direct contact, as participants in the ‘same’ movement. They share something: a common habitus or at least elements of a common habitus (Crossley, 2005, p. 22). Social movement activists involved in a movement participate in the activities of the movement and in the process are exposed to information exchange, and to the resources, knowledge, and skills of the movement. These exchanges link activist generations. Intensive interaction with highly experienced activists may lead neophytes to be radicalised and to develop a particular radical habitus as they relate to these more experienced activists. As Crossley argues, radical habitus moves ‘between activists; particularly between experienced/established activists who have acquired and/or co-generated it in their praxis, and who embody it in their participation, and neophytes who acquire it’ (Crossley, 2005, p. 22). Transmission of radical habitus involves the unification of space and time.
The repertoire is the core mode of communication in a movement, which is spearheaded by the activists using their radical habitus to convey a message to the public and remind them of their opposition. Repertoire can include speeches, theatrical works, creative art shows, and also media releases, scientific reports, pamphlets or a combination of many forms. The repertoire is crucial for radical activists as a political signal. Behind the repertoire, there are goals to be accomplished, which are manifested in various forms of delivery. In a social movement, a repertoire always relates to what is presented as a ‘crisis’, relating to accumulated grievances and requiring outbursts of opposition taking place in public space (Tilly, 1995; Traugott, 1995). The process of creation of a repertoire borrows from previous activist moments, Protest behaviour tends to draw upon a stock of historically and culturally variable ‘techniques’ of protest which agents learn: for example, petitioning, marching, occupation, tunnelling and bomb making. There is always room for improvisation or ‘coherent deformation’ and we should never underestimate the potential of agents to invent new techniques to add to the stock (Crossley, 2003, p. 48).
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So the emergence of new radical movements is the result of improvisation upon what has gone before in terms of social activism. The new radical movement supplies a new twist on previous activism.
Yet as Bourdieu pointed out, there are limits, ‘the would-be most radical critique always has the limits that are assigned to it by the objective conditions’ (Bourdieu, 1977, p. 169). In relation to radical habitus, the emergence of a radical protest movement is reinforced by the collective doxic belief, which is individually held by each of the activists involved. Bourdieu maintains that this doxic belief arises when objective structure and subjective expectation are no longer aligned. Critical reflection is actually a process of cognition that occurs when radical activists interrogate the mismatch between subjective expectation and broader social structure.
In summary, activist bravery in plunging into radical action is not an arbitrary act; they must share specific characteristics or dispositions that support the creation of a durable attitude or ‘radical habitus’. The concept here uses the idea of radical dispositions within an ecological habitus to emphasise the significance of their environmentalist position. Backsilmove was a movement of high risk to the activists involved. This study observes the process through which radical activist identity emerged and enabled successful protest actions.
3.4 Ecological Habitus Environmental behaviour is integral to the process of human social life. As Kasper observes, there are ‘active relations between people and their biological, ecological, physical, sociocultural, spiritual, and other contexts’ (Kasper, 2009, p. 320). An understanding of the significance of such relationships has inspired some sociologists to develop the concept of ‘ecological habitus’ (Haluza-DeLay, 2008; Kasper, 2009; Smith, 2008). This framework will be reviewed here and made use of in the subsequent interpretation of the research presented in this thesis.
In the field of environmental studies, the concept of ecological habitus points to, Embodiment of a durable yet changeable system of ecologically relevant dispositions, practices, perceptions, and material conditions – perceptible as a lifestyle – that is shaped by and helps shape socioecological contexts (Kasper, 2009, p. 318).
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Like the concept of radical habitus, the concept of ‘ecological habitus’ draws on Bourdieu’s original framing of habitus. ‘Ecological habitus’ is a relatively novel concept in environmental movement studies. Conceptually, the term ecological habitus intersects with the idea of an embodiment within place or an ‘ethics of place’ (Smith, 2008, p. 33). An ‘ethics of place’ is concerned to prevent environmental damage to a particular place. It is not necessarily embodied in any given social institution (Kasper, 2009). According to the findings of this study the emergence of an ethics of place, or an ecological habitus, comes about through participation in a social milieux, which interacts in a particular way with the environment over time. Kasper affirms that ecological habitus is crucial in conceptualising the conditions that shape the ecological dispositions of a person, their practices, and the material conditions that are coupled with the consequences of these practices, in the human relationship with nature, The concept is meant to aid in understanding these things in general, granting that although groups of people can share an overarching habitus as a result of shared sociohistorical contexts, every human is unique and has the capacity for novelty, thus habitus is durable yet changeable (Kasper, 2009, p. 321). Ecological habitus varies in relation to the context of the life of each person. In Kasper’s view these differences actually provide an opportunity to improve ecological habitus, Being able to identify general differences in the ecological habitus of people living in different contexts could provide important insights into the conditions that foster a more or less ecologically supportive habitus … Necessary first, however, is a model identifying the relevant relations between various dimensions of everyday life and the direction of the development of ecological habitus. Such a model of ecological habitus would not imply causality but would portray the conditions and relations that may be significant for its development (Kasper, 2009, p. 320). In Indonesia, education is a crucial space for Indonesian youth to expose themselves to a variety of environmental issues. In addition, there are social media, newspapers, magazines, and other informal media. Informal education and media develop cognitive skills in finding strategies to control environmental problems. Maulidya, Mudzakir, and Sanjaya (2014) demonstrate the relationships between cognitive skills and the pro-environmental actions of students in Indonesia. Yet the findings from their study show that students who have a higher level of ecological knowledge and cognitive skills do not necessarily demonstrate a higher ability to turn this knowledge into practical action (Maulidya, Mudzakir & Sanjaya, 2014, p. 195). Such seemingly paralysed pro-environmental attitudes are perpetuated by the ‘social
44 disjuncture’ (Appadurai, 1996, p. 11) between what they learn and their social milieu, which does not support their intention to save the environment.
In the context of Indonesia’s school system, the encouragement of pro-environmental behaviour is reflected in the curriculum. The government has responded by integrating environmental issues, such as climate change, waste, and the ecosystem in school textbooks. However, this policy does not by itself create ecological habitus. As Parker (2016) notes, there was an integration of natural resources issues into the curriculum in 2013. Yet, in reality the government has not defended natural resources (Parker, 2016). Sudarmadi et al. (2001) researched Indonesian young people, aged 19-25 years. They had a better perception and detailed knowledge of environmental problems than older cohorts. However, such knowledge was not accompanied by consistent pro-environmental behaviour (Sudarmadi et al., 2001, p. 182). Thus, it appears that ecological habitus is promoted through education, but in practice, it is lacking support in implementation.
Once the policy of decentralisation took hold in Indonesia, the development of ecological habitus faced great challenges. Decentralisation, which ideally could be the momentum for local governments to improve the quality of the environment, was found to be negative in effect. Studies show that local autonomy stimulated the local government to become more revenue-oriented to income generated from the exploitation of natural resources. This was not balanced by environmental conservation efforts (Widianarko, 2009). This failure has opened up space for oppositional ideas to emerge. For example, a study undertaken by Cummings (2006, p. 24) found that ‘Indonesian respondents favoured tighter restrictions on corporations, as evidenced by their support for the subordination of national environmental concerns to international concerns’. Based on this claim, people actually want the government to be firm with the market by tightening monetary policy against corporations that seek to exploit natural resources in Indonesia.
According to Nilan’s (2017) research on environmental activism in Indonesia, the development of ecological habitus moves well beyond simple acquisition of knowledge. It means not only gaining relevant knowledge, but also embedding environmental consciousness as lived quotidian practice. In short, the activist takes ‘the [environmental] impact of everyday practice seriously’ (Gäbler, 2015, p. 80). This points to the capacity for embodied individual and collective action. Ecological habitus varies in relation to the context
45 of the life of each person. It is a cumulative process taking place over a period of time, ‘a model of ecological habitus would not imply causality but would portray the conditions and relations that may be significant for its development in a particular way’ (Kasper, 2009, p. 320). For environmental activists at two Indonesian universities it was found that, One of the springboards for a reflexive awakening of environmental consciousness among the young people here seemed to be the shared perception of risk; discourses of ecological threat developed and honed through collective discussion and reflection over time, in both the virtual and face-to-face social worlds (…) It is proposed that awakening to risk through the blending of scientific knowledge and local knowledge points to the development of a locally attuned ecological habitus among Indonesian university student activists (Nilan, 2017, p. 9). This observation is relevant to the environmental consciousness of young activists in Backsilmove.
3.4.1 Ecological Habitus Leading to an Environmental Movement The environmental movement examined in this study aims to identify the composition of the socio-ecological values and social practice in the lives of engaged young activists; their ecological habitus. The findings of this doctoral study demonstrate that the interlinkages between the practice of pro-environmental values and the ecological disposition of the activists led to the environmental movement. Thus, social movements can arise from dialectical processes that ‘hinge between agency and structure’ (Crossley, 2002, p. 177). Crossley’s theoretical contribution to radical habitus invokes Bourdieu’s view that oppositional habitus comes about because of a misfit between individuals’ long ingrained ecological habitus and the environmental crisis occurring around them (Bourdieu, 1984, p. 22).
In the context of ecological habitus, such a misfit occurs when extensive liberalisation exacerbates an environmental crisis and threatens the pro-environmental lifestyle of the local population. As Haluza-DeLay maintains, ‘embodied ecological habitus’ (2008, p. 208) is an intangible fuel that empowers an environmentalist movement. The environmental movement emerges to attempt to enforce social control to maintain environmental sustainability. Conceptually, the environmental movement may offer the means and strategies for the
46 community in creating environmental alternatives whenever the environmental crisis potentially degrades the quality of their lives, Social movements can be the field within which habituations consistent with the alternative reality prefigured by movement framing can form and be maintained. In the case of environmentalism, a crucial goal for formation of a more sustainable society is an ecologically appropriate logic of practice, living environmentally without trying, which is founded upon the routinization embodied in an ecological habitus (Haluza-DeLay, 2008, p. 207).
In building everyday environmentalism, the movement becomes a space for activists to introduce to the public the logic of routinised ecological practices in order for them to gain new insights about how to apply environmental practice in their everyday lives. For instance, in a relevant study, Smith (2001) compared the everyday practice of society in general with the lives of the activists who joined environmental resistance actions in the UK, such as anti- roads protesters, tree sitters, and other radical movement activists. The lifestyle of the radical environmental activist differs from the lifestyle of most in modern society and departs from everyday life as a set of taken-for-granted acts. Those activists consistently developed a space of critique in relation to the everyday life of modern society. Haluza-DeLay (2008) sees such developments as the creation of an environmental ethos by activists.
The Backsilmove activists considered in this study consistently developed a space of critique in relation to the everyday life of modern society. They sought to reinstate the socio-cultural functions of Babakan Siliwangi urban forest, for example, as a space for young people to conduct creative arts while building a social networking event. The Backsilmove campaign worked to stop the government from joining up with the private sector to eliminate the local use of this forest that had been so laboriously built by young people and community members over the years. It is apparent here that the government and the private sector represent the dominant group, while the young activists represent the interests of the subordinate group. This unequal power relationship was a form of doxa for young people, which consistently drove their struggle to succeed through the high-risk activism of Backsilmove, which used historically relevant symbols of protest such as the ‘long march’. The creation of a distinctive repertoire of protest actions was an integral part of the sedimentation of ecological habitus within the activist self.
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3.5 Conclusion This chapter has explored the theoretical conceptualisation used in following chapters to analyse the data. In particular, the concept of ecological habitus provides a pathway for an understanding of particular pro-environmental acts, which are maintained and appear out of an extensive interaction with the surrounding environment.
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CHAPTER 4. METHODOLOGY
4.1 Introduction This doctoral study explores how young people in the Backsilmove protest group gravitated towards environmental activism and went on to advocate the saving of the city forest Babakan Siliwangi in Bandung, Indonesia. The details of the struggle are summarised in the timeline at the start of this thesis.
The specific research questions for the thesis project are:
1. What was the process by which an environmental activist habitus was formed in their early life experiences in the family and in the school, and in relation to the development of cultural capital?
2. How did the young people develop pro-environmental values in their early social milieux and later organisational memberships that fostered a sense of affinity to the environment and a desire to actively defend it in the field?
3. What was the nature of the social learning that many of them experienced during earlier training and activities with Greenpeace Indonesia, which served as a pedagogic agent and gave them a feel for the game of public activism?
In short, the project sets out to grasp how some young people might become environmental activists. A biographical trajectory approach was applied to demonstrate the milestones in this process. The biographical trajectory approach enables researchers to trace the earlier habitus development of informants and to reveal the past and present experiences that have led to this outcome. This is qualitative inquiry. It is concerned with how activists construct their experiences of reclaiming the environment and how they establish further action led by their previous experiences. Social constructionism is the epistemological paradigm for understanding the emergence of their activism. In a social constructionist paradigm, action is understood to be shaped by a person’s way of understanding reality and everyday events. Their perceived reality is framed through their habitus. When behaviour becomes routine,
49 social actors deal with a ‘typificatory scheme’ (Berger & Luckman 1966, p. 53). This is a cognitive scheme formed so that a person can deal with events. It represents another way of framing the idea of habitus. Thus an ‘individual can only be “known” through what they become while dealing with a particular situation’ (Weick, 1995, p. 24).
According to social constructionism, meaning embodies and manifests itself in the behaviour of an individual or a collective of people. Meaning is implicit in actions. Speaking about the individual’s actions, these cannot be separated from the beliefs that drive them. This is because ‘belief’ is like fuel that keeps the action going on. Preston, Salomon & Ritter (2013) suggest that ‘belief’ is formed through personal relationships, through how a person knows and interprets the social environment and then develops specific actions based on a set of ‘beliefs’. Eyerman and Jamison (1989) call this ‘cognitive praxis’. In terms of habitus, this pertains to the development, over time, of generative dispositions derived from family and historical context. From this perspective, ‘becoming activist’ is a social process that involves historical components of the individual, such as family and school. For Bourdieu, the agent formed through the capacity to ‘construct social reality, itself socially constructed, is not a transcendental subject but that of a socialised body, which engages in practising organizing principles that are socially constructed and acquired in the course of social experiences’ (Bourdieu, 2000, p. 160). The investigation of the life trajectory of Backsilmove youth as high-risk activists was in-depth and explorative. It made use of interviews and participant observation.
4.2 Researching the Development of Habitus In doing research related to habitus, the project has been guided by the ‘diachronic and deductive’ model of thinking. Bourdieu (1984) introduced this model to map in detail ‘social trajectories of agents so as to reconstitute the sequencing and sedimentation of dispositions across time’ (p. 318). The researcher needs to be observant in seeing changes due to the dynamic experiences of the individual: ‘habitus changes constantly as a function of new experiences’ (Bourdieu 2000, p. 161). To look at shift and transformation of habitus, Bourdieu himself divided the habitus into two levels; primary and secondary.
Primary habitus is defined as ‘a set of dispositions one acquires in early childhood, slowly and imperceptibly, through familial osmosis and familiar immersions’ (Bourdieu & Passeron,
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1977, p. 42). This explanation affirms that family is the most fundamental element in the developmental stage of an individual. In other words, social character formation of individuals happens from the time they are born and springs up in accordance with the capital owned by the family concerned. Secondly, Bourdieu and Passeron (1977, p. 42) identify ‘secondary habitus’. Secondary habitus is an internalisation of habitus in the context of the later learning environment such as school, coming through formal pedagogy or informal socialisation.
Bourdieu further proposes that habitus is formed in ‘the two modes of acquisition of culture’: the ‘familial and the academic, the experiential and the didactic; they indelibly stamp one’s relation to culture and the character of one’s cultural capital, of which habitus is an embodied form’ (1984, p. 65-8). Bourdieu’s explanation confirms that the characteristics of cultural capital attached to an individual are intensively established through experience in the family and educational institutions. Using those methodological framings for habitus, this doctoral study explores the life trajectory of activists by digging down to their significant experiences relative to the natural environment, from childhood to early adulthood. Artefacts contributing to their proximity or love for nature such as books, movies or images form an integral part of the relevant experiences. The effectiveness of this approach to understanding environmental awareness as a life trajectory process draws inspiration from the investigative work of Chawla (2008).
4.3 Research Design This project identifies environmental values which invigorated the participation of high-risk activists in Backsilmove and the particular pathways through which such values were socially maintained and further constructed. To answer the project research questions, the student researcher interviewed 26 young activists who had taken part in marches, rallies, sits-in and pre-protest preparation meetings. Focus group discussions were also conducted with five ex- Backsilmove activists.
4.3.1 Biographical Trajectory and Narrative Interviews The young activists were aged 18 to 30 years. Intensive interviews allowed investigation of their experiences leading up to, and including, engagement in the campaign to save Babakan Siliwangi. The student researcher refined an interview schedule that would elicit information
51 about the structural affiliations of young activists and knowledge about the political consciousness that drove them towards those affiliations. As this research focuses on young activists, a biographical trajectory approach informed the research design, to explore the activists’ experiences and practices in relation to the consciousness and values which inspired their eventual engagement in Backsilmove. Following the arguments of Connell (1995), Rubin and Rubin (1995) and Blee and Taylor (2002), it is understood that an orientation towards life history in social movement research can reveal activist experiences in protests and rallies, macro-events which have relevance to their development of radical actions and identities.
A biographical trajectory approach acknowledges a social constructivist understanding in which actors in social movements are understood to construct and frame their reality according to the context in which they live. Here, research participants serve as subjects of study who narrate and observe their past lives. Blee and Taylor (2002, p. 103) insist that such accounts be grasped by the researcher as stories that ‘fit with other events in their lives’. In more detail, a biographical trajectory approach, often referred to as a life history approach, can unpack personal stories, and show how social factors are influential in shaping the social changes encapsulated in the personal stories of interviewees. Such an approach favours the technique of a ‘narrative interview’ (Anderson & Kirkpatrick, 2015). Narrative interviews are ‘are a way of collecting people’s stories about their experiences. People tell stories about events in their lives all the time; it is one way in which people make sense of their lives. The narrative approach places the people being studied at the heart of the study process and privileges the meanings that they assign to their own stories’ (Anderson & Kirkpatrick, 2015, p. 631). The choice of narrative interviews for exploring Backsilmove activists’ biographical trajectory was effective as it allowed me to gain remarkable sequential stories of events that led them to become environmental activists, with such narratives going back to childhood experiences, and also to evaluate the cultural as well as social meanings embedded in those stories.
In interviewing practice, Forester (2006) advises the researcher to avoid abstract concepts when asking questions, as these may have an undue influence on participant replies. Instead, the researcher should ask interviewees about how they tackled, coped with, and encountered, relevant situations. It is important that the interview schedule allows flexibility, so that the interviewer can respond spontaneously to the stories that are told. The interview schedule for
52 this doctoral study listed some general questions about previous life experiences, but for each different interview, much depended on informant responses on that day. Such a flexible method is suggested by Robson (2002) to improve research outcomes. A flexible approach allows questions and wordings to be changed and explanations given. If certain questions seem inappropriate for a particular interviewee, they can be omitted, or additional ones included. The strength of this approach to interviewing is to ‘provide access to the context of people’s behaviour and thereby [provide] a way for researchers to understand the meaning of that behaviour (Seidman, 2006, p. 10).
Informants were recruited from young people who had participated as high-risk environmental activists in Backsilmove. The reader is reminded that the campaign to save the Babakan Siliwangi city forest had been fought and won by late 2013. So in November 2014, when active data collection began, Backsilmove was no longer very active as an organisation. Yet, there was still a website and a contact person. Through email correspondence, the student researcher introduced the project and was directed to various activists who had been involved in the campaign. By 2014, while many were still living in Bandung, others had re- located to Jakarta and Semarang. Semarang became the site for the first interview, with interviews in Jakarta and Bandung conducted later. Interviews mostly took place at cafés and restaurants. The activist as respondent made the choice of location.
4.3.2 Focus Group Discussion FGDs involving Backsilmove activists were planned to be conducted from January to February in order to capture an overview of the discourses that shaped their courageous decision to jump into the circle of Greenpeace Indonesia, and later Backsilmove. Initially, the student researcher planned to invite all Backsilmove activists to participate in three FGDs, each consisting of 7-8 people. However, unexpected flash floods swamped Bandung and Jakarta at that time and devastated trees on several roads, hampering transportation traffic. This local natural disaster prevented the activists from coming to the FGDs, especially those living on the outskirts of Bandung and Jakarta. Eventually, only five activists came, because the FGD location was only one kilometre away from their university campus. The single FGD was divided into two rounds comprising one hour each. In the first round, activists were asked to explain what literature they most frequently read while at primary school and how it informed their understanding of natural phenomena. In the second round they explained the
53 meaning of literature and texts consumed during the period of secondary school up to university.
The FGD revealed that the literature they perused when at primary school boosted their connection with nature, supplementing the knowledge which was discussed in science lessons and explored in small experiments outside the classroom. The literature they read after primary school level had more effect on predisposing them to join an environmental organisation.
4.3.3 Participant Observation Participant observation allows the study of connections between phenomena and the particularity of behaviour in a given context. It is an approach to ‘finding out what people do in particular contexts, and the routines and interaction patterns of their everyday lives’ (Darlington & Scott, 2002, p. 74). While the project interviews focused on events that had taken place in the past, participant observation was conducted to collect relevant details of activities, conversations, clothing, locations and settings. This method allowed the gathering of incidental data relevant to the ecological habitus of the high-risk activists who had been active in Backsilmove.
Bourdieu suggested some advantages of participant observation, Participant observation undertakes to explore not the ‘lived experience’ of the knowing subject but the social condition of possibility - and therefore the effects and limits - of that experience and, more precisely, of the act of objectivation itself. It aims at objectivizing the subjective relation to the object (Bourdieu, 2003, p. 282). In this study, participant observation proved a productive research strategy for observing and collecting data related to the ‘tastes’, ‘preferences’ and ‘lifestyles’ of the young activists in their daily lives. A ‘synchronic and inductive’ approach of this kind is useful to ‘trace out connections between patterns of preferences, expressions and social changes within and across realms of activity’ (Wacquant, 2014, p. 6).
Tastes, preferences, and lifestyles gauged through participant observation enabled the researcher to get an alternative understanding of the social actions exercised by Backsilmove activists within a certain social context. The informants were observed during interaction
54 with their in-group (in this case fellow Backsilmove activists) and their out-group (non- Backsilmove activists). They were also observed when they were in spaces such as bushland that represented connection with their current environmentalism. I noted their linguistic expression and also the word choices they applied during the conversation with friends. I jotted down observations in an ethnographic log book and incorporate those notes later during data analysis.
Observed preferences in menu and types of café selected for interview locations, the ambience of the café itself, and its offerings, were clearly linked to their identity as activists. A place often nominated for interview was the Yuki Café in Bandung. A small café of only around 50 square metres, it nonetheless displayed photographs depicting humanitarian issues. For the activists who had been associated with Backsilmove, Yuki Café seemed to bring up a feeling of activism and fighting spirit. At the same time, the choice of an alternative-style café suggests the activists are part of the middle class, with certain refined social tastes that distinguish them from other Bandung youth, who might prefer a coffee shop chain such as Starbucks. The suitability of the café for these young activists is not only determined by its menu, but by the cultural meanings that fit with their political identity.
Notably, during fieldwork in Bandung and Jakarta, the researcher made friends with the young activists, and they told stories outside the interview context. Such stories provided details, for example, about how they felt when they first walked out of the Babakan Siliwangi forest on the long march to Gedung Sate. Later, without asking for it, an activist invited the student researcher to trace out the two-hour long march conducted by Backsilmove during the campaign. This re-enactment walk began at the usual student entrance to the Babakan Siliwangi forest, and finally arrived at the gates of the parliamentary building Gedung Sate. Throughout the walk, the activist spoke about the intense emotional atmosphere when they were out there in the sun, surrounded by crowds of supporters. On another occasion, the student researcher was invited (post-interview) to stay overnight at the home of one of the activists who now lives in East Jakarta. During the train journey to his home, the activist recounted various long stories about his early encounter with Greenpeace. He described how he had become trusted as a volunteer coordinator in Jakarta. He spoke about how he was dating one of the fellow activists. That kind of participant observation gave an understanding of how subcultural life was formed amongst the activists and created a pattern of relationships between them.
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Notably, although informants were no longer active in Backsilmove, they are still concerned environmentalists in Bandung. They often come together to discuss cultural events in the city and surrounding areas. For example, the Backsilmove anniversary took place in February 2015 and the student researcher attended. The gathering took place at the Arts Workshop in Babakan Siliwangi and was attended by at least half of the original Backsilmove activists. These young activists remain united through a WhatsApp communication group online and keep updating their information on each other. After more than three hours of the 2015 anniversary gathering, which had commenced at 3.30 pm, the group moved on to chat in a café located on the upper Dago. After ordering food and drink, the discussion informally moved to consider the future of Backsilmove. The student researcher was aware of his role as a guest and just listened to the expression of issues and concerns. The activists proposed that the Backsilmove activist journey should not come to a halt. They suggested that Backsilmove might be able to break further through the political barrier in advocacy for the environment. One activist in this discussion criticised Greenpeace Youth Bandung because it had become less progressive in its advocacy. It was argued that the centralised determination of environmental action by Greenpeace did not provide a space of freedom for any new movement representing youth in Bandung. The informal discussion ended at 9 pm. The student researcher then walked home with activist Hadi for about 30 minutes. The talk was again about Backsilmove future directions, and about the youth-driven environmental movement in Bandung.
In another example of fieldwork immersion, the student researcher was able to meet activist and well-known pantomime actor Wanggi Hoediyatno, who had organised creative actions for Backsilmove. Wanggi showed many newspaper clippings and photographs of when he was on pantomime gigs. His pantomimes were aimed at raising awareness of human rights violations cases, making political messages to the government, and critiquing social inequality. As an activist who raised sensitive political issues, Wanggi claimed to have received threats from the Indonesian military. He urged vigilance where military-looking personnel were concerned. On another occasion, the student researcher was invited to watch Wanggi perform pantomime on a car-free day in Dago. He said that many activists in Bandung came along for the play; they were usually affiliated to WALHI.
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Through creating such associations during fieldwork, the student researcher became acquainted with the Arts Workshop of Bandung. One of Backsilmove activists, Wildan, arranged a meeting with Uwak Hasan, a senior painter in the Arts Workshop. He provided narratives of the history of the Arts Workshop since 1990 as an art space in Babakan Siliwangi. He also advanced the view that the broad-based movement to save the forest gave the opportunity for politician Ridwan Kamil to win election to the mayoral office of Bandung in 2013. Through this meeting, the student researcher was provided with a grasp of the political conflict from which Backsilmove emerged as a group committed to radical action. This added a new layer of background knowledge for the project. The participant observation also assisted with knowledge about traditional Sundanese culture and how it was threatened by commercial development in the city.
4.4 Data Analysis The first step was to transcribe all interviews and the FGD. In the next step, all of the transcriptions were thoroughly examined to identify similarities and contradictions according to themes. Coding and categorising are integral parts of qualitative data analysis, and have a big influence on the interpretation process (Darlington & Scott, 2002). Initial coding was developed to reflect the three research questions for the thesis project. The interview narratives were split into three chronological periods:
1. Early life experiences in the family and primary schooling 2. Secondary schooling and experiences with nature 3. At university
Coding identified the contradictions and the similarities of experience undergone by each Backsilmove activist. Contradictory and congruent sentences in the narratives were highlighted and given critical commentary related to the social meaning that was referenced. After that, the codes were categorised into sub-themes that built the main themes which are discussed in subsequent thesis chapters. I elaborated the thematic contradictions and similarities following Brewer’s suggestion to attach ‘meaning and significance to the analysis, explaining the patterns, categories, and relationships’ (2000, p. 104).
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4.5 Research Ethics Research ethics is aimed at ensuring the proper way of treating informants/respondents (Gillies & Alldred, 2002). Essentially, a researcher must demonstrate the principles of ‘dignity, privacy, and safety’ (Scheyvens, Nowak & Scheyvens, 2003, p. 140). Prior to conducting the research project, the Human Research Ethics Committee of the University of Newcastle granted research permission with the registration number H-2014-0194 (see Appendix 1). Informed consent and preservation of anonymity are two sets of procedures that have been strongly supported as methods to ensure ethical research (Robson & Robson, 2002; Scheyvens et al., 2003).
Firstly, informed consent defines the responsibility of the researcher towards the informants. They must be fully aware of their involvement in the research and actively engaged in the research without forcible action of the researcher. In other words, they are free to be involved with, or withdraw from, the research voluntarily (Robson, 2002). In the field I applied this procedure when encountering the local informants. I obtained consent as required. None of them felt concerned or were reluctant to be recorded. Although the situation appeared a little formal, it reassured me as a researcher that they were ‘cognizant whether they [were] willing to be interviewed’ (Scheyvens et al., 2003, p. 142).
4.6 Conclusion In summary, this doctoral study set out to explore how young people gravitated towards environmental activism to advocate for saving Babakan Siliwang. The research design reflected this aim by choosing a qualitative research design. The research methods used in that design pertain to providing answers to each of the specific research questions as follows.
[1] What was the process by which an environmental activist habitus was formed in their early life experiences in the family and in the school, and in relation to the development of cultural capital? Narrative interviews enabled me to deeply explore the diverse stories of the activists. I obtained narrated accounts of nature experiences in schools, with the majority linked to science experiments and scouting activities. In the family, narrative accounts revealed that they engaged not only with parents and extended family, but with broader community members beyond the family setting.
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[2] How did the young people develop pro-environmental values in their early social milieux and later organisational memberships that fostered a sense of affinity to the environment and a desire to actively defend it in the field? The narrative interviews yielded stories from secondary school when they experienced nature and wilderness. On the other hand, participant observation enabled me to meet the circle of friends and collective models within the Backsilmove network. In other words, narrative interviews and participant observation complemented each other. The written records of participant observation enriched the analytical findings from interviews.
[3] What was the nature of the social learning that many of them experienced during earlier training and activities with Greenpeace Indonesia, which served as a pedagogic agent and gave them a feel for the game of public activism? Through narrative interviews exploring the flows of narrated activist experiences, I was able to clearly map out the various forms of social practices they took while actively participating in the NVDA boot camp and environmental campaigns conducted by Greenpeace Indonesia. In addition, through the narrative interviews I gained data that was effective for mapping which parts of the training and activities that most created radical identity for the activists, and also created a sense of engagement with high risk activism.
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CHAPTER 5. SETTING THE SCENE - BABAKAN SILIWANGI CITY FOREST
5.1 Introduction Babakan Siliwangi (also known as Baksil) is a city forest of 3.8 hectares in the centre of Bandung, West Java (see map in Chapter One). On a sloping site with streams and watercourses, it is a remnant of lush tropical forest surrounded by bustling city streets. On 27 September, 2011, the United Nations granted Babakan Siliwangi the status of a world urban forest. An 85 metre raised walkway now allows visitors to enjoy the jungle views without harming the flora or fauna. Originally, the city forest area spanned 7 hectares. However, government decisions have diminished the size. Three hectares were leased to the Bandung Institute of Technology (ITB) which sits just above the steep slope of the forested area. ITB cleared trees and built university sports facilities. As the timeline shows, the forest then came under further threat in 2007 when the Bandung municipality under Mayor Dada Rosada granted 20-year forest management rights to developer PT Esa Gemilang Indah (PT EGI). The company formulated plans for a restaurant and hotel facilities in the city forest. The government stood to gain from the proposed commercial development.
There was immediate community concern and a Save Babakan Siliwangi movement was created. However, that loose coalition of community groups was not effective in its advocacy. It did not engage the concerns of local young artists and university students, who used the forest to gather socially and for creative purposes. The radical activist group Backsilmove was established quite late in the campaign, when matters were coming to a head (see timeline). The emergence of Backsilmove as a youth-driven environmental organisations can be seen as an expression of young people’s concern about the magnitude of the risk of development at the cost of environment or space which young people used for their everyday activities. But at the same time, Backsilmove gained momentum because another environmental movement - the much more mainstream Babakan Siliwangi Residents Forum was organising the campaign of opposition, and not achieving very much.
This chapter first outlines the impact of economic decentralisation on the city of Bandung, followed by discussion of the history of changes in Babakan Siliwangi forest. It begins with the early development of the Lebak Gede area as a farming enterprise during the Dutch colonial period, and also looks at later use of the land, including infrastructure development
60 for ITB sporting facilities. As public access to the city forest became more extensive, its function became more multifaceted. It served not just an ecological purpose but a social and cultural one.
5.2 The Impact of Economic Decentralisation on Bandung It is claimed that exploitation of Bandung’s natural environment accelerated after the financial crisis in late 1997 (Aritenang, 2013). In late 1997, some countries in Southeast Asia, such as Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia, suffered the impact of a global financial crisis (Winarso & Firman, 2002). In Indonesia the crisis was marked by the downward slide of the rupiah against the US Dollar, which also caused an increase in the value of foreign debt (Sherlock, 1998). Indonesia's foreign debt was already high due to economic policies of the Soeharto regime (Firman, 2000). An increase in the price of food imports was experienced across the country and the Soeharto regime became the ultimate target of political pressure (Sherlock, 1998). Economic chaos between mid-1997 and May 1998 eventually resulted in the ousting of President Soeharto. The authoritarian state was overthrown in late 1998 and was replaced by a democratic system. The country then worked to become powerful again by promoting economic growth through private investments, which came from within the country and abroad. The application of neoliberal policies strengthened the housing industry/property sector, which then broadened the capital market expansion to urban areas in Indonesia, especially Bandung and Jakarta (Aritenang, 2013; Permana, 2012; Nurdini & Harun, 2011). As an early policy towards economic improvement, the government introduced Otonomi Daerah - or the decentralisation law, where each province was granted autonomous rights to govern its domestic revenue.
The decentralisation legislation allowed local governments to exercise their full authority to regulate urban actors and regions, including spatial planning in their own territories (Takeshi 2006). Bandung Metropolitan Area (BMA) as a spatial unit in West Java optimised economic growth in key places, such as Bandung city (Kota Bandung) and the Punclut area in North Bandung (Hudalah 2010; Woltjer, 2014). Considering the potential of Bandung itself; the cool air, fertile soil, potential as a tourist destination, and reachable location by road during weekends (Hudalah, 2010), the government of West Java Province granted financial planning autonomy to Kota Bandung. The municipal government then focused on the development of tourism, with emphasis on the development of hotels and restaurants. In various ways, they
61 sought to utilise ‘unused’ green land for this purpose. Nature in urban settings should ideally be preserved, but in the hands of a profit-driven government it will be managed for economic interests. This reflects Escobar’s idea (1999) that nature can be exploited when ecological governance falls into the hands of economic power holders. Anthropogenic environmental disasters happen, but have been hegemonised as a truth by capitalism to be an exploited arena for their business. This is in line with Escobar’s (1999, p. 2) ideation: ‘what we perceive in the environment as natural is always cultural and social’. From a capitalist perspective, nature is then translated as an economic resource; cities then grown exponentially, along with middle class expansion.
Decentralisation aimed to expand economic growth and improve good governance so that the natural environment can be maintained. But authority to govern has often been misused by local government officials. The Babakan Siliwangi commercialisation plan shows one of the negative implications of regional autonomy. With economic growth to leverage domestic revenue as a primary goal, the Mayor Dada Rosada worked with a development company to commercialise Babakan Siliwangi forest for profit, including his own. When he was arrested on corruption charges in May 2012 it was evident that he had failed to take sufficient account of the reaction of local people to the proposed threat to their prized leisure resource – the city forest.
5.3 Babakan Siliwangi Forest as Public Space in Bandung City Babakan Siliwangi has undergone significant changes since the colonial period. The discussion below is dedicated to understanding those changes, and how the city forest became a space that could engage the public through diverse social and cultural activities. The following aerial photograph (see Figure 5.1) shows the city forest today, outlined by a yellow line. The loss of city forest land to ITB sporting facilities and other encroachments such as roads can be clearly seen. The history of Bandung records that Babakan Siliwangi was originally seven hectares of rice paddy fields, called Lebak Gede until 1930 (Katam & Abadi, 2006; Kunto, 1986).
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Figure 5.1 Babakan Siliwangi urban forest landscape
Adapted from Google Maps.
Legend 1. Arts Workshop 12. Motorbikes Parking Area 2. Food Hut and Sanggar Mitra 13. Cikapundung River 3. Forest Walk 14. Promenade 4. Goat Fighting Festival Arena 15. Sabuga Concert Hall 5. Vacant Area (ex-restaurant) 16. ITB’s Gymnasium 6. Garbage Collection Hub 17. ITB’s Soccer Field 7. Lingga-Yoni statues 18. ITB Students’ Parking Area 8. Village Chief Office 19. Tamansari Street 9. Entrance (only for pedestrian) 20. Dago Street
10. Entrance Gate (for all vehicles) 21. Siliwangi Street 11. Street food vendors 22. Tennis Court
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5.3.1 Evolution of Usage and Recognition In the 1970s, a restaurant called Babakan Siliwangi was built at the edge of the forest. And, since the name of this restaurant was widely recognised by the locals, people started routinely referring to the whole forest area as Babakan Siliwangi, even though the restaurant facility burned down later. The name continues to this day.
As previously, the local university ITB developed part of the original forest area following the granting of a lease from the government. Current ITB sporting facilities include two tennis courts, soccer fields, a jogging track, and a sports centre accommodating a fitness club and swimming pool. As the number of university students using the facilities increased, so did the number of motorbikes and cars. To tackle the parking issue, ITB then built a parking area for student vehicles between the sports centre and the jogging track. It should be noted that even though the entire area of Babakan Siliwangi is managed by the Bandung government, under the leasing arrangement, ITB enjoys the privilege of using it as long as it is for educational purposes. However, a lack of care and surveillance by both ITB and the Bandung government led to some problems. For example, the development of the ITB facilities attracted the presence of mobile street food vendors (pedagang kaki lima) catering for students. They gathered next to the parking area. This increased the volume of garbage scattered on the walking paths of the city forest, and there were no formal means of clearing it away. On the other hand, ITB does make indirect pedagogic use of the remaining jungle remnant. Since the remaining tropical forest is rich in tree species, students of Biology from ITB often hold scientific events in the forest to apply their knowledge, so in that sense the Babakan Siliwangi forest acts as a real-life nature laboratory for students.
5.3.2 Ecological Significance The Babakan Siliwangi city forest contains 1,661 tree species. The baseline study by Edriani (2013) also found that the forest has a tree density of 496 trees per square kilometre, of which the majority are more than 50 years old (see figure 5.2 to view the density of this forest). The dense tree cover helps neutralise carbon dioxide and absorbs heat from the surrounding urban area (Edriani, 2013) (see Figure 5.2). An interview in January 2015 with Dadan Ramdan, a WALHI Executive Director, established that there are 112 fauna species in the forest, including four indigenous primates that the government is supposed to protect under existing laws. Based on the density of indigenous flora and fauna, Babakan Siliwangi has gained legal recognition in the formal of some local regulations to protect it.
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Figure 5.2 Different tree species enrich the ecological function at Babakan Siliwangi
Source: www.backsilbio2013.wordpress.com
According to Regional Government Regulation No. 22, 2010 on Landscape Planning and Regional Planning for West Java Province 2009-2029, Babakan Siliwangi is part of North Bandung Region (Kawasan Bandung Utara). As a recognised city forest, it is categorised as a Strategic Region in the Province (Kawasan Strategis Propinsi). This categorisation recognises that the city forest functions as a natural protector of landscape at the lower altitude of Bandung city. At the local level of regulation, the recognised function of the city forest was enshrined in Regional Government Regulation No. 18, 2011. That regulation confirms that Babakan Siliwangi is integral to the environmental sustainability
65 of the Cikapundung River, because it is a catchment area. When the rainy season comes, the trees retain the extra water and slow the flow of runoff down to the river, preventing flooding. A walkway was built so that the public can enjoy the natural richness of varied tree species without degrading the soil and the existing groundcover (see Figure 5.3).
Figure 5.3 The walkway which was constructed in 2011
Source: http://baksilkita.blogspot.com.au)
5.3.3 Cultural and Artistic Significance Besides those legally recognised ecological functions in the city, a variety of social and cultural activities take place in Babakan Siliwangi which attract local people to visit. One example is the Arts Workshop (Sanggar Olah Seni/SOS) (see Figure 5.4). To preserve and promote works of art, especially paintings by artists from Bandung, in 1977 the Ministry of Culture and Tourism inaugurated the Arts Workshop. As part of the cultural heritage in Indonesia it is recognised as nationally significant. The Arts Workshop also reinforces the identity of Sundanese culture because it brings the synthesis of nature and art into the heart of the city. Nationally recognised Indonesian figures such as Trie Utami1, Acil Bimbo2,
1Trie Utami is a singer and composer. She is one of the senior artists in Indonesia performing contemporary dances. 2Acil Bimbo is a Sundanese singer and multi-talented actor. He is a member of the religious band Bimbo.
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Christine Hakim3, Dede Yusuf4, Rano Karno5 and many more visit the art studio to chat with local artists. They sometimes buy the paintings displayed there. The Arts Workshop attracts new young artists who learn from experienced painters and sculptors.
Figure 5.4 Arts Workshop (Sanggar Olah Seni) in Babakan Siliwangi urban forest
Source: www.adriarani.blogspot.com
Babakan Siliwangi is also a cultural space for a traditional Sundanese spiritual collective (penghayat aliran kepercayaan) of more than 50 members to gather. Every month, on the day when the full moon appears, Sunda Wiwitan6 spiritual collective comes to Babakan Siliwangi city forest to conduct worship. They place a set of offerings - incense and frangipani flowers - on the top of the Yoni, a large flat stone that symbolises female receptivity. They sprinkle
3Christine Hakim is a well-known film actress. She starred in the film Cut Nyak Dien in a leading role 4Dede Yusuf is a famous artist. In 2003 he turned his passion to politics and now he is Vice Governor of West Java Province. 5Rano Karno is an Indonesian artist and politician. Currently is the Governor of Banten Province. In the 1990s he was popular in the TV serial Si Doel Anak Sekolahan (Si Doel: The Schoolboy). 6 The syncretic spiritual tradition of Sunda Wiwitan comes from animistic roots. It is believed that spirits inhabit rocks, trees and streams. When the Sunda kingdom adopted Hinduism after the 4th century, Hindu gods and rituals were adopted and adapted.
67 roses around the Lingga, a large upright stone which symbolises male potency (Figure 5.5 below). Both sacred stones are located next to a sacred Banyan tree in Babakan Siliwangi. Together, they celebrate the unity of humans and nature. The majority of members are aged over 45. The Sunda Wiwitan monthly gathering draws domestic tourists and photographers to witness the rituals of worship.
Figure 5.5 Lingga-Yoni stones in the forest
Source: http://www.bandungnewsphoto.com
Another Sundanese traditional practice is the goat fight. 25 metres to the west of the Arts Workshop in Babakan Siliwangi, there is a large multi-purpose open area. Every fourth week, this space is used for a Goat Fighting Festival by the Association of Goat Breeders of West Java (see Figure 5.6). This is an event eagerly anticipated and attended by Sundanese people in Bandung. The open area includes a music rig and stage. The stage is always busy as a platform for free musical performances by youth from Bandung and surrounding areas on Sundays. Next door, some flat land north of the Arts Workshop is used as an open space for art installations and performances.
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Figure 5.6 Goat Fighting Festival
Source: http://www.maria-g-soemitro.com/2015/09/the-world-city-forest.html
Local artists in Bandung work actively to reinforce the identity of Babakan Siliwangi as a significant ethnocultural and ecological entity. One of the Sundanese rites held yearly in Babakan Siliwangi to maintain unity between the elements of earth, God and human existence is Ngalokat (see Figure 5.7). It is carefully carried out so as to maintain the balance of cosmic forces. In 2013 the special form of the Ngalokat ritual forcibly reminded the government of Bandung that it is essential to maintain the city forest for the continued existence of Sundanese culture7. In March 2013, a group of artists enhanced Ngalokat Hahalang Babakan Siliwangi to specifically purify the forest and protect it from calamity. Calamity was referenced to the threat of commercialisation by PT EGI in collusion with the
7 Even though Indonesia is a Muslim-majority country, there are still traditional people in rural areas who maintain spiritualism and shamanism. Early Sunda Wiwitan practices can still be found in rituals like Ngalokat.
69 government. A collaborative performance event that involved dance, art, and music in the Ngalokat ceremony was arranged by locally well-known artists like Opik Sunandar Bandung, Alpiyanto, Dodi Satia Eka, Arab Yudi, Abah Nanu, Tisna Sanjaya, and Isa Perkasa. The number of the year was spiritually significant. The number 13, according to Sundanese culture, is a symbol of the sanctity of the world. Symbols of nature such as birds, butterflies, mountains and forests appeared symbolically in the 2013 ritual and were embodied in the paraphernalia. The message was that without the co-existence of forest, water, and soil, humanity cannot survive. In this context, the implication is the need to ensure the balance between development and the environment.
Figure 5.7 Ngalokat: A Sundanese ritual
Source: Pikiran Jabar.com
The Ngalokat ritual normally begins with a ceremonial showering of flowers, which is called Siraman Moyang in Sundanese. In the 2013 ritual, one of the artists associated with Babakan
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Siliwangi was washed with water that was fetched from seven sources. The seven sources symbolise the perfection of God bestowed on man: Life, Strength, Vision, Hearing, Speech, Feeling, and Willingness. By performing this ritual washing, the ceremony delivered a moral message that the patrons of Babakan Siliwangi should be protected from calamity. Government officials and local politicians attended the 2013 enactment of Ngalokat, which lasted for a whole day. National and local journalists provided press coverage. The 2013 ritual was intended by organisers to convey a political message to the government, to pay more attention to the concerns of the public who are active users of the forest green space. The moral message was that the Sundanese culture, environment, and social life that has shaped the modern city of Bandung as a whole should be respected and preserved.
5.3.4 Significance for Young People The Babakan Siliwangi city forest has a special meaning for youth in the city. It is a primary leisure, socialising and courting space for them. They also use the city forest open performance space to attract public attention through music concerts. For example, a concert called Sunday Smile Picnic8 (Figure 5.8 below) was a regular event held once every two weeks by the City Park Community until mid-2012 (Alam & Nilan, 2015). At every concert, the great amount of youth interest in Bandung music was in no doubt. A music concert held by the City Park Community was able to attract hundreds of young people aged 17-28. The young people flocked to the concert on Sundays, not only to listen, but to socialise with friends and to walk and jog. Thus, Babakan Siliwangi, besides having ecological functions, was instrumental in forming valuable social capital for the citizens of Bandung youth through art and cultural activities. Due to the number and variety of youth events held there, by 2012/2013 Babakan Siliwangi had become the major cultural icon for young people in Bandung.
8 The fun of Sunday Smile Picnic can be watched at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0d6rXNoAvPs
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Figure 5.8 Sunday Smile Picnic
Source: Facebook
One of the annual events organised in Babakan Siliwangi city forest is Colour Run, organised by the Indonesian Computer Studies University of Bandung (UNIKOM) (see Figure 5.9). Besides promoting the benefit of running for physical fitness and reinvigorating a sense of affinity among students, this event encourages students to have a closer relationship with nature. It invites them to understand their cultural ownership of Babakan Siliwangi forest as a natural asset of Bandung city. The Colour Run starts with an initial lecture about how running as a cardiac sport can prevent individuals from hypertension. The finish line is at the Arts Workshop. A prize is awarded to the male and female participants who are first across the line. The partnerships reflected in the organisation of the annual Colour Run demonstrate sound collaboration between young people, the university and the arts community of Babakan Siliwangi.
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Figure 5.9 Colour Run organised by Indonesian Computer Studies University (UNIKOM) students
Source: Backsilmove
The event ‘REGIA: The Story of the City Forest 2013’ was initiated by the BCCF collective to expose people to the presence of cultural spots situated in Babakan Siliwangi and demonstrate to them the 2011 Forest Walk as one of the prominent facilities in the forest. For two days in April 2013 (see Figure 5.10), the event involved several activities such as Forest Dining, Forest Picnic, Yoga in the Forest, Blues Leuweng, Babakan Siliwangi Campaign, Children’s Workshop: Storytelling, ‘Ayo Main’ Games, Photo exhibition, and Light Inspiration. As visitors to the event walked around, a number of activities were on offer. For example, the Photo Forest had earlier encouraged people to send their experiential stories about the city forest so they could be heard by visitors to the REGIA event. The active Save
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Babakan Siliwangi Campaign was promoted through activities including: distribution of ecological information and an interactive map about the ecological function of the forest, with the option for children of writing and sending forest postcards. To engage young people with local arts, a Blues Leuweng concert was held by the Bandung Blues Society to spread the ‘vibe’ of the forest. A coloured light installation was put in place along the Forest Walk to add a night time romantic ambience to the forest. A Yoga in The Forest workshop, led by a professional Yoga instructor, successfully attracted 50 participants. Forest Dining was offered by Kafe Halaman. The restaurant provided a tea party in the daytime and an exclusive romantic dinner on the forest walk at night. Events specifically for children were also offered. Ayo Main (let’s play) activities provided hundreds of primary school-aged children with the opportunity to learn about Sundanese traditional games. In a separate Children’s Workshop, they made up their own stories about the city forest under the supervision of volunteers from Sahabat Kota (friends of the city).
Figure 5.10 REGIA: The Story of the Urban Forest
Source: www.galihsedayu.com
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A knowledge-sharing forum was held to tell people about the threat to Babakan Siliwangi. The forum was included in an event called Jorowok Bandung. Jorowok in Sundanese means ‘yelling’. The event aimed to let people know in strong terms about the environmental vulnerability of Bandung city in the light of improperly regulated commercial development plans. In that event, forest experts and social activists, including young people engaged in discussion forums to formulate ideas and map the future challenges for the city forest. The REGIA event was not aimed specifically at young people, but attracted them in abundance. This event showed the effectiveness of active public participation in concerted activities to maintain the relationship between urbanites and their local forest.
5.3.5 Significance for Children A city forest is one important resource for children to enrich their knowledge about biodiversity and to learn how a tropical forest functions. The transfer of knowledge to children at an early age about the value of the natural environment surrounding them is crucial for creating their sense of human agency, as they will become the future guardians of nature. Given the importance of environmental education, Babakan Siliwangi was often used as a learning area for field studies by primary schools and local kindergartens in Bandung. The city forest serves as a one-stop learning hub because besides studying the types of plant and animal species there, they undertake adventures exploring various spots in the forest. At the beginning of 2013, an environmental community called Saung Siliwangi was established and founded by former Bandung journalist Andi Efriandi. Prompted by the crisis to teach young people who have deep concerns about the environment, Saung Siliwangi successfully staged a Pendidikan Lingkungan (Environmental Education program), abbreviated as Eling, which also means ‘to remember’ This program featured environmental education focused on nature conservation in order to improve the children’s interactions with forests. The main topic was the ecological function of Babakan Siliwangi. It was training designed to develop students’ capability in maintaining environmental sustainability by teaching them the impacts of everyday consumption on the environment. One strand of the educational program was to boost their creativity by creating artworks, where basic ingredients are sourced from nature or used goods. Gaining pro-environmental values through this activity an early age, the children were expected to become strong advocates for the environment in the future.
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One of the first sessions was called Hayu Ulin (trees of) di Bababakan Siliwangi. 75 students were given an introduction to the basics of the history of Babakan Siliwangi, including its physical transformation to the present day. Students were invited to think critically about how infrastructure development and economic ambitions could further decimate the area of Babakan Siliwangi. In this first session, children were asked to identify how green spaces in urban areas can be diminished, for example, through the development of new housing facilities, shopping malls, and hotels. Although the critical capabilities of children will take time to develop, Andi, the director of the programme seemed confident that the children who took part will have greater sensitivity to changes in urban land use.
The Eling paradigm was to transfer the value of the environment through experiential learning, which means children are invited to feel and explore their own values through their own experience. Moreover, the skill of teamwork was also taught in the Eling program by enabling them to visit thematic posts in the forest in groups. At the Conservation Post for example, they were given extra knowledge on tree-planting as reforestation to avert landslides. A local Snake Lovers group also seized the attention of children in the program. A green tree snake was presented mid-session so that children understood the co-existence of animals as part of ecosystem balance. Then, they were tasked to answer quizzes on the names of the main trees in Babakan Siliwangi. Groups who first completed that quiz were allowed to continue to a Recycling Post which aimed to give awareness to children about using discarded items such as plastic drink bottles or cardboard to create pencil cases or flowerpots. In another example, at the Painting Post they were given not paint, but mud (earth, soil) to depict the human body. The purpose was to bring children to an alternative worldview through art, one specially related to closeness between nature and humans. The children also created a collaborative painting with plant and animal themes.
The examples above demonstrate the special significance of Babakan Siliwangi for all kinds of people, young and old, in Bandung. It provides a background for understanding the high level of support given to the campaign to save the city forest from commercial development, and later to the radical activism of Backsilmove.
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5.4 Urban Protest Bandung city was led by Mayor Dada Rosada from 2003 to 2012. He was under political pressure to raise city revenue. In this context, Babakan Siliwangi was regarded as appropriate for land-leasing to the private sector for the development of tourism facilities, both hotels and restaurants. It is unfortunate that the Bandung city government did not see those social and cultural activities of the community as a social asset that needs to be preserved and promoted as a symbol of Sundanese culture. It seems the city government at that time saw the artistic, cultural and social activities and events as not having economic value for Bandung. Rather, Babakan Siliwangi was thought to be a profitable site for development because it is surrounded by international hotels, has close proximity to universities, and is within walking distance of Dago Street, where fashion centres are located, as well as shopping arcades such as Cihampelas. Looking at the economic opportunities suggested by the city forest site, from 2003 the government of Bandung began to call for investors. In 2007 Dada Rosada signed a development contract with PT. EGI. PT EGI was already widely known for its hotel and restaurant businesses in Bandung. In December 2008, Environmental Impact Assessment (Analisis Dampak Lingkungan/AMDAL) commenced. At the end of December 2012, PT EGI notified the public that they had obtained a letter of Building Permission (Ijin Mendirikan Bangunan/IMB).
That signed contract instantly attracted the attention of activists and artists. They initiated a network of protest to show their anger and contention. One artist who aggressively voiced his anger at the possible development plan was Tisna Sanjaya. His accumulated frustration was not without prior cause. On February 5, 2004, at exactly 10am, Tisna Sanjaya’s installation in the forest - Perahu Doa (Prayer Boat), dedicated to the souls of the victims of violence during the New Order, was burnt down by the civil police unit on the grounds that the exhibition was wasteful and filthy, constituting littering in Babakan Siliwangi city forest. Artist Franciscus Xaverius Harsono argued that the pretext of garbage referred to by the city authorities was unacceptable, because Tisna Sanjaya’s installation was not shaped like garbage9. Yet, the Dada Rosada government claimed that the installation was garbage; containing no moral message and not artistic at all (Harsono, 2004). In fact, it seems that Dada Rosada felt insulted by the work of Tisna. He then deployed police and military troops
9 A visual record is available at the following link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0hITIY4uFi0
77 to suppress it. Although the New Order regime of Soeharto had passed, the leadership style of Dada Rosada still favoured military force with its intimidating actions.
In 2007, when the development contract was approved, the drums of war against the city government resurfaced in the city forest. Some organisations coalesced and formed the Babakan Siliwangi Residents Forum (Forum Warga Peduli Babakan Siliwangi). Anticipating further police intervention and unexpected inspection from political groups that were in alliance with Dada Rosada, the Forum held regular meetings in the Arts Workshop every night behind closed doors to discuss the agenda of fighting against the development permit. At the same time, online petitions were mobilised by the Forum to show public anger. Around 4,000 signatures were collected by September 2008. At the time, the mayoral regime of Dada Rosada was such that no one dared to wage demonstrations or political protest in public spaces, unless they were not afraid to go to jail. However, political mobilisation of the masses still took place. As a coalition of artists and environmental activists, the Forum continued to hold informal discussions about preserving the city forest during the years 2008 to 2012. The Forum continued to attract supporters and make the public aware of the looming threat to the Babakan Siliwangi forest. This reflects how a networked community can come together to put political pressure on the government. Underground forums such as the Forum Warga Peduli Babakan Siliwangi demonstrate that in times of crisis, their work as ‘subterranean networks’ (Melucci, 1989) can be successful in a movement.
Yet, although the protest movement to save the forest continued its activities from 2008 to 2012, there was little public protest, and young people were much less engaged in the process of planning and execution, even though Babakan Silwangi was so important for them. The older generation as well as civil society groups were over-represented in the forum and to some extent blocked the space for political participation by young people. As a point of departure, Backsilmove as an organisation of concerned young people was initiated to establish a community of direct action. It consisted of local youth and experienced environmental activists. Overall, Backsilmove emerged as an organisation of young people who detached themselves from the broader campaign, to form an ideology of high-risk resistance to defend Babakan Siliwangi city forest. Backsilmove formed its own identity
78 through young people’s innovative and creative actions. Further discussions about the trajectory of Backsilmove are detailed in Chapter Ten.
5.5. Conclusion This chapter has described the transformation process of Babakan Siliwangi – physically and culturally. Shifts in Indonesia's economy mainly marked by the liberalisation of the market, and reinforced by regional decentralization, turned out to be vehicles for municipal government ambitions to increase the income of the local economy, particularly by optimising infrastructure development that could raise the amount of tax, through, for example, hotel, mall, and restaurant development. This policy encouraged development at the expense of the urban forest area in Bandung. It was clear that government viewed the urban forest solely as an object of economic value from which profits could be quickly extracted. This chapter has explained the various uses of the Babakan Siliwangi forest by the community. Examples of events show how crucial this urban forest is as a lively site of transcultural interaction platform for young people and the public in Bandung. Later mass protests, which occurred in March 2013, demonstrated the collective power of the pro-forest community groups who were shocked by the city government’s commercialisation agenda. These events showed that although the people as a whole may not be directly involved in political decision-making, they remain an active and critical force in monitoring policies made by the government, and in protecting community resources against poorly regulated urban development.
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CHAPTER 6. ‘BEING’ AN ENVIRONMENTAL ACTIVIST
6.1 Introduction This chapter considers the profile of Backsilmove activists who were involved in this study, with emphasis on their everyday lives as activists in 2014. In that sense it examines their ‘cognitive praxis’ as everyday environmentalists; their displayed ecological habitus in the company of peers. The analysis here digs into family influences and the relevant cultural capital acquired. The concept of distinction from Bourdieu is used to grasp how their cultural norms as environmental activists are reflected in negotiations over ethical consumption, mobility and leisure practices and participation in public events. As indicated previously, all of them were tertiary-educated, indicating a middle-class background and the acquisition of cultural capital at an early age. For that reason, the discussion below starts with their educational profile.
6.2 Educational Profile Tertiary education for the people of Indonesia may be considered as the ladder to gain upward social mobility. Nilan et al. (2011) propose that the current generation of Indonesian youth is the most educated in history. Scaffolded by a rapidly growing economy and increase in private investment, upward credentialling of the labour market is the driver of this transformation (Nilan et al., 2011). Amongst Indonesian students, tertiary education fosters entrepreneurship and social creativity (Indarti, Rostiani & Nastiti, 2010). This section will show how cultural capital and academic status are represented in the biographical trajectory of young activists.
At the time of fieldwork in 2014, respondents were found to have studied, or to be studying, business, social sciences and humanities, informatics and education. For example, six had studied communications, four had a management sciences background, one had studied English literature and translation, while four had studied computer science (including Web Design). One had a sports education background, two had just graduated from arts, one had taken social psychology, another was still studying anthropology. Yet another was in his second year of tourism studies. From this, we see that they were well-educated young
80 activists (Malone & Tranter, 2003), presumably from middle-class backgrounds. When I asked them about educational background they talked about the kind of jobs they would like. It seemed a good quality job for them would be one that allowed them ample time for socialising with friends, represented one of their life passions, and gave opportunities for self- development. These job aspirations allude to the kind of good life imaginings that are characteristic of middle-class Indonesian youth (see Nilan, 2008). Their job aspirations favoured humanitarian causes, communication services and consultancy, journalism and education. In short, their job aspirations reflected the less-materialistic worldview observed in some profiles of environmental movement members worldwide (see Franzen & Meyer, 2009; Boeve-de Pauw & Van Petegem, 2010). They talked about their passions and being ‘hati- nurani’ (pure of heart) when applying for a job. I joked with Febri and asked what she would prefer: becoming a high-salaried woman working in an oil and gas company, or working as psychologist in a remote area. She declared that working as psychologist in a remote area would be far better than in mining, as she would be able to pour out her counselling skills and devote her time to helping others. Such responses denote a post-materialist consciousness (Inglehart, 1995) that is notable amongst social activists in the world (Perla, 2008).
6.3 Family Life In general, the young activists reported they were brought up in family environments with established economic conditions and did not experience difficulties in financing their tertiary studies despite the fact that there are a few structural impediments in their lives. For instance, seven respondents reported that their parents were employers; owning a food court, business deliveries of fish, timber management. Nine of them had parents working as civil servants, four had parents who were managers in private companies, one informant’s father was a lecturer and one did not identify his parents as he was currently living with his siblings. The parents’ employment background for young activists in this Indonesian study resembles findings by Skogen (1996) about young Norwegian environmental activists aged 13-25. Their parents’ jobs were in similar intermediate strata (Skogen, 1996, p. 426), including managers, lecturers, teachers, scientists, artists and the like.
As an early source of cultural capital, book ownership in the home is one indicator of the knowledge transfer process amongst family members (Skogen, 1996). In this doctoral study, all respondents reported over 200 books at their family home, with the majority of books
81 containing knowledge related to globalisation, politics and history. Moreover, their parents subscribed to newspapers and liked to get news updates on political topics in Indonesia. Watching television at night was an important activity. While watching, their parents were reported discussing political news, natural disasters and world governance. Perhaps inheriting that orientation to current affairs, the young activists in this study were social media-savvy (see Utomo et al., 2013). For example, during interviews they carried the latest smart phone models which are 24/7 connected to the internet through private mobile providers. Lim (2004) terms this internet access amongst young Indonesians a ‘convivial medium’ (p. 60). Her studies confirm that the internet has now become ubiquitous in everyday communication in Indonesia. Often times, the young activists would check for updates on Twitter, Facebook and Whatsapp during interviews, indicating close attention to newsfeeds and online communities, even though they run a different mode of communication to their parents. The respondents expressed great interest in news topics about environmental politics, environmental damage, adventurous activities and social movements, which they access via Twitter and online news portals. It is not hard to conclude that they absorbed this orientation from family life when they experienced a high level of current affairs discussion by their parents in the home.
6.4 Distinction – Going ‘Green’ The activists’ operation of green distinction demonstrates how they consume specific goods and services, and how they socially reveal their identity through those choices. Consumption is ‘conceptualized as acquisition and use of things including goods, products’ (Wilhite, 2008, p. 3). The section of discussion below illustrates the cultural practices that activists perform in terms of ethically consuming goods and products in their lives in ways that match their environmental concerns.
6.4.1 Ethical Consumption Ethical consumption is a practice that takes on the values of environmental and social sustainability of goods and services (Warde, 1997). Viewed from the perspective of the environment, it requires ethical choice in terms of consumption of goods. The aim is to prevent or discourage practices that are part of the destructive supply chain for biodiversity, forest ecosystem and surrounding local communities. Also, if goods are produced and managed by local communities, then the profit share should be distributed in a fair,
82 transparent and rewarding way for their lives. In other words, ethical consumption contains ecological standards that require individuals to notice every environmental impact of what goes into their bodies or even visceral effects that appear later in life (Sassatelli & Davolio, 2010). Humanising the environment (Mueller, 2014, p. 70) is probably the right term to coin as ontology for this practice. In this study, I observed that the practice of ethical consumption is quite ingrained amongst these young activists. It is omnipresent especially when they pick up food. They carefully choose modes of transport. These are the kind of generative dispositions commonly associated with an ecological habitus (Gäbler, 2015; Haluza-DeLay, 2008;).
In the selection of food or beverage, activists were cautious and critical of the production process and its supply chain networks. Lentia, for example, an activist who is fond of coffee, was extraordinarily selective in choosing the right café in Jakarta for a meeting. When being in the café she was not just hanging out and having discussions such as the majority of young people do, but was investigating the origins of brewed coffee and local people's lives behind the product. Therefore, she has only one favourite cafe on the outskirts of the CBD. This is Depot, where the coffee is processed by rural communities of Colombia. Moreover, along with her fellow activists, she likes spending weekend time in Cafe ABCD in South Jakarta. Unlike the majority of metropolitan cafés serving its menu in an air-conditioned room, the ABCD coffee menu is presented in a kiosk located in the midst of a market. By embracing the atmosphere of a genuine brick-walled coffee shop that serves directly from the bar, the majority of customers who are hipsters and art activists can interact with the barista while the coffee is prepared. They also can get a complete introduction from the barista about the origins and philosophy of the coffee. Lentia reminisced about the social location of cafes than can take her into close proximity to the grass root constituency that she mobilises for environmental action. ‘Oh, I feel merakyat there’ (more grounded), she confessed to me. On another occasion, I invited her and Hadi for a chat at a McDonalds restaurant. Although I promised to treat them, they both refused. I became aware that McDonalds is a restaurant that they avoid in order not to breach their political commitment (Portwood-Stacer, 2012) to struggle against global capitalism. This activist attitude suggests that consumers can influence social change, politics and the environment through making choices. Those activists suggested several strategies related to the politics of consumption and choice of food. Consumers need to develop awareness of free trade and organic products, local food, the
83 conditions of food workers and environmental quality (Baumann, Engman & Johnston, 2015).
In addition to the café, there are only certain restaurants that reflect their political alignments as young environmentalist activists. For example, a bamboo-walled food stall called Raja was favoured by activists Wirdan and Wildan in Bandung. So, although Hadi now lives in Jakarta, he always makes time for lunch there while visiting his fellow activists in Bandung. Their sense of activism is represented by the social nuances of the space. The woven bamboo walls create a sense of respect for the artisans, the local craftsmen, who weave the material collectively. This surrounding restores their sense of kerakyatan (grass roots) in the middle of the swift currents of urban modernisation. Traditionality is an aspect they appreciate as young people who grew up in an urbanised Indonesia. For them, this restaurant has the traditional authenticity of the Javanese noodle menu that still maintains the original taste from rural Indonesia. Even to the present day, a cup of warm tea is served with rock sugar from a pot made of clay. Hadi was born to a Javanese family that migrated to Jakarta in the late 1970s. He occasionally spoke to me in truncated Javanese language. In his native Jakartan accent he expressed how important noodles were to the memory of his grandparents: ‘I love coming over here Mas, Saya itu wong Jowo, tapi aku ora iso ngomong Jowo. Mulane aku seneng kesini’10. He implies reconfiguring the roots of his Javanese identity when visiting that traditional-looking food stall. It indicates that such space can ‘mediate individuals to participate by using goods to communicate social meanings’ (Guillén-Royo, 2007, p. 28).
Locally-made food is an important menu item for consumption by these activists and once again reflects an ecological habitus; exercising sustainable integrity in consumption. Locally made food is produced in-house and the production process and the selection of raw materials are strictly monitored. Locally made food is a form of alternative movement to counter the mainstream food sector (Otterloo, 2012; Blake, Mellor, & Crane, 2010). So, the young activists pick a restaurant, which has an ethically valid menu because they are concerned with the production process of food.
They held their collective meetings in the Tree House Café, built with a white classy-styled exterior. On the menu is a Veggie Brockwurst, a German-style home-made sausage made
10 Mas, I am definitely Javanese but can’t (really) speak Javanese. So I love to be here
84 with local vegetables that is palatable for vegetarians. Despite the fact that not all activists were vegetarian, they enjoyed this menu as a form of political support for the local food supply chain. Other local cuisines are also available. Several times I observed Wildan, Faisal, Nadia and Wirdan in that café having a serious discussion on strategic planning of environmental activism. Wirdan once jokingly remarked ‘Nongkrong seru tuch asyiknya di sini, yuk ngobrolin tentang riset’ (This place is great for chill-out, let’s talk about research). Wirdan’s remarks suggest that the café was not just a place to hang out, but also a space to revitalise the intellectual community of middle-class activists.
The activists preferred beverages such as avocado juice, tomato juice, guava juice, and the like to instant drinks. Faisal said the blended juices are healthier and more nutritious compared to Coke. He conveys the message that green consumption of local food is not only instrumental for reviving the local economy, but also an inherent action for disassociating themselves from global corporate capitalism, which is disastrous for the environment. Burlingame (2007) views such choices as representing a sustainable diet that is protective and respectful of biodiversity and ecosystems, economically fair and affordable (p. 7). Another activist, Puspita, created ethical consumption through consuming free range chickens that were free of preservatives and were halal. Originally, she was a pescatarian and semi- vegetarian, but it did not last long. For her, ethical consumption does not necessarily mean a vegetarian lifestyle. Instead, the most crucial aspect is the meat production process according to Islam. Her views on ethical consumption were rather strict. She preferred having meals at her home and avoided eating at a stall or restaurant due the fact that the menu might not be religiously and ethically verifiable. Yet Puspita’s practice was also an act of distancing herself from unsustainable food preservation and production (Coff, 2006) as an expression of ecological habitus.
6.4.1 Mobility Transport is essential for the young activists given their mobility inside and outside the city. The young activists in Bandung reported using motorcycles. One of the compelling reasons they prefer the motorcycle is because of the congestion of Bandung city in the morning. Similarly, activists living in Jakarta also used motorcycles. Yet they admitted that a motorcycle is a difficult choice to take in terms of environmental sustainability. For example, some who were studying expressed their desire to bike to campus or elsewhere, if the
85 government could create bike lanes in Bandung city to ensure their safety. During interviews, some complained specifically about how the city government policy was not pro- environment or bike-conscious. Even in the midst of vigorous public space revitalisation efforts and economic development, the Bandung municipal government has still not passed a bill to develop a consensus of establishing pro-environment policy. Thus, the young activists are bound to ride a motorcycle every day and they cannot be blamed because they are in a state of being ‘locked-in’ (Røpke, 1999; Jackson & Papathanasopoulou, 2008). Being ‘locked-in’ is an outcome of structural factors that hinder individuals from realising alternative choices. The government’s initiatives in building infrastructure do not support efforts in creating pro-environmental behaviour in the case of encouraging bicycle use.
6.4.2 Leisure and Fashion December to late March are holiday months for university students in Bandung and they usually spend them on leisure activities and excursions. Interestingly, the young activists spent their holiday time hiking in the mountains, rock climbing and canoeing. They spent leisure time together as a pro-environmental preference. They did not spend time socialising in the mall. Activists in Bandung or Jakarta refused to go to a shopping centre or mall. I came to realise that the mall is a representation of global capitalism for them and it became a target for resistance by the environmental movement. In the case of Faisal, his refusal was due to the fact of a painful childhood experience resulting from the construction of a mall. Protest efforts were made by Faisal in the form of small boycotts of mall goods or practices because they were inconsistent with his values (Boström & Klintman, 2009).
On several occasions of hanging out, the young activists wore particular styled clothes that characterised their involvement in the environmental movement. This matches the point that the symbols activists consume in their dress embed a desire to embrace an altered social condition (Portwood-Stacer, 2012). In a restaurant, café and on university campus, they wore T-shirts with text and images, for example, ‘Merah dan Kritis’ (‘Red and Critical’), ‘Yang Muda, Yang Melawan’ (The Youth, The Fighters), ‘Melawan atau Mati!’ (Resist or Die), ‘Ayo Lawan’ (Let’s Fight), that described the spirit of resistance. In addition, casual shoes and fleece pants were worn wherever they went. Such an outfit implies the identity of the outdoor adventurer (Henderson & Bialeschki, 2005). However, at the same time, that kind of outfit models the thinking radical.
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Symbols of Greenpeace as a radical environmental organisation were embodied in their wristbands. All the activists I interviewed proudly showed me wristbands inscribed boldly with ‘Greenpeace’. During the interviews, they folded up long sleeves, despite the air- conditioning. ‘Kan biarkeliatan (logo) Greenpeace-nya Kang’ (So I can let the Greenpeace logo pop out), one of the activists said, rolling up sleeves while we chatted at a café in Bandung CBD. These symbolic practices imply a cultural discourse to articulate the actions of themselves as Greenpeace’s agents. Rejecting plastic bottles, wherever they went they brought a tumbler along in their bag. Every time they were thirsty and took a tumbler out of the bag, I saw numerous stickers on it, especially the Greenpeace logo. Slogans included Selamatkan Harimau Sumatra dari Cengkeraman Kapitalisme Sawit – Save the Sumatran Tiger from the Grip of Palm Oil Capitalism (see Chisholm, Wijedasa & Swinfield 2016), and similar. Radical stickers conveyed messages about their everyday efforts as activists to destabilise the power structures of the status quo (De Certeau, 1984). Moreover, all activists chose to carry a backpack with Greenpeace key chains hanging on it. Some wore outdoor outfits and carried packs with brands such as Kathmandu, The North Face, Bergen, Jack Wolfskin, Thermarest, Cumulus, Patagonia, Rei and Columbia. Yet, while these are outdoor labels, they also reflect entanglement with global commoditisation (Beames & Brown, 2014) because they have been re-invented as fashion items.
6.4.3 Participating in Public Space Events Bandung is a growing regional capital city in Indonesia with strong branding in the creative industries. Comprising more than 60 per cent of the population, young people in Bandung contribute substantially to its creative industries. While there are difficulties in securing jobs in Indonesia, young people in this city revive the economic pulse of the city with ‘distro’ industries selling youth apparel. They also develop start-up IT companies as well as environmental consultancy services (Azzadina, Huda & Sianipar, 2012).
The emergence of environmental movements in Bandung began a long time ago. It commenced with the establishment of WALHI in 1985 and YPBB (Foundation of Bioscience and Bioethics) in 1992. Ten further groups followed the establishment of WALHI, whilst other NGOs concerned with environmental issues also became active. Most environmental NGOs in previous times involved themselves in a concerted effort to increase public
87 awareness about the environment (Nomura & Hendarti, 2005, p. 35). WALHI’s cooperative politics were conducted in collaboration with other NGOs. They opened up fresh air for environmental activism in Indonesia. This is because they received political protection from the government. It was also due to the fact that the environmental issues were not considered a threat to the Soeharto regime (Suharko, 2005). One of the most popular environmental collectives in Bandung was the Green Forum Bandung (Forum Hijau Bandung), co-founded by young entrepreneur Muhammad Junerosano, who was also engaged in the field of eco- entrepreneurship in Bandung and Jakarta. It involved large companies such as Circle-K, Hypermart and Carrefour in a movement for the removal of plastic bags in Indonesia (Alam, 2015).
More than ten community-based and environmental organisations of young people are headquartered in Bandung, and almost all of them conduct promotion of eco-friendly lifestyles (Alam & Nilan, 2015). Throughout my fieldwork, I observed their public environmental movement models, which tend to be soft-governed. They use environmental celebration, music performances, exhibitions and performances as cultural media to get noticed by the public. This celebration-styled environmental movement is consistent with the social class of activists in the study. Yet, curiously, the young activists interviewed for this study affirmed that they never or rarely participated in environmental campaigns held by any of those environmental organisations. For example, activists of Green Forum Bandung revealed that Greenpeace Youth Bandung members never attended their discussion forums until they were first invited in 2011. Activists in the Backsilmove movement, who were active in Greenpeace Youth Bandung considered Green Forum Bandung to favour a reformist position. The latter organisation was not interested in urging the government to create pro- environmental policies. Rather, environmental activism as promoted by Green Forum Bandung was mainly just pleasure. They had no courage to take to the streets to affect government policy change. In a nutshell, Forum Hijau Bandung and Greenpeace Youth did not demonstrate an aligned political platform (Melucci & Avritzer, 2000). In contrast, and even though a semi-autonomous organisation, Greenpeace Youth strongly upheld the principles and ideology of Greenpeace in using direct environmental direct action in their campaigns (Suharko et al., 2014). In short, the effort of these young activists to disassociate themselves from Forum Hijau Bandung acted to reinforce their identity as radical environmental activists. It pointed to the radical disposition of their ecological habitus.
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Nevertheless, the radical young activists were open to active participation in various exhibitions by environmental organisations such as one conducted by Padjadjaran University in 2012. Several members of Greenpeace Youth Bandung such as Raja, Canny, Wildan, Wirdan and Faisal – all later members of Backsilmove, staffed a booth at the event. In summary, when the opportunity arose to create an alternative (radical) presence in public space, the young activists participated (Hetherington, 1998). They showed great interest in the issues of human rights, socialism and anti-capitalism, the impact of environmental pollution at sea and the world of radical activism. The political world of protest was their passion and shaped their ‘collective identity’ (Polleta & Jasper, 2001, p. 285); their cognitive, moral and emotional connection with the broader community through the environmental movement. It is no surprise then that they were active in creating the successful Backsilmove campaign.
6.5 Conclusion This chapter has illustrated the profiles of young environmental activists with emphasis on their daily interactions through the cultural codes (Melucci, 1994) that constitute a radical social movement. It demonstrates their radical dispositions in restriction of material consumption and the use of symbols that articulate a green identity. It seems that ethical consumption, outdoor leisure, active participation in public protest and style showcase their everyday expressions of habitus as an environmental activist; their ecological habitus as cognitive praxis.
They use forms of distinction to construct an alternative political space at every moment. As Crossley (2003, p. 53) points out, ‘the personal is political’. As the fieldwork continued it became evident that Greenpeace had been instrumental in navigating them towards ‘green’ ideological choices. In short, a form of green distinction propelled their collective gravitation into a radical environmental organisation – Backsilmove. This process of gravitation to a radical environmentalist identity was rooted in the cultural capital (Bourdieu, 1984) tacitly communicated and transferred through everyday collective social practices of choice and discourse.
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CHAPTER 7. CHILDHOOD EXPERIENCES IN FAMILY AND SCHOOL
7.1 Introduction This chapter presents discussion of the evolution of Backsilmove activists during their childhood. It sets out what happened in the development of their primary habitus as defined by Bourdieu and Passeron (1977). The life trajectories here explore their experiences specifically during primary school, which also covers experiences within the nuclear family setting. It considers the Scouting movement and learning science subjects during primary school. It is evident that they had first-hand opportunities for being in nature and outdoor activities, and they also experienced resource exploitation in their local community due to development in the city. From the interview accounts, six themes were identified: Parents’ pro environmental behaviour, outdoor activities, parents’ political engagement, participation in the Scouting movement, learning about nature from science at Primary School level, and negative experiences linked to nature. These themes are congruent with Chawla’s study into activists’ life trajectories. That study found 77 per cent of adult activists (aged between 19 to 40 years old) perceived that childhood experience dealing with nature and environmental problems had been a special formative moment in their life, linked to their current activism (Chawla, 2006).
7.2 Parents’ Pro-Environmental Behaviour During childhood, parents are figures that play a vital role in shaping children’s understanding of the world. It is because children spend most of their significant time being with parents at home, and their lives are dependent on them. A study into the parental rearing model asserts that beliefs and attitudes ascribed to children are constructed mainly through child-parent interaction (Recuenco, 2010). Young activists in this study similarly indicated how the role of parents in introducing them to pro-environmental action was formative to their later involvement in the environmental movement. According to the interview accounts, pro-environmental actions such as gardening, waste separation, and watering the plants, were integral practices at home and they observed their parents or older family members doing these tasks.
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It appears that pro-environmental behaviour requires a specific model of socialisation rooted in interaction between children and older family members. For example, Pipin spent her childhood with a grandmother who routinely demonstrated environment-friendly behaviour in everyday life. Her grandmother was meticulous about waste separation, and this habit taught her about treating garbage properly, ‘she is a very strict person especially concerning garbage. During my primary school age, she was the one who took care of me, instead of my mum’11 (Pipin, interview, January 2015). In Pipin’s childhood, caring for the environment was a ‘normalization of everyday life’ (Sahakian & Wilhite, 2014, p. 27). She experienced not only normalisation and habituation in pro-environmental behaviour, but also other mundane environmental actions to sustain the life cycle of waste, which she learnt from her grandmother through the making of fertilisers from food leftover at home. In contrast to other young activists’ childhoods, Pipin’s pro-environmental behaviour was most likely shaped by the figure of her grandmother. Her later ecological habitus was primarily due to the early consistent ‘push factor’ imposed by her grandmother at home. She said of her grandmother, ‘up to now even though she is already retired she still practices garbage separation at home’12. (Pipin, interview, January 2015)
On the other hand, Canny’s story evidences her admiration of her mother’s assertive stance concerning household waste management during her primary school years. As she recalled, ‘oh yeah, I remember, when I was in primary school my mother was very outspoken and she always pushed us to separate the bins for food leftover and plastics’13. Even more, her mother attempted to teach this as an aspect of ‘becoming’ an acceptable good wife according to Indonesian norms. Her big sister shared similar experiences. On the topic of how environmental caring behaviour is connected to being a good wife that might possibly fit with Indonesian norms, she declared staunchly, Maybe it’s because she is a housewife who is always extremely responsible for the household chores. And she wants me and my sister to have such a character. But what
11Beliau itu orangnya keras banget ya, apalagi soal sampah gitu. Waktu aku masih SD kan dia juga yang ngrawat aku di rumah, selain ibu. 12Sampe sekarang walaupun dia udah lama pensiun tapi masih aja nglakuin pemilahan sampah di rumah. 13Oiya aku inge, dulu pas waktu masih SD yam amah itu emang orangnya cewet dan selalu maksa kami berdua untuk misahin tempat sampah buat kaleng, sisa makanan, dan plastik-plastik.
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I mostly keep in mind is her consistent pro-environmental habits at home and I still believe this now14 (Canny, interview, April 2015). Despite perhaps departing from her mother’s view on being a ‘culturally acceptable’ woman, Canny captured another persistent value from her mother, and this relates to the process of ‘becoming’ an activist. Specifically, her comment, ‘I still believe this’, as noted above, suggests that her mother is perceived as a transformational figure, who has shaped her social character later as a young activist. Furthermore, Canny adopted her father’s hobby of enjoying outdoor activities, which allowed her to develop a passion for nature travel: ‘when I was in primary school, my dad always reminded me, if you have a big dream of travelling to all over the Nusantara, you should start building your dream from now on through engaging in nature activities and being outdoors’15 (Canny, interview, April 2015).
Likewise, another young activist asserted that gardening with her parents during childhood instilled a sense of affinity to nature in her. For that experience, Puspita specified: ‘when I was in primary school, I liked to see my father gardening and enjoyed it together with him every weekend. He even allowed me to touch worms, soils, and plants’16 (Interview, March 2015). Gardening gradually shaped Puspita’s strong interest in nature. Looking after several rabbits at home was her activity when she was at primary school age, and her parents did not restrict this. While she was a child, she allocated time per week to feed her pet animals every morning before going to school with her elder sister. In the night, she even checked her pets, ensuring that they were doing well. Among the young activists in this study it was only Puspita who mentioned an emotional engagement with a pet animal. Later, her caring about animals manifested in her deep concerns about the vulnerable lives of deer inhabiting the backyard of University of Indonesia (UI) where she studied Psychology. With a tone of pity as she remembers her past, she told me about her initiative in deer conservation which had a connection to fun times with her pets: ‘They [deer] were very skinny and so pitiful. They reminded me of my rabbits many years ago. I have been at UI for years so they are like my
14Mungkin dia itu tipe ibu rumah tangga yang punya tanggung jawab kuat untuk tugas rumah tangganya. Dan dia tuh pengen aku sama kakakku punya sifat kayak dia. Tapi aku selalu ingat gimana konsistensi beliau terhadap lingkungan di rumah dan aku pegang ini terus sampe sekarang. 15Waktu masih SD, ayah tu pernah ngingetin aku, kalau kamu punya mimpi besar ke seluruh penjuru nusantara, kamu harus mulai bangun mimpimu sejak sekarang melalui kegiatan alam dan outdoor. 16Masih ingat dulu pas SD ayah kan berkebun terus aku ngliatin. Kami nikmatin ngebon setiap akhir minggu. Dia bahkan ngga nglarang aku nyentuh cacing, tanah, dan tanaman di sana.
93 family’17 (Puspita, interview, March 2015). This short statement points to the significance of having a pet animal. A relevant study suggests that taking care of animals during childhood can build empathy for animals (Ellingsen et al., 2010). Animal empathy, as developed by Puspita, aligns with the findings of a study which concluded that ‘childhood pet keeping was related to more positive attitudes toward pet animals and greater concerns about the welfare of non-pet animals and humans’ (Paul & Serpell, 2011).
As pointed out in Chapter Six, Puspita was rigorous and selective about the consumption of meat. I only eat the chicken slaughtered at a slaughterhouse close by home in the halal way, and it is ayam kampong (uncaged chicken) which is healthier. I uphold this belief since I had my first rabbits18 (Puspita, interview, March 2015). Based on her assertion, it seems that her ethical food practices have likely been formed by her previous emotional connection with rabbits, and this determines her attitude. Her commitment to ethical consumption resonates with the findings of Rothberger and Mican’s (2014) study, which claimed that childhood pet attachment correlates with an individual’s later ethical self-control over meat consumption.
Based on the interview accounts above, the respondents in similar ways reveal that pro- environmental action as taught and experienced in the family had an effect on their later development as environmentalists. It seems from these interviews that a sense of caring for nature can be instilled in individuals if learnt through direct experience rather than a purely theoretical approach. By giving chances to children to demonstrate waste separation, as in the above example, they can develop environmental views through experiential learning, which can go on to build their skills in managing the environmental problems around them. These findings resonate with Broedencamp and Copple’s (1997) study, which suggested that, ‘to be effective and engage children based upon their developmental abilities and ways of learning, their hands-on sensory experiences need to be immersive and open-ended rather than structured and scripted’ (cited in White & Stoecklin, 2008, p. 1). Moreover, becoming pro- environmental activists later often involved the parents as teachers from whom children got a
17Mereka itu kurus banget dan kasihan. Mereka ngingetin ama kelinci-kelinci aku beberapa taun lalu. Ya karena aku di UI nya udah lama, jadi mereka itu udah kayak keluarga sendiri lah. 18Dulu tuh aku pernah Fisketarian dan ngindarin ayam. Tapi habis itu langsung sadar eh semua makhluk hidup termasuk ayam kan disediain Tuhan untuk manusia agar ekosistem itu seimbang. Tapi soal ayam yang aku konsumsi sekarang, aku cuma mau makan ayam kampong yang disembelih di deket rumah dan itupun pake cara yang halal. Ayam kampong itu jelas lebih sehat.
94 first-hand experience in dealing with practical environmental issues (for example, household waste). The position of parents as ‘teachers’ at home in transferring pro-environmental attitudes through practice is pivotal, because egalitarian relations involving emotion and mutual cognition, embodied in parent-child exchanges, can upgrade environmental competence during childhood (Maccoby, 1992).
7.3 Outdoor Activities Outdoor experiences during childhood allow children to access more opportunities to have direct connections with nature. Previous studies indicate that nature experiences are embedded in the identity of environmental activists (Ruiz-Junco, 2011). For example, in a longitudinal study in Norway, Chawla (2006) found that pro-environmental actions enacted by Norwegian activists were a romanticising of past outdoor experience during their childhood. Young activists in this study presented similar reminiscences to those in Chawla’s study.
For instance, being born and raised in a rural area that was close by the beach had shaped a deep connection to nature. Ratu claimed that her childhood experience of frequently playing on Anyer beach in Serang West Java with her mother, especially at sunset, was very meaningful for her when she was young. For her, sitting on the seashore almost every day was mentally healing: ‘waiting for the waves to come over my feet was soothing and I could forget my problems in life. But, I can’t experience it any longer because I have now moved to the city to study’19 (Ratu, interview, January 2015). It has been claimed that contemporary Indonesian children are currently experiencing displacement (Rogers and Bragg 2012, p. 308), because they prefer the mall for family gatherings. In contrast, Ratu’s intense immersion in nature suggests how playing in nature or outdoors could psychologically enhance one’s sensibility to becoming a more nature-loving individual later in life. She mused on the current tendency of Indonesian families to take their children to the mall, ‘sadly, nowadays children would rather go to the mall than nature areas like I did. It is a crisis because they will never know nature when they are grown up’20 (Interview, January 2015).
19Nungguin gelombang dateng dan menyibak kakiku wah itu sungguh nenangin banget dan aku bisa nglupain masalah-masalah hidup lah. Tapi sekarang aku udah nggak bisa ngalamin lagi soalnya udah pindah ke kota buat belajar. 20Sedihnya ya, sekarang itu anak-anak akan lebih milih ke mall daripada ke alam seperti saya dulu. Ini tuh jelas krisis karena mereka ga tahu karena mereka ngga bakal tahu soal alam kalau mereka udah gedhe.
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Such a view points to the removal of green areas from Indonesian cities, which is a key concern for her environmental activism. A previous study confirms that pro-environmental actions dedicated to defending nature areas are built on activists’ childhood memories of spending significant times in certain natural areas like beaches, mountains, and forests (Scannel & Gifford, 2013). Ratu’s childhood in a rural area enabled her to be emotionally connected to nature. This finding matches the conclusion of a study into the comparison of affective connection and identity between those residing in rural and urban areas, suggesting that participants living in rural areas have greater affective connection that enables them to engage more with the natural environment than those from urban areas (Hinds & Spark, 2008). This tells us something important about the development of ecological habitus in the biographical trajectory of young people.
Among young activists in this study, the sense of caring for endangered animals was mediated through media that they access in everyday life, such as television. Grief is a specific emotional reaction to watching animals that they learned during childhood. This observation is consistent with a study revealing that individuals coming to care about nature is ‘mediated not only through an individual’s personal interpretations and negotiations of media messages, but also through discussions with others’ (Butler & Pidgeon, 2008, p. 48). As an example, Wirdan explained that his experience of visiting Bandung Zoo (Kebun Binatang Bandung) at the age of seven primed him for a strong reaction to a tiger killing aired on television: Visiting the Bandung zoo at Tamansari was the activity I liked most on the weekends and I went there with my father. It allowed me to know more about the life of tigers and other endangered animals. Now that I am in my twenties I was very sad watching news on TV about a tiger shooting21 (Wirdan, interview, December 2014). In another example, dealing with a nature experiment in the river fascinated Rayi for the first time during his childhood, especially when he discovered a small rare fish swimming in the river, and finally took it home with his friends. Having been astonished by the shape of the fish, he then took care of the fish by feeding it every day in an aquarium given to him by his parents. He claims that having a fish reinvigorated his sense of connection to nature. However, there was also a heart-wrenching incident aired on TV, which stirred him up to
21Kalo akhir minggu dulu pas kecil aku paling suka ke Kebun Binatang Tamansari bareng bapak. Dari situ aku bisa lebih tahu soal kehidupan harimau dan binatang yang hamper punah gitu. Nah karena sekarang udah umur duapuluhan jadi kalo nonton berita penembakan harimau di TV rasanya miris banget.
96 engage in environmental action. ‘Well, caring about fish doesn’t make me an environmentalist, but if I watch how an Orang Utan was murdered on TV, it makes me really sad because it is like seeing my own friend murdered’ 22(Rayi, interview, March 2015). For both Rayi and Wirdan, they had experiences in childhood that created an emotional connection to nature. This resonates with the biophilia hypothesis proposed by internationally recognised environmentalist, Edward O. Wilson. In the biophilia hypothesis Wilson (1984) claims that ‘people have an innate need to associate with nature, and this connection can enhance their physical and psychological wellbeing’ (cited in Heinsch 2012, p. 309). For young activists shaped by their experiences in their childhood, their ‘biophilic sense’ is a result of a process taking place during childhood. They were, as children, ‘falling in love’ with nature, and this can provide a glimpse into the possibility of ‘staying in love’ with nature as people grow into adulthood (Kalvitis & Monhardt, 2015).
Personal transformation was claimed to result from early experiences of nature. This was seen by activists as a mental resource which they could call upon to strengthen their later determination as activists. In that sense, personal transformation was achieved through direct interaction with nature and being active in environmental engagement during childhood. In regard to this matter, Canny said, My dad has liked outdoor activity since he was young. He often brought me to the mountainous area in the West of Bandung and the place was so beautiful. It was the first time for me to see how beautiful the landscape was. It was not only once. My elder sister also came along with us, and I think she was also a kind of adventurous person. This experience has made me more caring about nature. Nature can give me confidence23 (Interview, April 2015). In a similar way, Lentia believed that her engagement in environmental camp for three days when she was in Primary School Year Six had developed her determination. The camp was held for five days and I was introduced to different types of snakes and trees and went hiking with my group. I had a fear of heights, but after joining that camp I have been brave enough to go hiking. I usually went hiking every week with
22Yah peduli sama ikan sih enggak bikin aku jadi environenntalist tapi kalua aku nonton gimana Orang Utan dibunuh di tv tu ya bikin sedih banget lah, serasa ngliat temen sendiri dibunuh 23Papah tuh orangnya outdoor sejak muda gitu. Dia paling sering mbawa aku ke daerah gunung-gunung di Bandung sebelah barat, terus tempatnya indah banget. Dulu itu pertama kalinya ngliat wah itu lanskap kok indah banget ya. Enggak cuma sekali sih. Kakaku yg cewek juga sering bareng dan dia tu emang suka petualang orangnya. Pengalaman ini ya bikin aku peduli sama alam. Dan bikin pede, ngga tau kenapa.
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my big brothers at that time. If I hadn’t had any first-hand experience of going hiking, I wouldn’t be like I am now24. (Lentia, interview, March 2015) In the same way, at the age of seven Apri was very keen to go with her father to see the mangroves on the beach on weekends. Since her father’s job dealt with the forest, she found herself very knowledgeable about environmental issues such as forest burning and illegal logging. She was keen to attend an environmental camp but ended up developing her environmental skills through her leadership in the school herb garden. When I was in primary school, I actually wanted to join an environmental camp which would take place in Semarang-Java, but it was too far away from my home. Yet, it didn’t disappoint me too much because I got another opportunity to be a chairperson in taking care of herbs in my school garden. The more I became involved the more I understood the benefits of nature for our life25 (Apri, interview, December 2014). These claims reveal that the young activists’ emotional connection in their early caring for nature is central to their later identity as an environmental activist. Even more, it is apparent that their early experience corresponds quite directly to their current concerns about the environment. This is a process of biographical identity integration - making sense of their pre-activist past in ways that are in agreement with current environmental values and identities (Ruiz-Junco, 2011). It reveals the construction of an ecological habitus.
7.4 Parents’ Political Engagement Parental involvement in the political arena might be influential in shaping children’s attitude towards certain political preferences. Child-parent interaction is one of the possible pedagogical acts that could enable parents’ political values to be transferred to their children. The child would be more exposed to power relations, injustice, inequality, and other critical issues associated with decision-making processes at the state level. If a child is exposed to the political arena, this experience can foster their ambition to become an activist (Hedström, 2005). In a study of young political leaders, Braungart and Braungart (1990) found that they
24Dulu kempingnya lima hari dan dikenalin macam-macam ular dan pohon. Dulu juga ikut hiking bareng temen-temen satu grup. Sebenarnya dulu aku orangnya takut tinggi tapi habis ikut kemping jadi lebih berani naik gunung. Yah andainya ga punya pengalaman naek gunung mungkin ga bisa kayak sekarang.
25Waktu masih SD, aku tu pengen banget ikut kemping lingkungan di Semarang, sayangnya jauh banget lokasinya dari rumah. Enggak bikin kecewa sih, soalnya kan habis itu dapet kesempatan jadi ketua ngelola tanaman obat di sekolah. Makin ikutan kegiatan ini akhirnya bisa lebih ngerti soal manfaat alam buat hidup manusia.
98 were likely to have had a sensibility to the political arena at a young age. Although only a minority of young activists in this study revealed a nexus between their parents’ political engagement and their desire to defend nature, two informants should be mentioned. One is Febri. Her initial attachment to politics emerged when she was brought by her parents into a forum which highlighted the issue of welfare, My experience was closely associated with my father’s experience of engaging in the religious organisation Nahdatul Ulama26 in Demak, Central Java. At the time, that organisation had a discussion forum for eradicating poverty through developing entrepreneurship. Afterwards, I gradually learned that by being active in an organisation we can recognise societal issues and how to work on them27 (Febri, interview, December 2014). Febri admits that her specific interests in injustice followed her experience of her father’s religious meeting. Similarly, Apri’s father often brought her along to a local political meeting. Her experience taught her the importance of being assertive in order to defend her own position in the political scene. In my observation during the interview, compared to other young activists she demonstrated a determined personality, and was keen on debating the social impacts of the coal mining industry, presenting empirical facts and numerical data. She expressed her views staunchly about what becoming an ideal politician means: Despite working in a government office, my dad was also active in local politics here in Central Java. He often brought me along to attend the weekly meeting. Although I only sat looking at the participants during debates, it was such a cool moment. It looked as though all participants attempted to defend their own interests and I suppose I thought that is the right way to appear to be a politician. For politicians such as them, it was quite common to defend their own interests. Besides that, my dad was once elected as chairperson, but it didn’t last long because it took too much of his energy to manage such things28 (Apri, Interview, December 2014).
26Nahdatul Ulama or Nahdatul Ulama Indonesia is an Islamic Sunni traditionalist organisation in Indonesia established in 1926. 27Pengalaman saya itu berhubungan dekat dengan pengalaman bapak waktu masih terlibat di organisasi agama seperti Nahdatul Ulama di Demak, Jawa Tengah. Waktu itu, aku datang waktu ada diskusi pengentasan kemiskinan melalui membangun kewirausahaan masyarakat ceritanya. Setelah itu, aku perlahan-lahan belajar bahwa dengan aktif di organisasi kita bisa mengerti masalah-masalah sosial dan gimana cara mengatasinya. 28Walo bapak dulu kerja di pemerintahan tapi dia juga pernah aktif di kegiatan politik, local sih. Sering juga aku dibawa ikut pertemuan mingguan waktu itu. Ya walo Cuma duduk-duduk aja dan ngliat yang dating debat satu satu, tapi greget banget suasanya. Dari situ keliatan banget mereka itu mencoba mempertahanin kepentingan, tapi aku fikir seharusnya politisi itu harusnya kayak gitu. Politisi kayak mereka itu, sepertinya sih wajar ya buat mempertahanin kepentingannya. Oiya dulu bapak juga pernah jadi ketua, tapi ga lama, soalnya butuh energi banyak.
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This finding suggests that political socialisation could take form in direct exposure to a political practice. Even though, as children, the meaning of politics had not yet been clearly defined, during the process of socialisation they were aware of the atmosphere of rivalry among the participants through contradictory arguments and discourses. They were exposed to political attitudes. This finding demonstrates that ‘comprehensive absorption of values, ideologies, and practices or more basic appreciation for political engagement and self- expression’ (Hensby, 2014, p. 94) can come about through the political socialisation between children and parents. It may illustrate how a radical disposition of habitus comes to be developed.
7.5 Participating in the Scouts Previous engagement with organisations offering extensive outdoor activities may foster not only a sense of caring about the environment, but also train children about leadership styles and working in teams. In particular, the Scouting movement is an organisation that encourages pro-environmental activities (Recuenco, 2010, p. 13). Young activists who engaged in Scouting activities during Year Five and Six of primary school acknowledged that those experiences shaped their affinity to nature. Despite criticism that Pramuka (Indonesia’s Scouting Movement) is a hegemonic movement instigated by the former Indonesian regime that attempted the ‘disciplining of youth, a political ensnarement in the preparation of youth for Indonesian citizenship’ (Semedi, 2011, p. 19), Pramuka provides a variety of outdoor experiences to teach children about surviving in nature.
In this study, young activists confirmed that outdoor activities in Pramuka in their primary school years fostered a sense of adventure. Specifically, Wirdan spoke about his experience of participating in a rapelling lesson: ‘the rapelling lesson was a complicated one, but I liked it so much because it challenged my mind’29. Other activists also mentioned thrilling experiences, for example, ‘looking for tracks in the jungle’30 (Lentia, interview, March 2015), ‘being down at the river’31 (Adel, interview, January 2015), ‘stepping into a gravesite at midnight’32 (Febri, interview, December 2014). Rayi asserted that his experience in jungle
29 Latian memanjat itu yang paling kompleks tapi suka banget soalnya bisa nantang pikiran 30 Mencari jejak di hutan … 31 Menelusuri sungau … 32 Jurit malam (masuk ke area pemakaman pada malam hari) …
100 trekking and searching for tracks (mencari jejak) inspired him to later become actively involved in Greenpeace Indonesia, The most impressive moment was during jungle trekking and finding tracks. I felt like a detective at that time. Maybe it inspired me to engage in the scouting team of Greenpeace Indonesia33 (Rayi, interview, February 2015). Apri too learnt leadership in the first place when her Pramuka team was assigned to discover animal species by following their tracks in the jungle. She reported that she was immediately appointed as team leader by her teammates (Interview, December 2014). Nadia saw the benefit of being involved in the Scouting movement in terms of learning how to build solidarity among team members (Interview, April 2015). As for the solidarity building, she recalled, ‘when we were camping, I brought only two kilos of rice and shared with four friends so we had to divide it equally’34. Pipin explained how camping activities had taught her about living in simplicity after returning home from three days living in the forest: ‘Camping was hard for me, but it allowed me to see that without modern life we can still survive’35 (Focus Group Discussion, January 2015).
The location of a Pramuka campsite in an open air space or a forested area allowed young activists to have a ‘nature-caring’ experience. As an illustration in Resa’s experience, camping was an eye-opening chance, especially when she incidentally forgot her cooking stove: ‘eventually, I used tree branches for cooking. At that time, I was able to open myself to nature’36 (Focus Group Discussion, January 2015). Astri acknowledged her experience of drinking water from the river nearby during jungle-trekking to be ‘self-assuring’ and helped her to trust what nature provides for humans: ‘Fortunately, it didn’t make me sick, but taught me much about confidence. If we can be self-assured with everything we get from nature, all will be fine and we are safe’37. In a metaphor, Faisal described his experience of early
33 Yang paling berkesan sih ya ikut trekking di hutan sama mencari jejak. Rasanya dulu kayak detektif. Dari situ inspirasi buat masuk di tim Scouting Greenpeace muncul sampe sekarang. 34 Dulu waktu camping ceritanya aku cuma mbawa beras dua kilo dan dibagi dengan teman empat orang teman lainnya, ya akhirnya dibagi adil lah waktu itu. 35 Kempingnya berat buat aku sih, tapi bias ngasih kesempatan buat ngrasain kalo tanpa kehidupan modern kita sebenarnya masih bisa survive. 36Akhirnya saya pake cabang dahan pohon buat masak waktu itu. Sejak itu akhirnya bisa membuka diri dengan alam 37Untungnya air itu ngga bikin sakit tapi justru ngajarin percaya diri. Maksudnya gini, kalau kita bisa meyakinkan diri sendiri tentang apa yang kita dapat dari alam, ya semuanya pasti baik-baik aja dan aman.
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Pramuka camping as if he were protected by the Mother of the Earth: ‘it felt like sleeping in the arms of nature’38 (Focus Group Discussion, January 2015).
The accounts above suggest that active participation in the primary school’s Pramuka group may have morally influenced them to defend nature. A study into the relationship between nature experience during childhood and the formation of a pro-active support for nature found that childhood participation in ‘wild’ nature such as hiking or playing in the woods, and camping can shape environmental attitudes (Wells & Lekies, 2006). Another study confirms that nature-protective behaviours during adulthood are built upon childhood experience of living in nature from age seven to 12 (Kals, Schumacher & Montada, 1999). This finding also aligns with Tanner’s study: ‘youthful experience of outdoor and relatively pristine environment emerges as a dominant influence in these lives’ (Tanner, 1980, p. 23).
7.6 The Early Influence of Books The concept of ecological habitus implies some measure of ecological literacy. For individuals to become active in environmental actions, ecological literacy is pivotal for shaping attitude and behaviour in the face of environmental problems. Ecological literacy itself entails a combination of ‘knowing, caring, and practical competence’ (Orr, 1992, p. 92), which can be instilled in children from an early age of development. Fundamentally, ecological literacy can enable one to ‘understand how the natural world works as well as the dynamic of the environment’ (Magntorn, 2015, p. 50). Getting such skills through a book- reading activity may be an effective way to inculcate a person with the logics of thinking about the way all living creatures co-habit in the world, and to nurture pro-environmental behaviour. This argument is aligned to a very early study by Chawla into how children develop an affinity to nature. That study suggests books are an influential medium, indirectly forming children’s personality towards connection with nature (Chawla, 1999, p. 15). In this study, young activists revealed differing experiences of reading books—while they were still at primary school level—enabling them to access certain pivotal information pertinent to nature and living things.
38Serasa tidur di pelukan alam …
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As pointed out above, caring for animals is one of the perceived feelings young activists experienced in relation to nature. Canny said she started to love animals even more when she was able to read animal textbooks at Year 3. For her, such books allowed her to find similarity between humans and animals in the sense that both have their own language to communicate. She said keenly ‘it was so intriguing to read in the book how tigers can talk with crocodiles, like a human being’39 (Interview, April 2015). By the same token, during his primary school years Fadli was surprised by a storybook telling about an intelligent deer living in the jungle who prevented the crocodiles from preying on him. The story advanced his understanding of the balance of the ecosystem. After growing up I realised that the story actually unfolds in relation to the balance of the ecosystem in a jungle. In a jungle the animals prey on each other to sustain a normal ecosystem. If they got nothing to eat, they would demolish local settlements in response to food cravings40 (Fadli, interview, April 2015). Lentia’s experience of reading an animal encyclopedia when she was young developed her curiosity about animals which, in turn, reinforced her motivation to visit the zoo, ‘it was a very amazing experience, especially when I saw the shape of the crocodile in the book for the first time. Later, that experience sort of led me to going to the zoo with my dad’41 (Interview, March 2015). Another young activist was more ‘self-conscious’ about how living in an urban setting had disengaged him from nature, but playing with friends provided him a chance to develop early knowledge about animals. Rayi recalled that kind of experience in the following story: I am a kind of urban child so I rarely went to the river for playing, unless my friends invited me to do so. But playing most of the time with neighbouring kids allowed me to access story books about whales owned by them42 (Rayi, interview, February 2015). Melodi asserted that reading storybooks about cow-farming in the countryside developed her fantasy games with playmates: ‘we liked to create a model of a little farm with a lot of cows
39Waktu itu tu menarik dan unik ya bisa mbaca buku terus disitu si macan bisa ngobrol sama buaya seperti manusia biasa. 40Setelah gedhe baru sadar kalo cerita itu menyiratkan soal hubungan terhadap keseimbangan alam. Di hutan binatang-binatang itu kan makan satu sama lain buat nyeimbangin ekosistem. Kalo mereka ga punya apa-apa buat dimakan, mereka bisa ngrusak rumah-rumah disekitar buat nyari makanan. 41Jelas pengalaman yang luar biasa banget ya, apalagi waktu ngliat buaya pertama kali di buku. Dari situlah akhirnya penasaran dan termotivasi ke kebun binatang bareng papah. 42Ya karena guenya orang kota kali ya, dan jarang maen ke sungai kecuali ada temen yang ngajain. Tapi keseringan maen bareng anak-anak di tetangga sebelah malah bisa dapet buku-buku tentang ikan paus punya mereka.
103 in it because we were inspired by a storybook that tells about the joy of farmers taking care of the cows and milking them’43 (Interview, December 2014). Similarly, Hilman described his first exposure to endangered animals when his elder sister gave him an animal book: Back in 1998, my sister bought me some books about rare animals in Indonesia. In consequence I became well informed about the lives of varied animals44 (Hilman, interview, April 2015). These interview accounts suggest that young activists had developed interest in animals through reading animal story books when they were children (Calo, 2011). It seems that animal storybooks can help establish a greater interest in animals. This finding echoes the conclusion of an earlier study that claimed, Children learned more facts about animals from books that used factual language and/or realistic illustrations to describe animals (…). Picture books are an important source of information about the world and in particular about things and events that children cannot experience directly (Ganea et al., 2014, p. 8). As further evidence of this, Hadi’s story links his experience of reading whale stories in childhood to his current environmental concerns. At night, I often came over to my neighbouring friend’s house, who lived just a short stroll from my home, to read books about whales together. Thus, it was a deep sorrow for me when I saw a Youtube video about the whale killing festival in [Faroe Island] Denmark. It also made me want to go to Denmark [for the whale protection movement], but it is too far away and impossible at the moment45. Hadi’s concern about slaughter in the Grindadráp (pilot whale killing festival) is built upon the mediating process between technology and his previous experiences with the life story of the whale. The role of digital media is very important because it exacerbates feelings of environmental concern. It allows access to the ‘very depths of the sensory world, in the heat of meeting, encounter, and participation’ (Abram, 1996, p. 47).
43Kami tu dulu suka mbuat semacam peternakan sapi mini, nah terus ceritanya itu kayak si petani merawat sapi-sapinya tiap hari dan memerah susu. 44Dulu tahun 1998 kakak cewek pernah mbawain buku banyak banget, isinya binatang-binang langka di Indonesia gitu. Akhirna aku jadi tahu kehidupan macem-macem binatang disini. 45Dulu malem-malem pernah datang maen ke rumah tetangga sebelah, tinggalnya cuma beberapa langkah aja dari sini buat mbaca-mbaca buku tentang paus gitu. Sedih banget rasanya waktu ngliat di Youtube tentang pembunuhan paus masal di Denmark itu. Wah itu bikin aku pengen kesana tapi kayaknya ga mungkin deh soalnya jauh banget.
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The findings shed a light on differing experiences of reading pro-environmental literature during primary school years. Based on interview accounts, the young activists feel that previous experiences with book-reading allowed them to realise the unequal power relations between humans and animals. This is consistent with previous studies that indicate ecological affinity - students valuing science and technology, accepting the limits of growth, recognising people dominating nature – may stem from early experiences of reading animal books; acting as a catalyst (Kusmawan, 2007). For Backsilmove activists, their later chosen actions can be construed as a representation of the preference for nature they built cognitively since childhood (Windhorst & Williams, 2015). Their primary habitus seems to have included the generative disposition of concern for nature.
7.7 Learning about Nature from Science Subjects Ilmu Pengetahuan Alam or the Natural Science subject is taught from Year 1 to Year 12 in Indonesia with a different portion of practical skill in each subject, so it might be imagined that children have formally engaged with some environmental education through science textbooks at primary school level. The subject is given in primary school with the aim of equipping students with an understanding of the environment and living things around them (Kusmawan, 2007). Previous studies into the effect of science curriculum in primary school assert that children who learn directly at school about nature experiences ‘become sensitive to the issues and ideas associated with the environment’ (Recuenco, 2010, p. 8). In Indonesia, the natural science subject is the first lesson opening up an opportunity to study natural phenomena in an experimental way. While interview responses varied, it seems that this subject built up a fundamental cognitive engagement with nature for the activists.
For some young activists, natural science class offered an initial chance to learn about the mechanism of a growing plant. It began to shape their interests in science. For example, Fadli declared, There was a natural science lesson during primary school in year five and I was assigned a school assignment to grow beans by my teacher and keep them under observation from day one to eight. Consequently, it raised my interests in plants and stuff like that46 (Fadli, interview, April 2015).
46Dulu waktu SD kelas lima aku pernah ditugasin guru buat nanem kecambah dan diminta ngamati dari hari pertama sampai hari kedelapan. Akhirnya, (eksperimen) ini bikin minatku terhadap taneman meningkat dan aku suka sampe sekarang.
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Furthermore, the natural science subject allowed pupils to get first-hand knowledge about the concept of 3R (reuse, recycle, reduce), My class team was once tasked to create simple communication tools using milk cans and connect them with a two-metre rope. We made it in just a week but this lesson was so interesting to me because I got knowledge of sound waves by making use of second hand materials which would be reducing garbage in our home47 (Gerry, interview, April 2015). In another case, interest in nature came from the experience of learning from a teacher about the co-existence of humans and animals in daily life. Through this subject I also learned facts about plants and animals. I liked it most especially because the pictures of animals and plants are in the textbooks and all of it is living around us48 (Nadia, interview, April 2015). Overall, it seems that the natural sciences were formative for the young activists in making sense of natural phenomena. They gained awareness from participation in class experiments and reading textbooks. This seems to confirm that knowledge about natural phenomena gained through formal education during primary school may potentially foster pro- environmental action in students when they are young adults (Kusmawan, 2009).
7.8 Negative Experiences For some activists, negative experience of environmental problems led them to a commitment to struggle against environmental problems. In a study conducted by Chawla (1999), activists’ memories of a direct experience of the ‘destruction of [a] valued place’ (p. 20) was found to stir individuals to activism. The finding of Chawla’s study is echoed in the experiences of young activists in this study who narrated their exposure to environmental problems for the first time during childhood. The majority were disturbed by global warming that has come from increasing urban density and the combustion of cars and motor bikes in Jakarta and Bandung. They remembered experiencing this while they commuted to primary school by bus or on foot every day. Interestingly, it is those who migrated from smaller cities
47Tim kelasku waktu itu pernah ditugasin mbuat alat komunikasi jarak jauh pake kaleng susu dan menghubungkan dua kaleng itu dengan tali sepanjang dua meter. Kami mbuatnya Cuma seminggu tapi pelajaran ini menarik banget lah buat aku soalnya bisa dapet pengetahuan tentang gelombang suara dengan pemanfaatan barang-barang bekas yang bisa ngurangi sampah di rumah. 48Di pelajaran ini aku juga belajar soal fakta-fakta tentang tumbuhan dan binatang. Aku juga paling suka pelajaran ini soalnya gambar-gambar binatang dan tumbuhan ada di buku teks dan pada kenyataannya mereka hidup di sekitar kita.
106 or suburban areas who show the most distinctive sense of living with modern risk due to industrialisation (Beck, 2012), perhaps because the contrast was stronger.
Three activists represented examples of that phenomenon. They are Ilham, who lived close to a palm oil plantation while he was in Year 7, Wildan, who lived in an oil exploitation area when he was 10 years old, and Fadli, who was raised in a rural area of Bandung Regency (Kabupaten Bandung) before moving to Bandung city at the age of 12. Ilham spoke of how, on his way to school, he sighted the forested land that had been burnt and logged for a new palm plantation area by private companies. He observed the company’s container trucks going past almost every day. His heart was broken when he spotted an animal killed near his house. About this incident he declared, ‘at that time I actually became aware that this industrial activity was destructive’49. He then continued, ‘it saddened me but I could not do anything, especially when seeing an orang utan shot and killed’50. Similarly, Wildan lived in an oil producing region in Riau Province. Petrol tankers were an everyday experience. His encounter with a vulnerable community near his home was a ‘cognitive opening’ (Azca, 2011, p. 67) for him to understand social injustice. He asserted, My dad said the petrol would be shipped to Malaysia. But the irony was that, one kilometre away from my area there was a poor and deprived neighbourhood, and the condition saddened me at that time. So, it raised a question in my mind: ‘Where is the profit from selling petrol channelled?’ - because I had just witnessed a real deprivation with my eyes. I became aware that our country is experiencing huge exploitation from the private mining industry but this doesn’t make a wealthier society51 (Wildan, interview, February 2015). Fadli moved from the rural area of Garut to the city of Bandung. He resented the declining quality of the forest he used to visit during his primary school years. He condemned the behaviour of visitors who spoiled the edge of the forest with rubbish, When I was in Year 5 the road heading to that taman hutan rakyat (public forest park) was gradually damaged. Having closely observed this I saw that there are too many
49Waktu itu akhirnya aku jadi sadar kalo kegiatan industry ini emang ngrusak. 50Bikin aku sedih sih iya tapi nggak bisa berbuat apapun, selain ngliat orang utan ditembakin dan dibunuh gitu aja. 51Bapak tu bilang kalo minyak minyak itu bakal dikirim ke Malaysia. Tapi ironinya itu ya waktu ngliat satu kilometer dari area sini ada daerah yang orang-orangnya miskin dan menderita gitu, wah perih waktu itu ngliatnya. Terus, waktu itu aku mikir, nah itu ‘keuntungan jual beli minyaknya dikemanain coba?’ ya prihatin aja ngliat orang menderita di sekitar. Setelah itu jadi sadar juga sih oh ternyata ni negara juga dieksploitasi gede-gedean sama industry tambang tapi yaa itu, gak bikin masyarakat makin sejahtera aja.
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cars and motorbikes brought by visitors and they throw their plastic food containers anywhere in the area52 (Interview, April 2015). Extensive mall development not only damages the environment but can also cause the local community to lose their rights to ground water. One of the young activists, Faisal, lived behind Paris Van Java (PVJ) Mall when he was young, and experienced a damaged community water reservoir, which had been exploited for the mall construction project. Mall construction damaged the quality of household life in a housing complex less than 500 metres away from the development area. They not only lost access to clean water, but also to electricity. This prompted Faisal to engage in activism for the first time at the age of ten, The local residents living behind PVJ could not consume water any longer and they were very disgruntled with PVJ. All the residents in that area staged a protest, but our protest was apparently unheard by PVJ management and the government. I also joined the protest at that time, because PVJ had impaired the life of our local community. If local residents had remained silent at that time, we would have experienced more dire impacts due to the development53 (Faisal, interview, January 2015). As a child activist, Faisal was involved in direct action against unregulated urban development. This example suggests that young people engage in activism as a way to express their opposition to the capitalist logic practiced by the government, where environmental degradation is the outcome of the ‘capitalist pattern of development’ (Diani & Lodi, 1988, p. 105). This would clearly contribute to the later development of a radical disposition within an ecological habitus, if the young person maintained their sense of outrage.
Mobility during childhood may also equip an individual with a sensibility to the climatic changes in an area in which they once lived. For example, Raja spent two years in Bandung at the age of 11, and then returned to his hometown in Kendari, Southeast Sulawesi. To study for a Bachelor in Informatics, he came back to Bandung in 2012. To some degree, Raja
52Waktu masih kelas lima SD aku pernah jalan-jalan ke tahura (taman hutan rakya) yang rusak sedikit demi sedikit. Setelah ngamatin lebih deket eh aku liat kok banyak banget mobil sama sepeda motor pengunjung, dan mereka itu ya buang bungkus makanan plastic seenaknya disana. 53Warga local yang tinggal di belakang PVJ ngga bisa ngonsumsi air bersih lagi dan mereka kecewa banget sama PVJ. Semua warga waktu itu nggelar protes akhirnya tapi ngga didengerin sama pihak PVJ manajemen dan pemerintah. Saya itu juga ikut protes waktu itu, soalnya PVJ udah bikin kehidupan masyarakat sini lumpuh. Ya kalopun warga tetep diem aja waktu itu, kami bakal ngalamin dampak yang lebih ngeri karena pembangunan mall itu.
108 seems to have ‘built initial bonds to the destination he first visited based on prior experiences with similar destinations’ (Cheng & Kuo 2015, p. 546). He said, My mindset was altered a lot after I lived in Bandung. Perhaps it is because I have become an adult so I can analyse things that change. In my twenties I witnessed the environmental crisis much more directly. My curiosity drove me to ask Bandung people about their experiences of dealing with the annual flood. Now I could make sense of how it feels to be living in a flood-prone area like Bandung. Also, my father used to live in Bandung when he was taking his Masters in Agricultural Economy at Padjajaran University54 (Raja, interview, January 2015). His memory of Bandung provokes his discontent with the present condition of the city, which is more littered and polluted than when he first paid a visit. He also noticed the weather: ‘Nowadays Bandung is indeed getting hotter and more humid, unlike many years ago. Bandung was cool and the air was fresh’55 (Interview, January 2015). Raja’s childhood memories reveal his ‘cohesive rootedness’ (Roger & Bragg, 2012, p. 311) in Bandung which later compelled him to join the environmental movement, As the infrastructure development has been massive in Bandung, I found the landscape also changed. It makes my childhood somehow hard to remember. And I want to get this memory back through Backsilmove56. (Interview, January 2015) In this case, Raja’s local sense of place ‘acts as an “enabler” and “reinforcer” of action, providing a location in which to act, and people to act with, rather than as a motivating factor per se’ (Rogers & Bragg, 2012, p. 307). Therefore, Raja finds Backsilmove has provided him a space for reviving his past memory about Bandung. In the interview account, he complained about neoliberal development in Bandung, especially the expansion of hotel and restaurant development, which has transformed the mountain city to be more commercially expansive and economy-driven. This finding is consistent with a previous study that indicated an activist may engage in a movement to expand their connection with a second place they
54Mindset saya itu berubah banyak setelah tinggal di Bandung dulu. Mungkin karena sekarang udah gede, jadi bisa lebih nganalisis perubahan-perubahan waktu dulu. Di umur 20an kayak sekarang aku bisa nyaksiin krisis lingkungan secara langsung. Keingintahuanku bikin aku penasaran buat nanya-nanya ke orang Bandung gimana pengalaman mereka dengan banjir di sini. Sekarang aku bisa ngrasain gimana hidup di daerah yang rawan banjir gitu. Bapak juga dulu kebetulan pernah tinggal di sini waktu ngambil S2 pertanian di Universitas Padjajaran. 55Sekarang ini Bandung malah lebih panas dan lembab banget, nggak seperti beberapa tahun lalu. Dulu itu Bandung panas dan udaranya bersih. 56Setelah pembangunan fisik di Bandung sini makin massif aku liat landscape disini juga berubah. Itu pengalaman waktu kecil sulit dilupain. Dan aku pengen pikiran itu bisa balik lagi lewat aksi Backsilmove ini.
109 move to as their ‘home place’, but also to become ‘inhabitants of the earth’ (Tredinnick, 2003, p. 27).
These varied interview accounts of early influences reflect how valuable childhood experiences of nature can be. They create the primary habitus of someone who might later become an environmental activist. The data support the claim that those activists who grow up in rural environments can have significantly higher levels of emotional connection and identification with nature (Roger & Bragg, 2012, p. 308). In short, childhood experiences have ‘propelled them into environmental action’ (Recuenco 2010, p. 14). The data also point to a range of other experiences early in life that were later influential in their decision to form Backsilmove.
7.9 Conclusion This chapter highlights diverse experiences in childhood which implanted in the Backsilmove activists a sense of caring for nature. Knowledge gained about the natural world during childhood has been mediated through interaction with parents, taking time for outdoor activity in a natural setting, reading, participating in a nature-driven organisation, and by encounters with local environmental crisis. This finding confirms Chawla’s (1999) argument that pro-nature influences from childhood are formative for later environmental activism. Current environmental action calls upon previous knowledge, skills, experiences, and memory from the early lives of activists. The accounts considered in this chapter support an analysis in terms of Bourdieu’s theory of ‘habitus’. Early experience during childhood establishes a habitus, or ‘powerful internal edifice’, which in turn structures ‘how they are disposed to the social worlds’ (Walker, 2015, p. 52). This manifests most significantly when they later work collectively to create the successful Backsilmove campaign. We might say that the activists in that campaign had demonstrated ‘ecological identity work’ since their childhood (Thomashow, 1995).
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CHAPTER 8. PRE-UNIVERSITY ACTIVISM
8.1 Introduction In the previous chapter the focus was on the young activists’ significant life trajectory during childhood in the family and in school. This chapter looks at formative influences in the next stage of their lives, the phase of formation of the secondary habitus (Bourdieu & Passeron, 1977). In the interviews, several activists asserted that there were significant experiences in high school years before they continued to a university education which directly motivated them to join environmental activism as part of a larger contribution to conserve the environment. In a continuation of narratives presented in the preceding chapter, this chapter examines accounts from the high school years. Their experiences make reference to middle- class ‘cultural products’ that signify the ‘social tastes’ they later showed as young activists (see Chapter Six).
Many of the findings in this chapter indicate that a young person’s educational choices involving nature experiences boosted skills used later in the Backsilmove campaign. They made reference to particular types of literature, both fiction and non-fiction, and music which shaped their interest in the environment and co-constructed their motives in embracing environmental activism. It is interesting to find that these capacities were not merely formed through conventional participation in outdoor activities and environmental action, but through cultural products that invoked ecology-related themes. For one respondent, for example, engaging in fandom for a band that voiced objection to social and environmental problems provided an alternative path to become an activist. Fictional literature such as novels about social activism in Indonesia also shaped their identity as proponents of environmental activism. Similarly, non-fiction books reinvigorated their patriotism and ignited a sense of rightful struggle.
8.2 Science Courses Experiencing environmental devastation may lead an individual to have sensitivities that shape their future trajectory and thus form their subjectivity. Despite most activists being residents of Bandung from an early age, they had developed different levels of subjectivity
111 about the way encountering environmental problems shaped their passion for the environmental movement. This observation corresponds the point made by Low and Lawrence-Zuniga (2003, p. 77), who explained that ‘different people inhabit the same space differently based on their experiences, their personal histories, and the ways in which places position them’.
Raja, a young activist born and raised in Kendari, Southeast Sulawesi came to Bandung for senior secondary schooling. He had already witnessed environmental degradation and learnt about nature during high school science classes. He declared staunchly, When I was in senior high school there was an Environment Course. My teacher taught me that mangroves were instrumental to prevent the coastal area from abrasion. So I knew that mangroves give an advantage in conserving the ecological system, despite the government’s inability to maintain them. Besides that, I also did further research about mangroves57 (Interview, January 2015). Learning first about mangrove devastation at school was a mediating experience for Raja, as he could observe and measure the rate of impact in a practical way by using the knowledge he acquired in class. Upon return to Kendari, Raja discovered great changes in the environment; specifically the loss of the mangrove area along the beach. ‘It surprised me very much. The location was near a highway. So now the location is crowded with settlements, and even the coastal areas have been sold for private restaurants’58 (Raja, interview, January 2015). That knowledge drove his motivation to join the environmental movement. To some extent, this interview account advances our understanding of environmental learning at secondary school. His attitude of protest emerged after he had developed a level of critical thinking towards the possible negligence of the government in not protecting the environment from the impact of infrastructure development. This argument corresponds to the argument that whenever ‘one’s personal self and environmental work begin to blur together, a growing concern emerges for them to build a better future’ (Matsuba et al., 2012, p. 96).
One young activist emphasised that her past experiences in nature meant she made an important decision during high school for her university study. Puspita was initially more
57Waktu masih SMA, kan dulu aku pernah ambil mata pelajaran soal lingkungan-lingkungan gitu kan. Guruku pernah ngajarin kalo bakau itu penting banget buat mencegah daerah pantai dari abrasi. Jadi ya dari situ aku tahu kalau mangrove ngasih manfaat untuk menyelamatkan daerah-daerah itu. Selain itu, aku juga nglakuin riset soal tanaman bakau gitu. 58Sekarang ookasinya udah penuh banget sama hunian-hunian, dan parahnya itu ya daerah-daerah pantainya udah dijual buat restoran-restoran swasta gitu.
112 interested in anthropology because she thought this subject would give her ample opportunity to explore the natural world, My father allowed me, but said it should be my third choice. My first choice was Architecture but my father didn’t support me because he was worried that I would return home too late, maybe midnight. Then my father asked me to choose Psychology, but I was not familiar with this subject because I never learned this at school.59 She found a solution, When I studied Psychology, I managed to blend my Psychological way of thinking with Anthropology, then I made the decision to focus on Social Psychology. After learning more I realised that Social Psychology is a kind of combination of Sociology, Anthropology, and other aspects of Psychology. As I didn’t want to be a Psychologist I concentrated on Social Psychology60 (Puspita, interview, March 2015). For her, Social Psychology allowed her to self-realise her social existence and closely connect it with the larger phenomenon of nature (Haluza-Delay, 2012). Studying Social Psychology enabled Puspita to undertake research into the environment. It equipped her with relevant skills to identify shortcomings in forest management. She also became aware of ideal educational methods for early childhood education: Social Psychology allows me to explore many things that are social, actually. I must understand people inside and out. Why is our forest being lost? It is not because people are greedy, but it is something to do with the government failing to educate children from an early age. Natural science in primary school has been an important subject to learn, but children are never given enough time to do experiments outside the class. They are taught too much about theories about how rain falls (bagaimana hujan itu turun), but never given what the main ecological function of rain is for our forest sustainability61 (Puspita, interview, March 2015).
59Ayah tu ngijinin (buat masuk Antropologi) tapi di pilihan harusnya masuk ketiga. Terus, pilihan pertamaku ya jurusan Arsitektur tapi ayah nggak ngasih restu soalnya dia khawatir nanti aku bakal pulang tengah malem terus. Akhirnya ayah minta aku milih Psikologi habis itu, tapi ya kurang begitu familiar sama matakuliahnya soalnya belum pernah belajar di SMA waktu itu. 60Jadi waktu belajar psikologi aku kombinasiin sama Antropologi, terus aku ambilnya Psikologi Sosial. Setelah belajar lebih dalam lagi ternyata jadi sadar kok Psikologi Sosial itu semacam campuran antara Psikologi, Antropologi dan aspek-aspek lain Psikologi. Tapi karena aku ngga mau jadi psikolog akhirnya fokus ke Psikologi social. 61Psikologi Sosial bisa mengeksplore banyak hal yang biasanya sih bersifat social ya. Aku harus ngerti luaran ama dalemnya orang. Nah, misalnya kenapa kok hutan itu hilang? Ini bukan karena orang itu tamak ya tapi karena kaitannya pemerintah gagal mendidik anak-anak sejak kecil. Pelajaran pengetahuan alam itu penting tapi anak-anak ga pernah diberikan waktu buat nglakuin eksperimen di luar kelar. Mereka itu udah terlalu
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She would later make use of her Social Psychology expertise to examine and assess the degree of public concern about the commercialisation of Babakan Siliwangi city forest.
8.3 Dealing with Nature and Wilderness Being with nature and spending time in wilderness areas were activities integral to the secondary school years of some young activists. These were formative years for them to gain leadership skills, and to nurture a deeper affinity to nature. They engaged in individual life- changing experiences that built a path to the environmental movement. Most identified the nature lovers’ club (Pecinta Alam) as an extra-curricular activity in their school, alongside other humanity-driven groups such as Student Red Cross and the Scouting movement. The nature lovers’ club was part of their extra-curricular activity during their secondary school years, with an average length of participation of one to two years. In general, they perceived Pecinta Alam had encouraged their view of nature as undisturbed nature, ‘without people or human material development, relaxing and with a sense of freedom’ (Haluza-DeLay, 2001, p. 43). They received the same encouragement in nature-based activities from Pramuka. Looking into the effect of wilderness experience, Bialeschi, Henderson, and James (2007) found that wilderness-related activities are important for positive youth development.
Some young activists described their positive experiences in Pecinta Alam. It acted as ‘leave from stressful days at school’62 (Harris, interview, March, 2015), ‘a gateway from routinised activities and the pressure of the city’63 (Rama, interview, April 2015), ‘a life-changing moment because I can prove to my parents the benefit of a first-time chance to go hiking in the mountains’64 (Nadia, interview, April 2015). Another said ‘it is a hijrah65’66 (Melodi, interview, April 2015), while another said it taught her ‘valuing hardship and respecting nature’67 (Puspita, interview, March 2015). For them, close connection with nature had been instrumental in rejuvenating their well-being as young persons and for getting them away for a while from inescapable routine. The feeling of well-being continued after the nature activities. The emotional connection to nature remained and informed their response to later banyak diajarin teori tentang bagaimana hujan turun tapi ga pernah dikasih tahu fungsi-fungsi ekologi dari keberlanjutan hutan. 62 ninggalin hari-hari penuh stress di sekolah 63pelarian dari aktivitas-aktivitas rutin dan tekanan kota 64 momen yang ngubah hidup soalnya aku bisa mbuktiin ke orangtua tentang pertama kalinya bisa pergi naek gunung 65A spiritual journey in God’s creation. 66buat aku sih ini kayak perjalanan hijrah untuk menjadi lebih bersyukur sama nikmat Allah SWT 67menghargai hidup yang keras dan ngormatin alam tentunya
114 events. We can use Gerry as an example. He always always went to Karimunjawa for his getaway. He said that spending a significant amount of time at the seashore alone revitalised his brain and mind as well as helping him to gain more physical energy. When the crisis over Babakan Siliwangi occurred in Bandung, he made the connection to nature that he had earlier established on visits to Karimunjawa, Listening to the waves made my mind so peaceful, and I could regain so much energy. In early 2013 I was shocked to hear that part of Babakan Siliwangi would be developed as a restaurant. As someone who loves nature that moment was really shocking and depressing. When I heard so many newspaper headlines covering the annexation of Babakan Siliwangi my hands were shaking. It was like I had lost my own home68 (Gerry, interview, April 2015). It is noteworthy that although Karimunjawa Island and Babakan Siliwangi have different features - the first is an ocean beach and the latter is an urban forest - Gerry expressed a ‘responsible morality’ (Rohm & Osula 2013, p. 26), which connected the two. It prompted him to take into account his connection to the natural world for his involvement in the environmental movement. Gruenewald (2003) notes that being in different places mentally inculcates us with how the ideal world works and how our lives should be shaped according to that idealism. This could well be an important component of ecological habitus.
In contrast, Raja grew up in a natural landscape near a mangrove area at the local beach. Regular visits to Amarilis mountain enabled him to develop a sense of greater admiration for the place he lived in. I liked mountaineering to Amarilis, a beautiful mountain. Its view was astounding, and it has a camping site. When I camped with my friends, I could enjoy the scenic view of Kendari city from there. There is also a waterfall where the river flows are just like a white thread. Long ago, I observed monkeys playing in the waterfall. The waterfall I like the most because it is cool and the trees nearby are really shady69 (Interview, January 2015)
68Ndengerin ombak wah rasanya bikin hati ama pikiran damai dan bisa ngembaliin energi yang hilang. Dulu tuh ya awal 2013 kaget rasanya waktu denger beberapa bagian Babakan Siliwangi akan dibangun restoran. Sebagai orang yang cinta alam berita it bener-bener bikin shock banget dan down. Waktu denger bahwa banyak surat kabar ngabari pencaplokan Babakan Siliwangi tangan ini tu rasanya bergetar. Rasanya tu kayak mau kehilangan rumah. 69 Aku suka banget naik ke pegunungan Amarilis, gunung-gunungnya indah banget. Pemandangannya wah mengesankan bangett lah, dan punya tempat kemah juga. Waktu kemah sama temen bahkan bisa nikmatin keindahan kota Kendari dari atas sana. Di sana juga ada air terjun yang aliran sungainya seperti benang putih.
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Going hiking to Amarilis mountain allowed Raja to enjoy natural features available in the wilderness. It advances our understanding of positive response that is vital to ‘spiritual quality development in one’s experience’ (Horwitz, 1996, p. 34). This finding echoes Matsuba and Pratt’s (2013) previous study, where they asserted the value of positive affective response to nature. Raja’s account suggests that the spiritual quality of natural beauty promotes individual defence of nature, and this is formative for later involvement in environmental activism.
To build student skills in working in a team, a Pecinta Alam branch often conducts a physically tough initiation for new members; this might turn out to be a challenging moment for them because they encounter and get exposed to the wild of nature firsthand. The activity itself is usually organised by senior students deemed as having sufficient experience in leading hiking for newcomers. One young activist, Hadi, revealed this event to be a life- changing moment. I first climbed Gunung Gede during my senior high school time. The most impressive moment was not when arriving at the highest point but when I took the lead in a group of junior members. I found leading such first-timers was not that easy because we should be able to inculcate values in them and give them the best examples of surviving strategies70 (Interview, February 2015)
He said he had learned a valuable lesson about how to cope with pressure, The values were about how to become committed nature lovers. It was hard because nature was so wild and not easy to tame. One of the team members I brought back was suffering from a heart attack and there was a storm for almost an hour and the wind affected our camp site. The rain was so heavy and lasted for hours. We were in the middle of the jungle and unable to return to the base camp because it was located very far behind us. We got into a state of panic on our way to the highest point and
Beberapa tahun lalu, saya masih inget banget tuh ya, saya ngobservasi monyet-monyet yang main di area air terjun. Air terjun paling suka waktu itu soalnya keren banget (alirannya) dan pohon-pohon di sekitarnya juga teduh banget. 70 Ceritanya itu mulai waktu aku pertama kali naik ke Gunung Gede waktu SMA. Momen yang paling berkesan malah bukan saat naik ke puncak tertingginya tapi pas mimpin anak-anak member baru. Dari situ mulai sadar ternyata mimpin anak yang baru pertama kali naik gunung tu jelas ga mudah ya soalnya kitanya harus bias ngajarin nilai-nilai ke mereka dan ngasih contoh gimana strategi biar survive disana
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none of the alumni and senior members were accompanying us71 (Hadi, interview, February 2015)
Here a wilderness experience enhanced emotional connections to nature and encouraged a desire to foster similar nature connections among other participating persons (Grimwood, Haberer & Legault, 2015). It seems that a challenging wilderness experience directly relates to self-actualisation (Bochniak, Todd & Young, 2007). Hadi later said, ‘this was a moment when I found the kind of leadership in me that could bring Backsilmove forward’72. Taking the lead in a crisis situation in nature granted him a positive identity and social skills for the later successful co-leadership of Backsilmove.
Other activists also claimed that being actively involved in Pecinta Alam was a transformational experience that directly informed their concerns about current environmental problems occurring in Bandung city, My experience with the nature club when I was in senior high school Year Two was really astounding. I escaped from this hectic city which I sometimes don’t like because the government has scrapped some of the green areas. All of the corners are now hotels and restaurants, oh how I hate it. The government is not thankful to God who has bestowed Bandung with clean and natural air to be protected, conserved, and preserved. They know about the frequent flooding from TV but still they are littering and throwing away garbage into the river73 (Canny, interview, April 2015).
Asked about who should take responsibility, she responded,
For such disasters they always blame the government that fails to provide them with garbage bins at many points. Also, the government has acknowledged that water scarcity is a problem now in Bandung but they still allow private companies to build apartments. The water catchment areas in Bandung have started to disappear, but the
71 Nilainya itu yang jelas gimana jadi pecinta alam yang punya komitmen kuat dengan alam. Waktu itu ya sulit sih soalnya alam kan keras dan ga mudah ditakluin. Salah satu anggota tim anak baru itu malah ada yang kena serangan jantung waktu itu dan pas ada badai selama satu jam, anginnya malah nyaris ngrusak tempat kemping kita. Hujannya wah lebat banget dan berjam-jam gitu. Kami di tengah hutan dan ga bisa balik ke basecamp soalnya jauh banget di belakang kita. Kami ya panik waktu menuju ke titik tertinggi dan ga ada alumni atau anggota senior yang ndampingin kami. 72 Ini tu bener-bener momen soal kepemimpinan yang bisa bikin aku mbawa Backsilmove maju nantinya. 73Pengalamanku sama klub Pecinta Alam itu waktu SMA kelas Dua, wah luar biasa. Aku paling suka melarikan diri dari kota yang hektik banget, dan ga suka sih sama pemerintah yang ngilangin beberapa lahan hijau. Setiap sudut hotel dan café oh aku ga suka. Mereka (pemerintah) itu apa ga bersyukur ya sama Tuhan yang udah ngaruniain Bandung dengan udara yang bersih dan natural untuk dilindungi, dilestarikan dan dijaga. Mereka (masyarakat) tahu tentang banjir rutin di TV tapi ya mereka tetep mbuang sampah sembarangan ke sungai.
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government is still chasing profit from infrastructure development projects. The government also knows that there are no shady places on the street side to sit but their works are felling the trees for flyovers and they allow private companies to install advertising roll banners which are only profitable for certain groups of people74.
This account suggests that a realistic understanding of risk and a greater appreciation of nature may be built upon former experience in wilderness activities (Lekies, Yost & Rode, 2015, p. 1).
8.4 Literature that Shapes Activism Books and novels are acknowledged as effective to inspire individuals with activist values. Del-Gandio (2008) argues that literatures serves as ‘rhetorical entitlement’ for activists to develop their sense of crisis in particular settings of conflict. For example, open mindedness to other cultures was perceived by Puspita as an integral part of what shaped her activist identity. The book Garis Batas (Borders), a 2011 travel novel by young Indonesian writer Agustinus Wibowo, inspired her to grapple with the social significance of cultures, The title is Garis Baras. Agustinus Wibowo describes how Soviet countries were divided into small nations. His book sheds light on how there are no wrong cultures and it depends on how we look at them. Agustinus Wibowo gave me invaluable insight into the making of cultures and what makes a society have their own culture. So all cultural views are correct, and should not be blamed. It depends on how we interpret the culture75 (Puspita, interview, March 2015). In Garis Batas, the Indonesian author, an avid backpacker, describes his personal journey in Central Asian countries including Kazakhstan, Tajkistan, Kirgistan, Uzbekistan, and Turkmenistan, where the language barrier in daily communication worsened his day-to-day interaction with locals and government officers. His inability to communicate with them got
74Untuk bencana kayak gitu mereka (masyarakat) selalu ngeblem pemerintah bahwa pemerintah itu gagal dengan penyediaan tempat sampah di beberapa titik. Pemerintah udah tahu kalua air itu langka di Bandung tapi masih ngizinin perusahaan swasta mbangun apartemen. Area tangkapan air di Bandung kan juga udah mulai menghilang perlahan-lahan tapi pemerintah tetep aja ngejar untung dari proyek-proyek pembangunan infrastruktur. Pemerintah juga tahu kalua ga ada tempat teduh di pinggiran jalan buat duduk tapi proyek mereka itu nebangin pohon-pohon untuk jalan toll dan mereka ngizinin (perusahaan) swasta nginstall banner yang Cuma nguntungin segelintir orang dong. 75Judulnya itu Garis Batas, karangannya Agustinus Wibowo yang isinya mendeskripsikan soal bagaimana Negara-negara Soviet itu terpisah-pisah jadi Negara-negara kecil. Bukunya dia itu njelasin soal oh ini ga ada kultur yang salah atau benar tapi semua itu tergantung dari sudut mana kita ngeliatnya. Agustinus Wibowo ngasih gambaran jelas tentang proses terjadinya budaya-budaya dan apa yang bikin masyarakat punya budaya mereka sendiri. Sebenarnya sih ya semua pandangan kultural itu bener ya dan ga perlu lah dicerca. Sekarang udah waktunya gimana kita menginterpretasi budaya yang beda itu.
118 him into trouble. He even came under political pressure due to his inability to clearly inform them about his next destination. It seems that reading Garis Batas provided Puspita with an understanding of the need for respect for other cultures. In the statement she makes it clear that culture constitutes the values and social characteristics of a society. As a prominent young activist, this thinking is fundamental for her to grasp the different settings of activism. At the same time her reading of Garis Batas encouraged her to recognise that to become an activist one should have the attitude of, and the adaptability toward, self-immersion in cultures other than her own. A previous study confirms that novels that tell stories about travel are valuable because an activist can make sense of how it feels to live in different cultures (see Spratt, Peterson & Logos, 2005).
Puspita has since undertaken trips with Greenpeace to environmental projects in Pulau Seribu76 and to some remote places in Indonesia. By her account, reading Garis Batas in her teens moulded her later experiences of adventurous travel into a form of activist identity: a radical disposition to take her views to all parties, regardless of cultural difference. In her later activism she has encountered diverse stakeholders such as community, government, and other parties which are notably embodied with distinctive cultural practices. In another sense, reading this non-fiction book in her teens has successfully aided her to face challenges in life through undertaking a journey into the unknown. Puspita was supported in her later dealing with environmental problems and their impact on the public through reading about how another young Indonesian faced the challenge of journeying through other cultures.
Similarly, Melodi’s strong commitment to Greenpeace was consolidated by reading an inspirational novel by environmental activist and author Tosca Santoso77, Sarongge. Sarongge narrates the everyday life of Ksatria Pelangi who is dating an organic farmer living in Sarongge village. Ksatria Pelangi means Rainbow Warrior, and therefore implies the political struggle of Greenpeace. Melodi said, Sarongge is a real place located in the foothills of Gunung Gede, Cianjur, West Java. The author holds strong environmental values and visions. In this novel, there is much
76 Pulau Seribu means ‘Thousand Islands’. It refers to an area of almost 128 small islands located in the Bay of Jakarta in the Java Sea (http://thousandisland.co.id/). 77 As well as being a writer, Tosca Santoso is a leading influential journalist in Indonesia.
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history of environmental problems, including cases from diverse areas in Indonesia, which are real78 (Melodi, interview, January 2015).
Melodi also mentioned reading Ayu Utami’s Bilangan Fu, another novel that emphasises environmental destruction. Having read Bilangan Fu, Melodi was influenced against the establishment of a cement operation in a local settlement. I like Ayu Utami79 so much, all of her novels are outstanding. Bilangan Fu is a novel that always reminds me of Greenpeace’s values and its powerful struggles in Indonesia. Bilangan Fu is about a community that lives within the area of Sewugunung Mountain where a cement producing company is going to be established. Besides spirituality, this novel also teaches me environmental values and the life philosophy of Ayu Utami as a young indefatigable feminist80 (Interview, January 2015)
Firstly, the novel opened up her eyes to the natural devastation perpetrated by a cement corporation. Secondly, the figure of Ayu Utami as a feminist novelist provided her with specific ideal about becoming a female activist in Indonesia. The latter is clearly reflected in her later comment: ‘Ayu Utami is just amazing. She is vulgar but so brainy and smart, which is obvious in her novels’81. In other words, this novel enhanced Melodi’s awareness of an unjust society, of dis-empowerment and marginalisation, which helped compel her into environmental activism. The dramatic context illustrated in the novel helped Melodi as a young female activist to understand the importance of questioning the structures in her life (see Curtis, 2012).
Gerry was influenced by reading a historical book that highlighted Bandung’s urban planning in the past. One activity that he enjoyed most passionately during his final year at senior high school was reading, particularly local history. For him, Bandung Tempo Doeloe (Kunto, 1986) incited his discontent over the current governance of Bandung, because it talked about
78 Sarongge itu tempatnya nyata di bukit Gunung Gede, Cianjur Jawa Barat. Penulisnya juga punya nilai-nilai lingkungan dan visi. Di novel ini banyak banget cerita tentang sejarah masalah-masalah lingkungan, termasuk kasus-kasus dari beberapa area di Indonesia, yang real juga. 79Ayu Utami is one of the progressive Indonesian female writers whose novels are dedicated to challenging authoritarianism and oppression. 80 Aku tu paling suka Ayu Utami, semua novelnya sangat luar biasa. Bilangan Fu itu novel yang ngingetin aku sama nilai-nilai Greenpeace dan kekuatan juangnya di Indonesia. Bilangan Fu nyeritain tentang komunitas aktivis yang tinggal di area gunung Sewugunung dimana di situ ada perusahaan produsen semen yang akan mbangun. Selain spritualitas, novel ini juga ngajarin tentang nilai-nilai lingkuungan dan filosofi hidup Ayu Utami sebagai feminis yang kekeuh dan tak terkalahkan lah. 81 Ayu Utami tu luar biasa banget. Dia itu vulgar tapi juga otaknya keren dan cerdas, keliatan banget dari novel-novelnya kan.
120 environmental issues. Anchored in experiences in nature, this book mediated his political expectations. He declared: In Bandung Tempo Doeloe, Bandung in the 1960s was so fresh, misty, and there were still birds chirping on the tree branches. Traffic congestion never even occurred at that time. Now poor waste management in this city concerns me. You see, some parts of the city are like a dumpsite, as people litter everywhere, especially in the Cikapundung river where you can see massive garbage afloat. And I am also concerned about the city forest82 (Gerry, interview, April 2015). He furthered his elucidation on Bandung in the past by talking about the recently elected city mayor, Ridwan Kamil, whose current development programs focuses on park refurbishment and public facility renewal. To some degree, he is in favour of Ridwan Kamil’s innovative approach to Bandung city space. Before Ridwan Kamil won the election, public parks in some places were not well- taken care of by the government. Even young people like us hated going out because there were no beautiful parks here. But now I support Ridwan Kamil because he has initiatives for park refurbishment and beautification83 (Gerry, interview, April 2015). Through reading Bandung Tempoe Doeloe, he could imagine Bandung city in the past, which was much better than now. Some natural features revealed in the book such as parks, fresh air and natural beauty, aided him to benchmark the present degraded conditions of Bandung city; this upset him. He was troubled by the current conditions of Bandung. He recognised that urban environmental problems such as garbage and river contamination were caused by the inadequate political will of the Bandung government in maintaining the city. This fired him to activism.
During Hadi’s Year Three in Senior High School, his passion for reading about radical movements arose after he went through a hard leadership experience in managing new members in the nature lovers’ group. He read Catatan Seorang Demonstran (A
82Di Buku Bandung Tempo Doeloe, tahun 1960an itu kotanya bersih dan berkabut, banyak burung yang ciut ciutan di cabang pepohonan. Kemacetan lalu lintas juga ngga pernah ada waktu itu. Sekarang itu, manajemen sampahnya jelek dan ini yang bikin khawatir. Tahu kan, kalau beberapa bagian dari kota itu kayak tempat pembuangan sampah, ya karena orang nyampah sembarangan, apalagi tuh di Sungai Cikapundung kamu bakal ngliat buanyak banget sampah ngambang disana. Selain itu juga taman-taman. 83 Sebelum Ridwan Kamil menangin pemilihan (walikota Bandung beberapa taman umum di sudut kota ga begitu keurus sama pemerintah. Bahkan ya anak-anak muda kayak kita itu ogah keluar rumah karena ga ada taman yang cantik di sini. Tapi sekarang aku support lah ke Ridwan Kamil, soalnya karena emang dia berinisiatif untuk ngubah taman-taman dan mempercantiknya.
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Demonstrator’s Notebook) about the struggles of Chinese Indonesian rebel, Soe Hok Gie. Gie was a young activist during the 1960s who jotted down all his experiences in his diary, published under several titles. All the books narrate radical experiences of activists during the dictatorship of the Suharto regime in Indonesia. I read the books of Soe Hok Gie. The climax was when I identified with his experience in the 1966 demonstration from his handwritten diary after he returned from the demonstration, and I perceived that he was a critical activist but also caring. What I liked most was the way he wrote his day-to-day story in a very well ordered structure and could even remember every single second he spent in activism. He also exposed his personal life. His books left me a message about the importance of having a solid ideological stance as an activist84 (Hadi, interview, February 2015). For him, those books as a form of radical text were emotionally compelling for his continuous trajectory as an activist. On the issue of radical text, Megoran (2013) documents that reading texts about radical anti-authoritarian praxis is a source of resilience for members of any resistance movement.
Another activist, Astri, was old friend of Hadi’s. Although they went to different secondary schools they had a common interest in leisure in the wilderness. She also joined Pecinta Alam in Year 3 in Senior High School. She also gravitated toward the role model of Soe Hok Gie because he was an adventurer and dynamic individual. Gie is very inspirational, and he is fascinating. He was not a professional who had a political career, but he is caring, and that was his significant capital. He cared about politics by enacting a social movement against Soekarno with his friends. And he jotted his experiences in his diary and, reading his book, I came to think of idealism. Idealism is not always made concrete by doing big things. As long as we have even a small concern, but are consistent with our ideology, it will have an impact on society85 (Astri, interview, April 2015).
84Pernah dulu baca bukunya Soe Hok Gie. Klimaksnya itu waktu mbaca tentang pengalaman ikut demo tahun 1966 dan tulisan tangannya ditemuin setelah ikutan demonstrasi. Dia itu tipe aktivis tapi juga punya kepedulian gitu. Aku paling suka waktu doa nulis cerita setiap hari dengan struktur yang jelas dan dia itu inget bener setiap detail yang dia lakuin selama aktivisme. Dia juga ngekspos kehidupan pribadinya, buku ini jelas banget ngasih gambaran oh penting juga aktivis itu punya pendirian ideology. 85Gie itu pribadi yang nginspirasi, dan dia mengagumkan juga. Dia itu bukan seorang professional yang punya karir politik tapi dia juga peduli, ini juga salah satu modal penting. Dia peduli juga tentang politik seperti yang dia tulis di diarinya dengan membuat gerakan sosial dengan temannya. Dan dia torehkan pengalamannya di diarinya dia. Setelah mbaca buku ini aku jadi lebih mikir soal makna idealisme. Idealisme itu tidak harus
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Her deep respect for Soe Hok Gie led the way to her acquaintanceship with his living old friend who was also a University of Indonesia student radical activist in the 1960s, Herman Nantang. As a result, Astri’s nostalgia for radical activism in the past was mediated through her active engagement in the present with a senior activist. I am also well acquainted with Gie’s friend, Herman Lantang; he is Gie’s buddy. He is a senior member of Pecinta Alam at the University of Indonesia. He brought Gie’s corpse back to Jakarta. He also has made a diary of his activism journey. I love reading a diary of travelling authored by an activist. I am the kind of person who likes travelling, but I also like reading their experiences86 (Astri, interview, April 2015).
Based on the interview accounts above, it seems Hadi and Astri similarly sensed an embodying energy in themselves that was encouraged by their reading of the works of Soe Hok Gie. The influence of that early exposure to risk-taking people can be seen by their later entry into high-risk environmental activism. In both cases, reading Gie’s day-to-day documented diary allowed them to grasp real situations and activist networks of the past. Mar and Oatley (2008) note that a documented narrative on a political activist can be a mode of thought by which subsequent generations make meaningful sense of past tactics to create a new movement. Indonesia now is very different to 1966. However, by reading Gie’s book, these two young people activated the memory of his resistance campaign into their imaginations. As a result, they were enabled to emulate aspects of Gie’s activism in their later involvement in Backsilmove. Glenberg, Meyer and Linden (1987) confirm that the creation of spatial relations between the past and present in a social movement is bridged through reading about the radical identity of activists in the past. As Hadi later co-founded Backsilmove, he clearly identified himself as an agent of change. His evolution toward activism echoes the finding of a previous study that found sustaining a spirit of rebellion can be supported by a canonical model of how an individual activist can inspire a change in the world (Scherzer, 2015, p. 40).
A striking example of the link between environmental activism and the early influence of books came from two young Backsilmove activists with extensive experience in Greenpeace. diwujudkan dengan melakukan hal-hal besar. Sejauh kita punya perhatian dan konsisten dengan ideology kita, ya itu bisa punya dampak besar ke masyarakat. 86Aku juga kenal sama temen Gie, Herman Lantang, dia itu sahabatnya Gie. Dia juga salah satu anggota senior dari Mapala (Mahasiswa Pecinta Alam) nya UI (Universitas Indonesia). Dia waktu itu yang juga mbawa jenasahnya Gie ke Jakarta. Dan dia juga nulis kehidupan aktivismenya di diarinya. Saya tu suka banget nulis diari yang ditulis sama aktivis. Aku tipe orang yang suka traveling tapi juga mbaca pengalaman-pengalaman para aktivis.
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Faisal had read Atlantis by Agatha Christie and Resa had read The Alchemist by Paul Coelho. Those books refer to an imaginary past or future. That theme links to elements of uncertainty in activism. Faisal said of Atlantis, It is a masterpiece novel and when reading it I felt immersed in the story. It is basically about a detective who is searching for artifacts, and the story resembles my life because I am a kind of adventurous person. The novel drove me to explore my life by joining different kinds of activism which are challenging. Atlantis influenced me to think deeply and be patient because it has a very complicated story, which is what I like most87 (Faisal, FGD, January 2015).
Resa made similar comments about the The Alchemist
The one I liked most was The Alchemist. That novel conveys a message about someone’s endless adventure in search for his own identity. To be able to go deeper into his own identity, the character must speak with nature. And if he has a dream, the universe will endorse him to realize the dream. With this conviction, he believes someday his identity will be in his hands. When I first read this novel, it reflected what I experience in life. At any moment my life is filled with uncertainty and no one can guarantee how my future will be, but that’s what makes my life what it is88 (Resa, FGD, January 2015). In summary, after reading Atlantis, Faisal identified himself as an adventurous person, and this encouraged his activist identity. For him, becoming an activist was an endless life journey. Similarly, Resa found a similarity between her identity as an activist and the stories depicted in The Alchemist. The environmental movement is the field in which she is engaged and the book led her to think about whether what she was undertaking in activism would be instrumental for her in later life.
87Ini salah satu novel masterpis lah dan waktu mbaca itu rasanya hanyut dalam ceritanya. Ceritanya itu pada dasarnya tentang detektif yang lagi nyari artefak sejarah, dan ceritanya itu kok mirip sama hidupku soalnya aku kan orang yang suka petualang ya. Ini juga mendorong buat mengeksplore hidupku dengan bergabung di aktivisme-aktivisme yang berbeda yang challenging lah pokoknya. Atlantis itu pengaruhnya sih aku bisa mikir lebih dalam dan bersabar soalnya ceritanya juga kompleks, tapi inilah yang aku suka. 88Yang paling aku suka tuh the Alchemist. Novel ini sebenarnya tuh nyampein pesan soal petualangan seseorang yang mencari jati diri sendiri. Biar bisa menyelami jati dirinya, si pelaku harus berbicara dengan alam. Dan bila dia memiliki impiannya, alam semesta akan mendukungnya untuk mewujudkan mimpinya. Dengan keyakinan ini dia percaya suatu hari ini identitasnya akan berada di tangannya. Waktu pertama kali baca novel ini, ceritanya merefleksikan pengalaman hidupku. Dalam banyak momen hidupku yang dipenuhi ketidakpastian dan ga seorangpun bisa ngasih garansi seperti apa masa depanku ntar tapi itulah yang bikin hidupku seperti sekarang.
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Notably, they also both read the novel Dilan: Dia Adalah Dilanku Tahun 1990 about early life in Bandung during their final year in secondary school. That was a time that they were getting more concerned about current environmental problems in urban Bandung. The book was discussed in the Backsilmove FGD for this thesis. Pipin had also read the book. Resa: I like Dilan: Dia Adalah Dilanku Tahun 1990 because it has the historical setting of Bandung in the 1990s. In those years Bandung was still fresh and far less polluted. The more I read the more I reminisced about Bandung in the past, like ‘I wish I could live in a cooler Bandung’, as nowadays this city is getting hotter and the streets are not very wide. That book is a mix of nature and love89.
Pipin: That book is so me, it brings me back to the past. When I first read it, I imagined trees everywhere and very calm. In the 1990s there were fewer motorised vehicles and only a few people had them. Dilan, the lead character, is depicted in the novel as a romantic guy, cool, and a nature lover90.
Resa: After reading the novel, I wanted the government of Bandung to eradicate the public cabs (angkot) because they crowd our city and cause accidents. Angkot routes cause much disturbance. All routes coming from outside Bandung city merge and they lead to traffic jams in the morning91.
Pipin: Maybe the government of Bandung should limit the number of private cars. Recently it has been much easier for people to buy a car or a motorbike. Yet, the government is not strict with the regulations. Furthermore, access to get a driving license for those under 17 is easy92. (FGD, January 2015)
89 Aku paling suka novel Dilan: Dia Adalah Dilanku Tahun 1990 soalnya isinya tentang setting kota Bandung di tahun 1990an. Di taun-taun itu Bandung tu masih seger dan ga begitu berpolusi. Semakin baca aku semakin kebayang-bayang tentang Bandung. “Wah andai saja bisa hidup di Bandung yang lebih dingin’, soalnya sekarang kota ini udah makin panas dan jalanan makin lebar. Novel ini itu isinya ada cinta dan alam. 90Novel ini tu aku banget, isinya membawaku ke masa lalu gitu. Waktu pertama kali baca buku ini, kubayangin pohon ada dimana-mana dan nenangin banget. Di tahun 1990 jumlah sepeda motor tu jauh lebih sedikit dan cuma beberapa gelintir orang aja yang punya. Dilan, si pemain utama, dilukiskan sebagai cowok romantic, cakep, dan pecinta alam gitu. 91Setelah baca novel ini tu aku pengen pemerintah Bandung bisa ngurangin jumlah angkot soalnya bikim kota penuh banget dan nyebabin kecelakaan. Beberapa rute angkot juga semrawut banget ya. Semua rute yang dari luar Bandung masuk campur aduk dan nyebabin kemacetan pagi hari. 92Mungkin ya pemerintah Bandung itu harusnya membatasin jumlah kendaraan pribadi. Sekarang ini lebih gampang buat orang bisa beli mobil atau sepeda motor. Bahkan, pemerintah udah ga ketat soal. regulasi. Selain itu, untuk bisa bikin SIM ( surat izin mengemudi) buat mereka yang dibawah 17 taun aja udah gampang.
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It is apparent that Dilan: Dia Adalah Dilanku Tahun 1990 provided Resa and Pipin with an illustration of Bandung in the past. In that way it reinvigorated their passion in engaging in the environmental cause from which Backsilmove later emerged. The example illustrates that literary fiction stories enabled these young activists to get transported into an imagined world of Bandung in the past that fuels their anger about the condition of Bandung in the present. In line with this argument, Stable and Bishop (2000) found that concerns about the environment can be bolstered by literary fiction, when scenes are adopted from the political history of particular places.
8.5 Music Gerry explained that one source for his deep concern about environmental issues was the music of instrumental post-rock local bands he enjoyed during his senior high school years. He said he was filled with tranquility and visualised himself being in nature when listening to their sound. In light of this observation, Galloway (2014, p. 71) documents that a soundscape in music may stimulate connections between audiences and the environmental movement, and generate individual and collective environmentalist activity. Under the Big Bright Yellow Sun is a local youth band that influenced Gerry’s sense of nature. In Bandung my favourite band is Under the Big Bright Yellow Sun. Their music is very catchy, and makes me feel good. When I hear the tunes it feels like I am in the forest93 (Gerry, interview, April 2015). Self-immersion in nature, according to the excerpt above, arose when he was sinking himself deeper into the music. Galloway (2014) asserts that experience with music can create positive sonically-saturated communities that foster environmental awareness. For Gerry, environmentally-inspired music pushed him to engage later in the campaign to save Babakan Siliwangi.
Beyond the local band, Gerry also admired Sigur Rós, an Icelandic post-rock band. He felt that the soothing instrumental tune of their song Hjema led him to enjoy even more being in nature. Discussing the meaning of Hjema and how it affected his life, Garry said, The majority of the Sigur Rós album narrates the beauty of nature, which cannot all be explained in words. It also tells how peaceful Iceland is. Hjema is one of the songs I listened to before I joined Backsilmove. (…) this song tells what the universe is. It
93Di Bandung band favoritku itu ‘Under Big Bright Yellow Sun’. Musik mereka itu enak didengar dan bikin perasaan enak. Waktu ndengerin tunes lagunya itu rasanya kayak lagi di tengah hutan.
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cannot be depicted in any words to put it simply, but can be felt like a breeze and a fountain94 (Gerry, interview, April 2015) In summary, Gerry’s musical tastes enabled him to grow his sense of belonging to nature. It has led him to emotional bonding with nature and self-envisioning of being in nature and later propelled him toward environmental activism.
It is clear that music can be inspirational because it has particular effects on emotion, perception, and worldview. The young activists nominated different favourite songs in interviews that reinvigorated their motivation to participate in environmentalism. Canny, for example, described four songs that encouraged her self-transformation, and made her increasingly gravitate towards the environmental movement. She explained, I have many, but generally all the songs I love embody values and the spirit to engage others in sensitising themselves to the environment. They convey my concern about the human behaviour that is destructive. Also, these songs at least send a message about prevailing peace on earth. In order, they are ‘Earth’ by Michael Jackson, ‘Efek Rumah Kaca [The Greenhouse Effect] by Efek Rumah Kaca band, ‘Orang Utan’ by Navicula, and the last is ‘Bumi Marah’ [Angry Earth] by Superman Is Dead. The deepest one in my mind is ‘Earth’. It is not only a message to us as humans to live in a sustainable way with nature, but how destruction in nature is a reflection of exploitative human behaviour95 (Canny, interview, April 2015).
In her account she was not merely attracted to the lyrics about nature itself but also developed critical discontent about nature’s destruction.
Melodi gravitated more towards the music rather than the lyrics. When listening to certain songs, she felt the breeze in the mountains and the waves of the ocean. I am actually influenced by a band whose songs are not directly related to the environment, such as Owl City. Through their songs I can fantasise about going to the
94Mayoritas lagu-lagu Sigur Ros itu nyeritain tentang keindahan alam, yang ga bisa lah dijelasin pake kata- kata biasa. Lagunya nyeritain tentang damainya alam di Islandia. Hjema itu salah satu lagu yang pernah aku dengerin sebelum ikut Baksilmove dan musiknya nyeritain tentang alam semesta. Singkatnya ga ada kata-kata yang bisa njelasin gimananya, tapi bisa dirasain seperti desir angin dan air hujan. 95Banyak sih tapi secara umum aku suka musik-musik yang bisa nanemin nilai dan semangat orang lain biar cinta lingkungan. Mereka (musik-musik) juga nyampein pesan keresahan tentang perilaku manusia yang destruktif. Kalau diurutin nih ya, suka ‘Earth’ karya Michael Jackson, ‘Efek Rumah Kaca’ oleh band Efek Rumah Kaca, ‘Orang Utan’ oleh Navicula, dan terakhir ‘Bumi Marah’ karyanya Superman Is Dead (SID). Tapi paling dalem di hati itu ya ‘Earth’. Di music itu ga Cuma pesan ke manusia agar hidup berdampingan sama alam tapu juga refleksi gimana kerusakan di alam itu karena perilaku manusia yang eksploitatif.
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beach or hiking. As for the Corrs, I like their unique rhymes, which are so Irish. If I imagine Ireland while listening to The Corrs, I can feel the breeze in the mountains and waves on the ocean. Both of their works are timeless, I mean they are forever in my heart 96 (Melodi, interview, January 2015).
She highlighted the ‘close-to-nature’ ambience created by the instruments: The most obvious thing in The Corrs is Celtic folk music. In all of The Corrs’ music they play traditional Celtic musical instruments such as the tin whistle, violin, percussion, bodhran and so on. These Celtic instruments are unique to me. Some of the songs they compose are without vocals, so it is just instrumental. I mostly listen to The Right Time, Haste to The Wedding, Old Hag, Love to Love You. These songs are instrumental, and they make me imagine the beautiful pristine forest in Ireland. They are very impressive97 (Melodi, interview, January 2015). On the other hand, for knowledge about environmental problems and how development impacts the environment, Melodi was inspired by the lyrics of the Indonesian band Navicula in their album Kami no Mori (a rainforest compilation). Songs in the album that motivated her to engage in environmentalism were Everyone Goes to Heaven, Harimau-Harimau, Zat Hijau Daun, and Orang Utan. Music has the capacity to allow large groups of people to share emotional and mental states (Cherry, 2015, p. 7). As such, certain songs factor intelligibly into our decisions in life, as these young activists assert in their narrative (Howard–Spink, 2004). This is relevant to the influence of music in the development of environmental awareness as an aspect of secondary habitus.
On the other hand, two other young Backsilmove activists - Hilman and Fadli - had followed very different trajectories to activism through music. They were influenced by Indonesia’s
96Aku tu juga sebenarnya dipengaruhi sama salah satu band yang sebenarnya lagunya ga ada sangkut pautnya sama lingkungan, seperti Owl City. Lewat lagu-lagu mereka aku bisa kayak berfantasi pergi naik gunung atau hiking. Dan tentang The Corrs, aku paling suka karena iramanya yang unik, dan Irlandia banget lah. Aku juga bisa mbayangin desiran angina di gunung dan ombak di pantai. Karya-karya (music) mereka itu ga dibatasi waktu, sepanjang zaman lah, mereka itu selalu ada di hati. 97Yang paling menonjol di The Corrs itu adalah ya karena gayanya sih, semacam music Celtic traditional. Musik-nya The Corrs itu kebanyakan memakai instrument tradisional ala Celtik, seperti suling tiup, biola, perkusi dan bodhran dan masih banyak lagi lah. Instrument Celtik ini unik sih buatku. Beberapa music yang mereke create itu malah kebanyakan tanpa nglibatin penyanyi vocal, jadi ya cuma instrumental doing. Aku biasanya ndengerin The Right Time, Haste to The Wedding, Old Hag, Love to Love You. Semua musik-musik ini tuh instrumental semua dan bikin aku ngebayangin kayak berada di hutan yang masih alami di Ireland. Semuanya menyentuh lah.
128 alterpunk scene. They were fans of the band Superman Is Dead (SID)98. For them, songs performed by SID were part of their ‘rhetorical habitat’ (Bawarshi, 2003) when they were younger, and also now. For example, Hilman was encouraged through their music to develop a critical discontent about Indonesian young people’s future because of scarce jobs and diminishing urban spaces. Other songs in Indonesia are pretty much utopia and like talking about love bla bla bla. Try to listen to Superman Is Dead songs, they all touch upon young people’s problems as well as the difficulty in getting a job; also we have to have social connections here and there, because every corner of the city has been filled with restaurants and hotels. That has devastated green spaces. In fact, the only band that is voicing objections about urban development is Superman Is Dead99 (Hilman, interview, February 2015).
This interview account suggests that SID songs refined Hilman’s thinking about what it means to be living in a developing country where young people seek better opportunities for the future. It may be that young people such as Hilman feel a sense of powerlessness when confronted with the risks of development. Socially critical music written and composed by young musicians led them to join a fanbase because they are keen to have their experiences represented in the music they listen to (Trier-Bieniek, 2011). Since 2010, Hilman has been a member of the SID fan group headquartered in East Bandung. He said, ‘since I joined the fan headquarters, I have found out more information about social protest, like how Jerinx became a vegetarian because he was sick of animal killings’100. The social gathering of SID fans creates a symbolic space where social problems gain a critical mass of opposition. Baulch’s (2002) study in Bali documenting physical spaces for grassroots engagement found that symbolic and physical spaces of mass protest and interaction were often the result of activities by music fans of a particular band. Alter-music bands in Bali attract loyal sympathisers. Popular culture can play a part in popularising particular issues such as human rights and environmental degradation (Viviani, 2014). This seems to be the effect in the case of these two activists.
98Superman is Dead are punk rock pioneers of Bali. The band is three chord attitude-heavy young men, including Jerinx (http://www.supermanisdead.net/biography.php) 99 Lagu-lagu lain di Indonesia itu agak utopis banget ya soal cinta-cintaan. Coba deh ndengerin liriknya lagu- lagu superman is dead, sebenarnya yang mereka suarain itu juga masalah-masalah anak muda sekarang. Nyari duit susah, kerja juga ga mudah coz harus punya koneksi dulu disana-sini, dimana-mana udah banyak banget bangunan hotel restaurant yang ngrusak lahan hijau, ya satu-satunya band yang bisa ngasih protes lewat lagu itu salah satunya ya SID. 100 Dari sanalah saya mulai tahu soal gerakan sosial ini dan itu, kayak Jerinx itu dulu jadi vegetarian karena prihatin ama pembunuhan satwa.
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Hilman claimed that his deep identification with SID songs created a subjective predisposition to join an environmental movement at a young age. I didn’t know what the impacts of recent urban planning were, but after listening to the albums of Superman is Dead I got acquainted with the notion that development not only impacts poor people, but also the environment. The environment is ruined afterwards101 (Hilman, interview, February 2015).
Hilman had been very concerned about the future of the city forest, ‘if Babakan Siliwangi had been demolished for a restaurant or hotel, then, as young people where would we go to socialise? We wouldn’t have been able to enjoy the freshness of nature while socialising and being on a date (laughing)’102 (Hilman, interview, February 2015).
Overall, the accounts suggest that music is a key influence in drawing young people together into a social space where they absorb criticisms about the places they inhabit. In those spaces they are sensitised to ongoing environmental problems that threaten important aspects of their lives as young people. Pruit (2011) claims that music plays a significant role in helping people to refine their self-identity as activists through a discursive framing of societal issues. One obvious way is through combining a music concert with a protest event. An open air concert is one type of social protest that I learned through SID because in a music concert everyone can join in. So being an environmentalist is not just having a garden or going to the forest frequently. We can do things other than that. SID gave me another example of how to be an environmentalist103 (Hilman, interview, February 2015).
The excerpt above suggests that Hilman relates his experiences of being a loyal fan of SID to becoming an activist. This finding supports Collin’s (2013) assertion that a person may consider himself/herself as an activist through self-attachment to a particular frame of the
101Aku tu juga sebenarnya ga tau seperti apa dampak pembagunan areal perkotaan seperti yang terjadi sekarang tapi setelah ndengerin beberpa albumnya SID aku jadi bisa ngerti lah kalo pembangunan itu ga cuma bikin masyarakat miskin sengsara tapi juga lingkungan. Lingkungan rusak juga kan akhirnya. 102 Kita bisa liat nanti apa yang bakal terjadi kalo andaikan Babakan Siliwangi itu bisa dimusnain buat restoran atau hotel. Terus, kalo rusak kita anak muda mau kemana coba buat kongkow-kongkow? Kita mungkin ga bisa lagi nongkrong-nongkrong sambal leha-leha nikmatin alam yang seger ‘kan. 103 Konser-konser di panggung itu salah satu protes sosial yang aku pelajari dari Superman SID soalnya dari situlah semua (orang) bisa join. Jadi ya jadi environmentalis itu ga melulu di kebun atau pergi ke hutan secara terus menerus ‘kan. Kita tu bisa nglakuin hal lain dari itu, dan SID itu ngasih contoh laen tentang gimana jadi environmentalis.
130 environmental movement. In the case of many activists, one of those important frames was music.
8.6 Movies that Re-invigorated an Activist Attitude Gerry had long been passionate about the film Letters from Iwo Jima104 which he first watched during high school in 2009. He had had a passion for history since he was in primary school. Letters from Iwo Jima depicts the recruitment of Japanese soldiers at a young age for the military service against the U.S. during the Second World War. Gerry’s motive for watching Letters from Iwo Jima came from his interest in the history of the Samurai. Gerry associated the struggle of the Iwo Jima troops with how he feels about defending his own country, Letters from Iwo Jima depicts how Japanese troops defended their homeland with all they had. They took risks for their land, and sacrificed themselves for Japan. What shocked me was that the troops were recruited at a young age, even much younger than me. At the age of 20 and even 17 they were taken out of home to join the military, and moved to another island. The main inspiration of this movie for me is about our land, which is our place of birth and which must be defended whatever it takes105 (Gerry, interview, April 2015). It seems Gerry’s spirit in becoming a Backsilmove activist was driven by his idea of defending the homeland, in this case the city of Bandung. As he was born in Bandung it seems possible that his sense of localism invigorated his passion for the field of environmentalism where he could defend the people of the city. Being an activist for Gerry meant putting patriotism in practice as he devoted his energy to saving Bandung. I argue that this strong emotional subjectivity about the characters of patriotic Japanese troops and allied events in the film arose as he was absorbed by the story. Letters from Iwo Jima resonated with his feelings about capitalist urban development. That kind of emotion-provoking film tends to engage people who use their mental energies to make sense of the story for future political engagement (Zwarun & Hall, 2012).
104 Letters of Iwo Jima is set during the conflict between the United States and Imperial Japan during World War II (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0498380/). 105 Di Letters of Iwo Jima nyeritain soal tentara tentara Jepang yang mempertahankan tanah air mereka dengan apapun yang mereka punyai. Mereka juga ambil resiko demi tanah air mereka, dan ngorbanin diri sendiri demi nilai-nilai sebagai orang Jepang. Yang bikin kaget itu ternyata tentara-tentaranya direkrut waktu masih muda dan lebih muda dari aku. Bahkan waktu itu ada yang umur 20 taunan atau 17 taunan diambil diam diam dari rumah untuk ikut militer dan pergi ke pulau lain. Inspirasi dari film ini salah satunya ya tentang tanah air, tempat dimana kita dilahirin dan harus dipertahanin apapun resikonya.
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8.7 Volunteering for Disaster Relief One early influence towards later activism was volunteering for disaster relief during the secondary school years. Three activists clearly identified that disaster relief had reinforced their humanitarian values. For example, Resa regarded her experience in humanitarian aid as representing a ‘moral obligation to fellow human-beings and a small milestone for making a change’106 (Interview, January 2015), while Faisal emotionally connected his aid involvement with his previous childhood experience of negative mall development. He conceived his active aid involvement as conducted ‘in sympathy with those who experienced suffering similar to mine’107 (Interview, January 2015).
As floods hit a poor Bandung community at the Citarum riverside, Resa and Faisal were tasked with collecting data on the number of devastated houses. To do this they walked along the riverside to interview local heads of households. Along with another activist Pipin, they voluntarily registered to be part of the relief crew during Year Two in Senior High School, when Greenpeace Youth Bandung was recruiting volunteers to distribute aid and assistance for the flood disaster. For Resa and Pipin, their experiences dealing with disaster relief ignited their desire to generate positive outcomes, which would later reinforce their engagement in Backsilmove. Benzone and Tost (2009) note that this is a basic desire to be part of the larger progression of life, to leave the world a little better off for our presence in it, and to feel as though one has mattered (in Matsuba, 2012, p. 1095). Pipin felt very concerned in the relief field: During the flood victims’ assessment I met local people complaining about poor sanitation organised by the government. Some of them suffered from skin diseases. I even met with the elderly aged over 70, and a primary school-aged child who had lost all of her textbooks. In the end, we collected used books for the children. More sadly, many also lost their schooling certificates108 (Pipin, interview, January 2015).
106Ya itu kewajiba kita sebagai sesaa manusia dan langkag kecil untuk membuat perubahan. 107 Simpati buat mereka yang ngalamin penderitaan sama kayak aku. 108Selama pendataan korban aku ketemu sama orang-orang lokal yang tinggal disana dan mengeluhkan pemerintah membangun sarana sanitasi yang buruk. Mereka juga menderita penyakit kulit. Dan aku bahkan ketemu sama kakek-kakek umurnya 70 tahunan dan anak kecil yang kehilangan buku sekolah mereka. Di akhir (pendataan), kami kumpulkan buku-buku bekas untuk anak-anak. Sedihnya itu ya banyak diantara mereka yang kehilangan ijasah sekolahnya.
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Pipin transformed her values as she encountered, firsthand, victims in dire circumstances from the flood peril. To that extent, it seems the direct experiences of certain young activists in disaster relief embodied them with certain values. A previous study into the effects of young people’s involvement in disaster relief discovered that they embrace positive values and spirituality, alongside social as well as thinking skills from their assignment (Bialeschki, Henderson & James, 2007).
These same three activists were perhaps influenced by their even earlier exposure to Greenpeace values. Resa emphasised the way Greenpeace membership had opened a pathway for her into the field of the environmental movement. To me Greenpeace is integrating real action with the central issues of a campaign, and they design solutions based on research and scientific findings. And their actions suit me, they increase my interest. I was still young. I had creativity and endurance. By joining Greenpeace Volunteers Bandung we transformed the environment into a more liveable space by our own creativity109 (FGD, January 2015)
Pipin also pointed to the significance of being provided early on with a place for the expression of activist identity. She attributed this to her involvement in Greenpeace. Greenpeace is a space where I can activate my passive energy. I mean, as young people we have got so much energy to be spread out into positive interactions and places. Greenpeace is a space where so many chances came to us. As a young person I do not want to embark into a negative space which could bring us to a dark future. I considered these things and engaged myself in Greenpeace actions such as relief in Citarum110 (Pipin, FGD, January 2015).
For these two young activists, it appears that their early active involvement in Greenpeace allowed them to embrace personal shifts in their lives and build a strong sense of working in the area of humanitarian relief. Following the Focus Group Discussion they both indicated
109Buat aku Greenpeace itu mengintegrasikan aksi nyata dengan isu isu central di kampanyenya mereka dan mereka merancang solusi berdasarkan penelitian dan temuan-temuan ilmiah. Aksi mereka itu aku banget lah, yang bikin aku makin tertarik sama mereka. Selain itu, aku juga masih muda dan punya kreativitas dan daya juang. Dengan gabung ke volunteer Greenpeace kami dapat mentransformasikan lingkungan menjadi ruang yang lebih bisa untuk hidup dengan kreatifitas kami. 110Greenpeace itu sebuah tempat dimana aku bisa mengaktifkan energi pasifku. Maksudnya, sebagai orang muda kita punya banyak energy yang harus disalurkan dan dialirkan ke interaksi positif dan tempat yang benar. Sebagai anak muda, aku ga mau terjerumus di tempat yang negative yang bisa mbawa kita ke masa depan yang suram. Setelah ikut Greenpeace voluntir pertama kali, aku langsung nglibatin diri di aksi-aksi Greenpeace lainnya seperti Citarum.
133 that Greenpeace was an ideal organisation and they felt they belonged there. It was a space for them to voice their identity as creative, passionate, and outward-looking young people a space where they could gain experience of the values of the organisation (Polson et al., 2013). Later, this was translated into a passionate involvement in Backsilmove.
8.8 Conclusion This chapter has presented narrative accounts of personal experiences relating to the development of generative dispositions in the secondary habitus as the interviewees evolved into high-risk activists. Overall, the experiences that they had during the pre-university period are crucial milestones that shaped their motives for later participating in the environmental movement. Different components, such as learning science subjects at school, going through a transitional period of mobility to wild places, cultural products and artifacts such as bands and songs, fiction and non-fictional literature interacted and significantly contributed to the formation of the environmental identity of the respondents as well as to their further engagement in the environmental movement. It seems clear that pre-university was a transition period for developing analysis of an environmental crisis in the area in which they lived.
As they became more sensitised to broader environmental problems, their consciousness about local environmental problems was influenced by a number of sources, including inspirational books and membership of Greenpeace. As for music, they perceived it to be more than a cultural product that marks their ‘taste’ and lifestyle. Through the sound and the lyrics they developed a stronger affinity to nature and became more compelled to engage in environmentalism. In summary, experiences related to social activism during pre-university schooling are co-constituted with other components of an ecological habitus. Technology, cultural products, educational institutions and social practices are pathways to acquire sensibility in the production of a certain predisposition to become an environmental activist.
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CHAPTER 9. GETTING INTO RADICAL ACTIVISM
9.1 Introduction The previous two chapters document the early trajectory of youth activism for those who later became involved in Backsilmove; their development of primary and secondary habitus. Family and school served as spaces for learning about and enhancing their environmental awareness. Those chapters revealed that Backsilmove activists had been extensively habituated and exposed to varied actions that advocated the sustainability of nature. I found that in these cases family and school played a strategic role in developing the predisposition to protect and conserve the environment through cultural practices associated with high-risk activism.
Continuing to explore shaping influences for Backsilmove activitists, this chapter scrutinises the ways in which the earlier political participation of the young people in the environmental movement shaped their activist identity: their ecological habitus (see Haluza-DeLay, 2008). The concept of ecological habitus points to embodied dispositions that constitute ‘a feel for the game’ in environmentalism. To have a feel for the ‘game’ of environmentalism means engaging in the struggle for conserving the natural world against exploitation (see Lewis, 2015). Habitus can be reflexively modified (see Threadgold & Nilan, 2009). Change of mindset can be due to ‘an awakening of consciousness and social analysis’ (Bourdieu & Wacquant, 1992, p. 167). One of the drivers for the awakening of environmental consciousness among young people is the shared perception of risk, discourses of ecological threat developed and honed through collective discussion with peers. Another driver is a feeling of outrage and anger against state authorities for failing to protect the environment. As implied in the previous chapter, many of the young activists who later became involved in Backsilmove had been strongly politicised by earlier involvement in Greenpeace Indonesia.
9.2 Greenpeace First, I will outline the general context. It seems that Greenpeace as an environmental organisation has a strongly established logic of practice for the Backsilmove activists to later use in creating the model of struggle to save the city forest. For example, one activist working
135 as a media coordinator asserted, ‘we acknowledge that our repertoires in this movement are taken from Greenpeace, because they are credible and effective’111. From comments such as that I gained insight into how the repertoire of Backsilmove protest was adapted from models for activism practiced in Greenpeace campaigns. Their earlier involvement yielded what Eyerman and Jamison termed a ‘grassroots epistemology’ (1989, p. 103) of environmental protest. Greenpeace contributed to the creation of a later high-risk activist habitus through engaging young people in campaigns.
The majority of Backsilmove activists underwent training with Greenpeace Indonesia, of which one program was Non-Violent Direct Action training (NVDA). NVDA training is provided so that young activists will be able to safely perform high-risk environmental campaigns in order to draw media attention (Furst, 2012). Through media attention Greenpeace aims to insert their environmental messages into the political system and into local as well as global public discourses (Rootes, 2014), and thus affect the environmental discourse in a country. For example, in terms of protest, Greenpeace’s activities include the strategy where a small number of activists physically visit a source of danger, while being fully conscious of the fact that they may be personally harmed either by the environmental hazard itself or the risk of being arrested (Brown & May, 1989). Such strategies must be non- violent, so the activists are deliberately developed to be militants with the capability of handling risks on the sites of the campaigns. The activists are expected to demonstrate fearlessness when struggling against the targeted enemy (Brown & May, 1989), but not to the extent of endangering themselves.
For recruitment, Greenpeace Indonesia is keen to encourage young people who have pre- existing skills and talents relevant to activism. Since Greenpeace focuses on public outreach through media publication, young people who are active in blogging, have research skills and engage in outdoor activities, are needed. They also want to recruit those who are good at organising events, and those who demonstrate willingness to spare their time to being mobilised when needed (Greenpeace Indonesia, 2012). Even though the recruitment is open and online for young people, this organisation prefers to attract future young activists through networks of activists who have been active in the campaign for years and are trusted, such as
111 Kami akuin sih kalo repertoire yang dipakai di gerakan ini diambil dari Greenpeace, soalnya kan udah kredibel dan efektif sebelumnya.
136 local Greenpeace Youth coordinators. Across the globe, Greenpeace is known for its success in intervening in environmental policy through media and national stakeholder negotiation (O’Brien, 2013). In Indonesia, Greenpeace has established some local non-partisan organisations called ‘Greenpeace Youth’ (Suharko et al., 2014). These organisations are an extension of Greenpeace Indonesia at the local level. All the young activists in the regions have the opportunity to take part in Greenpeace training.
Having framed the dynamics of activist engagement in Greenpeace, the chapter now moves to interrogate the social network of Backsilmove activists that brought them into the field of direct action to save the forest. That network was developed while they were involved with Greenpeace. The activist narratives reveal that friendship in the university, social media, and learning from other activists are the main paths they followed to Greenpeace. Subsequently, I explore skill building training such as NVDA. It is proposed that this process of recruitment, training and involvement in protest refined their radical disposition of habitus relevant to high-risk activism.
9.3 Entering the Field of Activism: Getting into Greenpeace Activism The Backsilmove activists entered the ‘field of contention’ (Crossley, 2013) with Greenpeace through different pathways. However, one element of ‘young people’s transition’ (Nilan & Parker, 2013) was clearly demonstrated across the interview accounts. They made use of spaces for socialisation to accrue social capital to build their future capacity. Some were looking for an organisation where they could exercise personal environmental values and build their symbolic capital as activists. They viewed Greenpeace as a prestigious environmental organisation which contributed to their cosmopolitan coolness, for example: My elder sister studied at UGM. When I visited her boarding house, my eyes were immediately drawn to the Greenpeace poster. In my heart I said, ‘It would be cool if I could join Greenpeace. It's a great organisation and the most influential in the environmental struggle in the world’112 (Puspita, interview, March 2015). In a Greenpeace campaign in Jakarta in 2012, Puspita’s passion gathered particular momentum. That experience reinforced her decision to become an online donor and pay the
112Kakak perempuan kuliah di UGM (Universitas Gadjah Mada, Yogyakarta). Waktu saya ngunjungin kos- kosannya mataku tiba-tiba tertuju pada poster Greenpeace. Dalam hati berkata ‘wah keren kali ya kalo bisa join Greenpeace. Itu kan organisasi besar dan paling berpengaruh di perjuangan lingkungan di dunia’.
137 annual membership. In contrast, she thought that while WWF as an organisation represented her love for animals, it was an elite organisation because it has no mass involvement scheme: Actually, I first fell in love with WWF because I love animals so much. Unfortunately, I had no chance to volunteer in that organisation in 2011. It seems they do not open up enrolment for participation. Finally, I chose Greenpeace. To become a Greenpeace volunteer one should have a blog; incidentally I had been blogging for years, so then I entered my blog address in the online registration. Without much delay, I received a call from one of the volunteer coordinators of Greenpeace who also studied at the University of Indonesia and shortly counted me in research projects of Greenpeace.113 (Puspita, interview, March 2015).
Another activist affirmed Puspita’s disgruntlement about WWF. She said: ‘To be honest, I wanted to join WWF but I was declined because they do not accept volunteers and only accept donors who are aged over 21 years’114 (Canny, interview, April 2015). According to social identity theory, individuals have a strong motivation to seek out specific groups where they will be accepted and respected. Thus, Canny and Puspita conceived that Greenpeace provided them with membership that could fulfil their ‘need to belong’ (Baumeister & Leary, 1995). Social media was the pathway that took Canny on the journey with Greenpeace. In 2009 she created a Twitter account and wrote in her profile that she had an interest in defending the environment. Virtual dialogue with one of the volunteer coordinators of Greenpeace increased her optimism about joining the organisation: At that time, I always retweeted the post in the following account: @GreenpeaceID, @Greenpeace @solargeneration and suddenly an administrator of Greenpeace Twitter sent me a message in my inbox asking: ‘Are you interested in participating in one of our actions if you get invited?’115 (Canny, interview, April 2015).
Retweeting is an online social activity that allows us to be recognised by others. Canny’s (re)tweeting made her profile visible to Greenpeace. Her involvement in activism increased.
113Sebenarnya saya pertama kali tu jatuh cinta sama WWF, soalnya saya kan suka binatang banget. Sayang sih ya saya ga punya kesempatan buat voluntiran di organisasi itu tahun 2011. Keliatannya sih mnere ga buka pendaftaran buat partisipasi. Akhirnya saya pilih Greenpeace. Untuk jadi voluntir Greenpeace seseorang harus punya blog dan pas banget saya ngeblog bertahun-tahun, lalu masukin alamat blog di pendaftaran online itu. Gak lama habis itu, saya ditelpon salah satu coordinator voluntir Greenpeace yg kuliah di sama-sama kampus UI dan nglibatin saya di proyek risetnya Greenpeace. 114 Sejujurnya sih aku pengen join WWF tapi waktu itu ditolak karena mereka ga nerima volunteers dan cuma nerima donor yang berusia lebih dari 21 tahun. 115 Waktu itu aku ngetweet sebuah postingan di akun @GreenpeaceID, @Greenpeace @SolarGeneration dan tiba-tiba admin Tweeternya Greenpeace ngirimin aku pesan di inbox, nanyain: ‘eh kamu tertarik engga ikutan di salah satu evennya Greenpeace kalo diundang?’
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Firstly, in the third year of her university studies in 2012 she was invited to an Earth Camp for nominated Indonesian youth. Secondly, she was involved in ‘Homeless Tiger’, one of the largest events of Greenpeace 2012. It was held in Bandung. The campaign aimed to draw attention to the decrease in the number of Sumatran tigers. They face extinction from illegal logging. Canny’s journey as an activist really began with her involvement in these two activist events. She felt her identity as an activist was honed and formed there. ‘That's how I felt the struggle as an activist who can demonstrate to the public the atrocities of corporate parties in Indonesia’116 (Canny, interview, April 2015). We can see here the shaping generative dispositions of environmental awareness and anger.
Face-to-face friendship networking also attracted young people to join. For example, another activist decided to volunteer with Greenpeace after being persuaded by a close friend who was already in Greenpeace. That kind of informal recruitment process is based on peer assessment about particular skills that Greenpeace needs: ‘We cannot invite random people to be activists or volunteers for Greenpeace. They should have particular talents in information and technology, the ability of writing a blog, how much time they can dedicate to direct action in the coming years, and a strong interest in the environment’117 (Canny, interview, April 2015). She also narrated how fellow young activists were picked up mainly due to their time availability for volunteering and building extensive networks with community. She listed them: Wirdan has the expertise in website development and animation because he's a student of Informatics and Technology, while Faisal and Reza obviously have fostered organisational partnership with local communities in Bandung. Meanwhile, Ilham is calm but also brave to go to the field of action. And Rama, because he always has time on Saturdays118 (Canny, interview, April 2015).
Another young Backsilmove activist was initially influenced by the voyage of the Rainbow Warrior ship in 2009. Through active involvement in rock climbing he encountered a local Greenpeace activist. He recalled the details:
116 Itulah rasanya perjuangan sebagai aktivis yang nunjuin ke khalayak umum tentang kerusakan yang dilakuin perusahan-perusahaan di Indonesia. 117 Kita tu ga bisa ngundang sembarang orang jadi aktivis atau sukarelawan di Greenpeace. Mereka perlu punya bakat tertentu di IT, kemampuan nulis di blog, dan waktu yang bisa didedikassin untuk direct action di tahun-tahun ke depan, dan minat yang kuat di isu lingkungan. 118 Wiran punya keahlian bikin website dan animasi soalnya dia kan mahasiswa jurusan informatika dan Teknologi sedangkan si Faisah udah ngejalin hubungan sama komunitas-komunitas local di Bandung. Nah si Ilham itu kalem tapi dia tu berani banget kalua ikutan aksi. Si Rama selalu punya waktu setiap Sabtu.
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His hobby in sporting activities looked like mine, so I thought we shared a common character. When I told him that I love challenging myself in adrenalin sports he assured me that Greenpeace was perfect for me because with this organisation I could nurture my talents by possibly being part of the adventuring boat team. At that time, I literally believed what he said because we clicked together119 (Rayi, interview, March 2015).
In contrast, Febri’s motivation to get into Greenpeace was driven by close peer relationships on campus. ‘I met with Uli who was active in Greenpeace. She explained to me at length about the details of Batang Leon120 activism in Semarang. Since we studied in the same Psychology class and hung around together, I could ask many things about the grassroots movement. One day Uli asked me to join that activism group for helping out Batang villagers whose lands were taken over by a private business for mining’121, (Febri, interview, March 2015). It seems that friendship plays a significant role in activism recruitment. It is not merely a social relation, but can form a (sub)cultural circle for young people based on their common interests. A previous study on the formation of youth-driven collectives suggests that being invited in by friends who provide collaborative informational and emotional resources keeps young people consistently involved (Kennelly, 2009). Thus the emergence of an activist environmental habitus is driven by the collective identity framing of the peer group.
The interview comments above reveal that young Backsilmove activists had embarked on Greenpeace environmental campaigns and actions after they had gravitated to a selected social space where they could express their social identity as young people concerned about the environment. This finding supports the claim that individuals have a strong motivation to pursue groups which meet their emotional need to belong. Such groups provide space for expressing feelings of uniqueness and sustaining self-esteem, as well as providing validation through the role model of others who have joined the movement (Brewer, 1991; Hogg, Hohman & Rivera, 2008). Thus for the young Backsilmove activists, their ‘feel for the game’
119 Hobinya tu olahraga kayak gue jadi ya gue piker sih kita punya sifat yang sama. Waktu gue bilang ke dia kalo gue suka tantangan adrenalin di olahraga lalu dia ngeyakinin kalo Greenpeace itu sempurnah lah buat guw, soalnya di organisasi ini gue bisa ngembangin bakat dengan aktif di tim boat. Waktu itu gue bener-bener percaya kalo kita tuh cocok satu sama lain. 120 Batang Leon is a youth-based local environmental activism in Semarang initiated by Greenpeace Indonesia. 121 Saya dulu tu kenal sama Uli yang udah aktif di Greenpeace, dia njelasin panjang tentang kegiatan aktivisme Batang Leon di Semaang. Karena kita juga sama-sama kuliah kelas Psikologi dan sering hangout bareng, jadi bisa nanya banyak hal soal gerakan grassroot. Suatu hari itu Uli mbujuk saya join kelompok aktivisme yang membela masyarakat Batang yang tanahnya diambil oleh negara.
140 in environmentalism (Gäbler, 2015, p. 78) was enriched by collective struggle in the field of Greenpeace protests.
9.4 The Learning Path to Activism
9.4.1 Non-Violent Direct Action Bootcamp Before participating in campaigns, Greenpeace recruits have to undergo induction training where they are introduced to the facts about environmental problems that affect Indonesia, based on Greenpeace research (Furst, 2012). For example, activists who later formed Backsilmove said they were given a presentation about the percentage of remaining tropical forests in Indonesia and the types of damage, as well about endangered animals that are about to become extinct. Videos of animal killing and habitat destruction were shown during the training to intensify the feelings and emotions of prospective activists. One activist recounted in detail the induction training: My first induction training was about forest fires in Indonesia, and I was really shocked when I saw an image of orangutans being killed in the area of the palm oil company. I ended up crying because the incident was harsh. Then, I also found out about major environmental crises such as forest fires and land conversions. Those images were making sense to me. What was presented was striking, especially when videos of orangutan killings were shown122 (Wirdan, interview, December 2014).
Recruits should also develop their critical knowledge as activists before plunging directly into campaigns and direct action in the field. Greenpeace equips them by giving three-day bootcamp training on Non-Violent Direct Action so they can protect themselves from any risk that could be life threatening. In a protest, it is common to see the security forces or police in charge of protecting the location. They are authorised to evict the activists whenever the protest lasts longer and is considered as leading to a public nuisance. So activists must design scenarios and predict potential risks that may occur. In this training, the new activists are forbidden to conduct acts that cause extreme confrontation, such as cursing or blaming in a derogatory fashion. In other words, NVDA heightens the likelihood of ‘dramaturgical circumspection and discipline’ (Fiorito & Nicholls, 2016), or safe protest. Greenpeace is
122 Waktu pertama kali dikasih Induction Training tentang kebakaran hutan di Indonesia, aku tu kaget banget dan bener-bener shock soalnya ngliat orang utan dibunuh di area perusahaan kelapa sawit. Akhirnya nangis soalnya peristiwanya kejam banget lah. Lalu aku bias tahu fakta-fakta tentang krisis lingkungan yang paling besar seperti kebakaran hutan dan konversi lahan. Gambar-gambar itu bener-bener jelas buatku. Apa yang dipresentasikan bener-bener luar biasa, apalagi waktu ngliat video orang utan di bunuh.
141 widely known as a radical environmental organisation that prioritises strategies to achieve a goal rather than requiring self-sacrifice (Furst, 2012; Eyerman & Jamison, 1989). Participation in NVDA may lead to self-transformation, to a modification of habitus, for example: My NVDA bootcamp was in Bogor. We were taught how to deal with security officers when they force us to walk back and stop the movement. At the training the scenario given to my group was that we were questioned by the police and taken to the office. We must avoid confrontation with them and respond to their interrogation firmly but calmly. The reflection from this case was that, as long as we do not fight them, we will not be shot, as we did not do anything harmful123 (Lentia, interview, March 2015). Lentia later had a real life experience in the Greenpeace Indonesia protest against KFC. She found herself surrounded by a crowd and local authorities, ‘I was quite shocked to see that there were so many people who made up the crowd and looked at me (…) I was afraid that the security guard would come over and take me for further interrogation’124. Wirdan reflected on what he had learned from both bootcamp and later protest actions: It is all about learning to fight the fear. Fear during the action in the field actually comes from within ourselves. If we stage the protest in a peaceful manner without violence, the police are not going to shoot us125 (Wirdan, interview, December 2015).
It was also claimed that NVDA equipped activists to present succinct information to journalists that is free from distortion: ‘I really knew how to handle the media’126 (Apri, interview, December 2014). The new generative dispositions and capacities they acquired through Greenpeace training and involvement encouraged the development of qualities of bravery and confidence, as well as advanced negotiation skills. For example, following his participation in the NVDA bootcamp, another Backsilmove activist, Rayi, had teamed up with other Greenpeace activists to unfurl a banner on the top of the Ministry of Fisheries building.
123 Kamp NVDA ku waktu itu di Bogor. Kami diajarin gimana ngademin pihak keamanan yang maksa untuk mundur dan mengentikan gerakan. Sewaktu training, scenario buat kelompok sudah dibuat dan waktu itu kami ditanyai oleh polisi dan dibawa ke kantor. Apa yang dilakuin waktu itu ya menghindarin konfrontasi sama mereka tapi tetep ngrespon interogasi mereka secara secara tegas tapi tenang. Refleksi dari kasus ini sih, sepanjang kami ga nglawan mereka, ga bakal ditembak, karena engga nglakuin hal-hal yang ngrusak. 124Aku agak shock dan setengah kaget waktu tahu bahwa banyak orang di kerumunan yang ngliat aku (…) Apalagi waktu itu aku takut soalnya ada security guard yang datengin dan gimana kalo dia ngambil aku buat diinterogasi. 125 Ini tuh tentang pembelajaran tentang melawan ketakutan. Ketakutan-ketakutan saat berada di aksi lapangan tu sebenarnya dating dari dalam kita sendiri. Kalo kita bikin aksi protest dengan tindakan damai, polisi ga akan nembakin kita. 126 Waktu ngadepin media saya benar-bener tahu gimana nanganin mereka.
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It was a political demand for the government to be more credible in governing the sea and preventing it from intrusive private fishery industries which overly exploit endangered fish. The day before the direct action campaign, he sneaked into the ministry by presenting himself as a regular employee. He successfully brought a bag containing a folded banner that would be hung out the next day. When reaching the designated top floor, he put it in a corner which was rarely visited. On the protest day, he entered the building again. Shortly after unfurling the banner, he was taken by the building's security officers: I answered all of their questions honestly. I told them that I had not caused any damage. I was not a criminal in this action, because I did what a good citizen can do for the environment and for justice127 (Rayi, interview, February 2015).
He maintained that the earlier NVDA training had equipped him to carry out this mission effectively.
The narratives above elaborate the transformative effect of the NVDA bootcamp for achieving a successful environmental campaign through ‘creative disruption’ (Ingalsbee, 1996, p. 272). On an individual level, radical values infused in that camp inculcate the generative dispositions for dealing with risks that may emerge during campaigns, including the appearance of political opponents who could counteract their movement goals. In other words, Greenpeace training and activism experiences have added new political and practical capacities to their existing environmental habitus.
9.4.2 Learning in Jumpa Militan (Meeting of Militants) Strengthening of the activist network is vital to keep the spirit of any environmental movement alive. So once a week Greenpeace activists came along to a voluntary forum called Jumpa Militan. The word militan (militant) acknowledges them as an exclusive group of activists who base their actions on direct struggle: We use the word ‘militan’ because being a militant activist is significant. It is cool (keren) and wonderful if many smart people engage in this forum. First, the idea of militancy is a platform for everyone to devote themselves to direct action. Second, militancy is a great foundation for a movement. You can develop real influence if you
127 Gue jawab pertanyaan-pertanyaan itu dengan jujur dan gue juga akui ga nyebabin kerusakan apapun. Gue kan bukan juga penjahat di aksi ini, karena gw nglakuin sebagai warga negara yang baik buat lingkungan dan perdamaian.
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work with like-minded militant people. We see ourselves as militants but we are not too serious. The Jumpa Militan creates more solidarity since we make the time to routinely meet128 (Astri, interview, April 2015).
Jumpa Militan consolidated the sense of community among young activists who were the manpower source for Greenpeace. As militants, in principle they remain available for mobilisation in times of contention. The meetings of militants kept the flame of activism alive (see Doherty, Plows & Wall, 2003). Yet, as a space for advancing activism, Jumpa Militan also reflected the character of urban youth culture. For example, the selected meeting venue of a coffeeshop in a trendy shopping mall illustrates how Greenpeace activism is intertwined with middle-class inner city life. Over coffee in such a place, middle-class activists can presumably exchange ideas without the risk of being under surveillance by police (Aljunied, 2013).
The special appeal of Jumpa Militan is to young activists who have developed a robust self- concept of action in the spirit of struggle. They have a political ‘feel for the game’ in the militant sense. In the Greenpeace Jumpa Militan they position themselves as solid members of a radical environmental movement organisation, especially in comparison to so-called ‘popular’ green action. You know Earth Hour, don’t you? The Earth Hour organisers never talk about the real roots of the fact about why we should turn off the lights or electricity to reduce the reliance on fossil fuels so the impacts of climate change will be mitigated. They do not help solve the real problem. In my experience, no Earth Hour activist ever informs the public about the logic behind that action. It is just a celebration. Therefore, I prefer to join a concrete movement, which has real solutions to offer129 (Astri, interview, April 2015).
128 Omong-omong kami pakai istilah kata ‘militan’ karena menjadi aktivis militant itu ada pentingnya. Itu keren dan luar biasa kalo banyak orang cerdas dapat terlibat di proyek ini. Selain itu, militansi dapat menjadi platform buat siapapun untuk mendorong mereka berjuang diatas minat dan keinginan. Kedua, militansi itu fondasi yang kuat untuk sebuah gerakan. Kamu bisa membuat gerakan yang berpengaruh jika gaul dengan orang yang sama-sama militant. Kami sih ngliat diri kami militant tapi ga begitu serius lah orang-orangnya. Biar bikin anggota tim kompak kami perlu waktu untuk ketemu rutin. 129 Kamu tahu kan Earth Hour? Earth Hour ga pernah bicara soal akar-akar tentang fakta kenapa sih kita kudu matiin lampu atau listrik sepanjang hari biar mengurangi dampak perubahan iklim jadi dampak perubahan iklim dapat dimitigasi tapi mereka tu ga bantu nyelesain masalah. Di pengalamanku sih ya, ga ada aktivis Earth Hour yang pernah ngasih informasi ke publiksoal logika di balik fakta itu. Cuma perayaan doing kan. Makanya saya sih lebih pilih gerakan yang kongret yang punya solusi buat ditawarkan.
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Astri asserts that the action she undertook as a Greenpeace activist had more impact than populist environmental events which involve the mass public. She implies that such public environmentalism does not put any pressure on the government to produce a viable climate change mitigation policy, for instance.
As a learning community for young activists, attending Jumpa Militan helps maintain a radical environmental habitus; a collective political identity of saving and protecting the natural world. Cross and Snow (2011) contend that such collective identity is developed by the reinforcement of movement values, and the strength of the activist network and ties. Through such routine reinforcement of the value of direct struggle, individuals maintain their radical activist connection to the movement and its tactical goals. Having framed the shaping conditions of environmental activist engagement in Backsilmove, it is timely to turn to what actually happened.
9.5 The Formation of Backsilmove Like the Babakan Siliwangi Residents Forum, Backsilmove emerged from local anger against government moves to allow commercialisation of the Bandung city forest. Backsilmove was formed to take direct political action primarily by young environmental activists who had previously been directly engaged in Greepeace.
Before Backsilmove was established in February 2012, Greenpeace Youth Bandung members had become disgruntled with Greenpeace Indonesia’s centralised regulation, since they were not given freedom and the chance to create new environmental action based on ongoing local issues. In retrospect: Here, [in Bandung] actually there were a lot of local issues that can be raised as part of environmental advocacy, such as forest commercialisation, but Greenpeace Youth could not make any direct struggle for it because it was out of the scope of Greenpeace work130 (Wirdan, interview, December 2014).
Melodi also lamented how Greenpeace restricted them from being active in fighting local environmental problems such as Babakan Siliwangi privatisation:
130 Di sini [Di Bandung] sebenarnya banyak banget masalah lokal yang bisa dijadikan sebagai bagian advokasi lingkungan dalam sebuah gerakan seperti komersialisasi hutan tapi Greenpeace Youth ga bisa bikin perjuangan baru soalnya itu di luar skop kerjaan Greenpeace.
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Actually, why Backsilmove was established was because we were disappointed with Greenpeace. The organisation would not take the Babakan Siliwangi issue as an arena of struggle131 (Melodi, Interview, January 2015).
It was a major disappointment for the activists that Greenpeace Indonesia did not seem to want Greenpeace Youth Bandung affiliates to intervene or take part in reclaiming the Babakan Siliwangi city forest. This was because the local environmental crisis was deemed not to have transnational implications that could strengthen Greenpeace branding as an environmental organisation in the country. In a study on the leadership dynamics and environmental activism of Greenpeace, Eyerman and Jamison (1989) point out that although Greenpeace is one of the important environmental political organisations in the world, it can be apolitical at the local level. The main organisation may not take local environmental issues into account if the problems at that level are deemed as not generating sufficient transnational media attention to attract potential international donors. In the midst of disappointment, a number of Bandung and Jakarta Greenpeace Youth activists consolidated to form a new organisation, Backsilmove.
A driving force for the formation of Backsilmove by experienced Greenpeace activists was the fact that their collective values did not fit within the agenda of protest set by the local community group the Babakan Siliwangi Residents Forum. In January 2013, Greenpeace Bandung Youth members were in attendance at the Resident’s Forum planning of collective action against the commercialisation of Babakan Siliwangi, which was held in the office of WALHI West Java132. The forum elected Tisna Sanjaya as the leader. He was elected because he was thought to be committed to the struggle for defending Babakan Siliwangi. Politically, the election by the forum compensated him because he had been abused by the Dada Rosada government regime when his paintings and artworks were torn apart by the civil police. Yet, this important meeting of the Babakan Siliwangi Residents Forum did not give any chance to young activists to speak up. Nadia, an activist who was attending her first meeting of the Babakan Siliwangi Residents Forum, stressed that it was no session for young people to make their opinions heard. Hadi reflected on his frustration during that meeting:
131 Sebenarnya sih kenapa Backsilmobe didirikan karena kami tu kecewa banget sama Greenpeace sebagai organisasi yang tidak anggap masalah Babakan Siliwangi ke dalam issu untuk perjuangan. 132 WALHI is Friends of the Earth Indonesia. It is Indonesia-based environmental organisation, which operates in provincial level.
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Most of those who spoke in that forum were ‘old men’ at that time. We wanted the planning to be straightforward and not too much time wasted. But it wasn’t like that. Furthermore, the meeting did not count young people as active agents, but still considered them as second-class citizens133 (Hadi, interview, February 2015).
Wirdan claimed that the role given to young people by the Residents Forum at that meeting was just making and distributing leaflets and brochures. There was an obvious contrast between this assigned role and their usual powerful position as militant activists in Greenpeace protest actions.
They were activists who had long been involved in environmental actions, so they were sensitive to the political flavour of the Residents Forum meeting:
At that time, I clearly saw the engagement of the Residents Forum. It was directed by Ridwan Kamil and he was using the Babakan Siliwangi forest campaign as a strategy to win the mayoral election. If he was to win, we didn’t want our names to be on the list of the Forum supporters, leading the public to think we were a part of his group134 (Lentia, interview, March 2015).
That kind of criticism alludes to young activists’ disentangling process in Indonesia. They consider that state politics is ‘dirty’ and there is a lack of respect for the people’s representative mandate given to members of parliament. The prevalence of this viewpoint is readily observed, then and now. During my stay in Bandung for almost six months, corruption cases and misappropriation of public money were always featured in local and national television coverage. Young Indonesians assume that politics is dirty and full of corruption. As young activists, the Greenpeace youth found the political manoeuvring of the Babakan Siliwangi Residents Forum to be disgraceful. The establishment of Backsilmove was a way to independently express their radical environmental values in struggling to preserve the Bandung city forest.
133 Kebanyak orang yang bicara du forum itu udah tua-tua waktu itu. Kami tu pengen usulan yang mereka ajuin tu ga bertele-tele dan terlalu buang buang waktu seperti itu. Ditambah lagi, pertemuan ini juga ngga masukin anak muda sebagai agency dan masih nganggap mereka sebagai warga kelas dua. 134 Waktu itu saya ngliat jelas keterlibatan BCCF. Waktu itu juga BCCF masih dikepalai sama Ridwan Kamil dan dia menggunakan Babakan Siliwangi sebagai strategi untuk memenangi pemilu walikota. Kalau dia menang, kami ga mau nama kami masuk di daftar mereka yang dampaknya kita bagian dari mereka.
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In short, political and social dissonance led to the forming of Backsilmove. The young activists were disgruntled with both Greenpeace campaign policy and unequal political relations in the Babakan Siliwangi Resident Forum. This dissonance drove them to create an expressive new movement that fitted their expectations and values as young people. Crossley (2002, p. 44) views this kind of innovative actions by agents as a disconnection from the ‘circle of reproduction’ to generate new structures. The break provides an opportunity for them to develop their critical reflection, which allows for a new model of the environmental movement to emerge (Crossley, 2003). Their environmental defence action in creating Backsilmove increased their sense of agency and provided them with the capability to perform direct actions using the models, strategies and tactics adopted from Greenpeace.
Two weeks after attending that same meeting of the Babakan Siliwangi Residents Forum, Wirdan contacted Hadi to finalise the concept of Backsilmove. They began by designing social media to expand the influence of young people. The distance between Jakarta and Bandung was not a barrier for them. After more than two weeks of communication, plans were prepared through online discussion on WhatsApp and Facebook. Despite their disappointment with Greenpeace, the Backsilmove founders recognised that the grand design of their movement referred to Greenpeace, for example: ‘our movement is widely adopted from Greenpeace’ (Lentia, interview, March 2015). Böttger (1996) and Kruger (1996) explain that post-1990s, Greenpeace actions were plotted and considered in detail. The execution of the action was very well co-ordinated. So it was a good model for Backsilmove to adopt.
Another adopted direct action strategy was emphasis on mass media communication. Böttger (1996) points out that an important tactic for Greenpeace is to involve the mass media in an action. They usually invite the media and even hire a professional photographer to cover the event. Böttger (1996) claims that Greenpeace only publishes photographs of successful field actions that have dramatic effects, so that the message conveyed to the public brings an emotional reaction. Greenpeace usually attaches slogans to photos with dazzling short sentences. Similarly, in their famous action of the long march from Babakan Siliwangi forest to the gates of the parliament, Backsilmove invited journalists from local and national newspapers to publish and disseminate the event. Moreover, young activists who had photography and journalism skills and extensive links to the mass media were prioritised in later Backsilmove recruitment.
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However, unlike Greenpeace, Backsilmove’s organisational structure was not hierarchial but egalitarian, with no top-down positions to show which ones are subordinates and superiors. Backsilmove operations were run according to the skills and social/cultural capital of each of the activists. For instance, to optimise recruitment of members and mass mobilisation, Canny was appointed as coordinator because she was widely known for her extensive networking with young people in both Jakarta and Bandung, as well as among the environmental organisations in Indonesia. She recruited young activists to Backsilmove from those active in Greenpeace Youth Bandung and Jakarta. With targeted recruitment, Backsilmove did not waste energy, but rather devoted its monetary resources to training activists. As a youth environmental organisation, social media such as Instagram, Facebook and Twitter were vital for disseminating the reports and photos of activities, and for spreading invitations to their network. One activist who was germane in this matter was Lentia. Besides having a Bachelor in Communication Studies, she had been involved as an assistant social media officer in numerous Greenpeace environmental projects. Backsilmove developed a website as an information centre for the public so they could get updates on the activities, values, and profiles of activists, and updates on the campaign to save Babakan Siliwangi. For expertise in website management, Backsilmove tasked Wirdan. He had mastered computer programming and had an educational background in informatics.
Research on the public perception of Babakan Siliwangi was undertaken as an integral part of Backsilmove activism to enhance public knowledge about the scientific facts of ecological processes in the urban jungle. This work required a highly skilled individual who had considerable hours of experience in designing and running research. The only member of the team to demonstrate that skill was Puspita. Similarly, Wanggi’s background in art school and theatrical protest meant he became the coordinator for pantomime performances at the entrance of Gedung Sate. Thus Backsilmove’s success in defending the urban forest was based on the best use of the particular human resources of the activists, such as their education and their previous experience in activism. The result was an accumulation of valuable and productive cultural capital for Backsilmove.
The compelling report Pembangunan Tanpa Mata (Blind Development) was a scientific summary released by Backsilmove for the public and the government. It aimed to increase environmental awareness of the scientific wonder and benefits of Babakan Siliwangi. This
149 research publication was a discursive strategy to reinforce the distinctive identity of Backsilmove as a stand-alone, youth-driven environmental organisation in the Bandung struggle. ‘There were so many organisations in 2013 fighting against commercialisation that used numerous ways to advocate for Babakan Siliwangi, but we wanted to use distinctive means’ (Puspita, interview, March 2016). Previously, Puspita had analysed the impact of the mining industry in East Kalimantan for Greenpeace. Her involvement in Greenpeace gave her significant opportunities to enhance research interests that dated back to her childhood (see Chapter 6). On her journey into the world of research at Greenpeace, Puspita started with the Energy Research Group: In 2011 the issue of deforestation in Indonesia was huge, and it was the main core issue that Greenpeace was working on. Finally, I decided to tell them that my interest was in energy issues. I chose energy issues, because first, I was not keen on a mainstream issue where it is everyone’s interest, and, second, renewable energy policies in Indonesia was a minor issue, and not so many people were into it. So, I joined the Renewable Energy group135 (Puspita, interview, March 2015).
Puspita’s expertise in research was not only informed by the depth of her interest, but was also mediated by occasions where she got the chance to meet experts who engaged her intellectual passion at that time. With great enthusiasm, she recalled: I got acquainted with a graduate of the Economy Department at the University of Indonesia. He was an amazing person. His thought was admirable because he always talked about environmental issues even though his degree was in economics. He wrote a report on coal-mining in East Borneo, and I was there too at the time. I went to East Kalimantan to survey the coal-mining industry. I even met the Dayak people and talked to them about their life. I observed that they were evicted from their land due to the coal-mining industry. So I wrote up the report and it was later published online 136 (Puspita, interview, March 2015).
135 Tahun 2011 kan masalah deforestasi di Indonesia sangat masih dan itulah isu inti pertama kali yang Greenpeace kerjain. Kedua, tentang energy, akhirnya aku putusin bahwa minatku tu di masalah energy. Aku pilih masalah energu karena, pertama aku ga suka masalah yang mainstream dimana semua orang kerjain dan kedua tentang kebijakan energi di Idnonesia masih masalah yang minor dan ga semua orang suka. Terus yaa, aku join Grup Energi Terbarukan. 136 Waktu itu aku kenalan sama seoranga alumni dari jurusan Ekonomi Universitas Indonesia, dia itu luar biasa banget buatku. Pemikirannya itu mengangymkan karena dia selalu bicara masalah lingkungan walaupun dia dari Ekonomi. Lalu, dia menulis tentang laporan tambang batubara dengan skop Kalimantan Timur dan aku juga disana waktu itu. Aku tinggal di Kalimantan timur nyurvei tentang dampak industry batubara di sana, dan aku ketemu sama orang Dayak asli dan ngobrol sama mereka tentang kehidupan mereka. Aku ngliat mereka
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Convincing the public through research, and enhancing the level of public knowledge about the environmental crisis are important elements in improving the influence of an environmental organisation on the public (Choudry, 2014; Mark & Hall, 2009). As mentioned above, in April 2013, Backsilmove disseminated Pembangunan Tanpa Mata (Blind Development). The radical title signalled a protest against the Bandung government’s plan to transform the city landscape through the development of tourist facilities, such as hotels and restaurants. Backsilmove analysed the impact of the loss of Babakan Siliwangi from an environmental law perspective. They argued that developing the Babakan Siliwangi forest area would further decrease the amount of green open space in Bandung and go against regulations. Of the total area of 17,000 hectares of Bandung City, Babakan Siliwangi is only about 0.02 per cent of the total. Based on the Spatial Regulations of Indonesia, green open space area should be 30 per cent of the total area of the city - both public and private land. In the Spatial Plan of Bandung itself, the public green space in the city of Bandung should be 20 per cent of the total, whether riparian areas, parks, public cemeteries or conservation areas. If Babakan Siliwangi were to be reduced further through commercial development, Bandung would lose its forest and a percentage of public green space.
Moreover, Backsilmove proposed that if the government commercialised the city forest, it would have violated the commitment it signed at the Children and Youth Conference, TUNZA, in 2011. On that occasion, the city government signed a declaration that Babakan Siliwangi was recognised as a world city forest and met the city forest classification of covering a minimum of 0.25 hectares, according to the laws of Indonesia. Backsilmove quoted from the Regulation of the Ministry of Forestry of the Republic of Indonesia (2009): ‘An expanse of land where trees grow compact and dense in urban areas both on state land and privately owned land, which is designated as an urban forest by a competent authority’. Furthermore, Backsilmove argued on the basis of competent authority. The report referred to the Spatial Plan of Bandung (Rencana Tata Ruang Wilayah (RTRW)). Under Article 45, paragraph 6, Babakan Siliwangi forest is designated as a green open space area of city forest of 3.1 hectares. Yet, as previously explained, the area is only 0.02 per cent of the total area of Bandung. Given the regulations issued by the Ministry of Forestry, Backsilmove calculated that the city forest should actually cover ten per cent of the urban area.
diusir dari tanah mereka oleh perusahaan kelapa sawit dan bicara sama mereka. Lalu akhirnya aku lanjutin dengan nulis laporan tentang kasus itu dan bentar lagi akan keluar online.
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On page eight of Pembangunan Tanpa Mata, Backsilmove wrote ‘Babakan Siliwangi is owned by the people of Bandung: Absolutely’. From the choice of wording itself, it can be seen that Backsilmove urged the government to restore the Babakan Siliwangi forest as a public space. Using legal arguments, Backsilmove claimed that Babakan Siliwangi was defined as a city forest with characteristics of firm-rooted trees, branches that are not easily broken, leaves that do not easily fall, and flowers/fruit/seeds producing economic value. It is composed of tall trees combined with shrubs and grasses. To support the validity of this argument, Backsilmove undertook an independent study that involved a number of interviews with botanists. The report identified that Babakan Siliwangi has 48 species of trees, such as durian and Ki Hujan (Samanea saman) that are capable of producing 5,880 kilograms of oxygen and absorbing 5,400 kilograms of carbon dioxide every day. Other biological facts reinforced the argument: for example, there are 24 bird species in the forest. The many tree species serve to prevent soil erosion and conserve groundwater stored through rain. Through this research, Backsilmove as an environmental pressure group consolidated knowledge about the forest and its role as part of the urban ecological system, arguing against commercialisation in any form.
In addition to putting pressure on the government to recognise the negative implications of spatial colonialisation in green areas, Backsilmove warned the government that Bandung people have environmental rights. They referenced Law No. 26 of 2007 on Spatial Planning. Article 60 states that every person has the right to know the spatial plan, enjoy the value of space as a result of spatial planning, obtain a worthy replacement on losses arising from the implementation of development activities in accordance with the spatial plan, and file an objection to the authorities against inappropriate developments in accordance with the spatial plan in its territory. It also states that a person can file a cancellation of the license and termination of a development that does not comply with the spatial plan, and file a lawsuit claim for compensation to the government and/or permit holder if development activities are not in accordance with the spatial plan, resulting in losses. Furthermore, citizenship rights should be included in the spatial arrangement planning. Backsilmove also voiced its complaint against the injustice of the government by citing Article 65 - that the implementation of spatial planning which is managed by the government must provide for public involvement in the planning. Public participation is to be implemented through the process of formulating the design of spatial plans and will ensure that the space will be used for their benefit.
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In the report, Backsilmove included survey results to demonstrate public perceptions of the urban forest as a ‘restorative environment’. Using a social psychology approach, Backsilmove adopted the concept ‘Attention Restoration Theory’ (Kaplan, 1995). This approach seeks to understand what individuals do when faced with tasks or activities that in the long run lead to fatigue or ‘directed attention fatigue’. In this declining condition, individuals seek a place to restore energy. They want a place that does not demand too much effort from them to focus, where they can enjoy the surroundings. Parameters of restorative space taken by Backsilmove from Kaplan’s approach included the following characteristics: located away from everyday life; able to provide experiences in space and time; interesting and engaging; and able to support desired activities. Babakan Siliwangi has these four restorative characteristics because the city forest presents a different atmosphere from the workplace where citizens of Bandung spend the day. Babakan Siliwangi also offers recreational experiences such as the Art Workshop gallery and the goat race show, as well as opportunities for photography, music and more.
In short, Backsilmove evaluated the restorative space potential of the urban forest through research. Their research revealed that Babakan Siliwangi provides valuable psychological functions, not only for residents from Bandung but also for those from Jakarta who visit the city forest. The government has therefore a chance to promote Babakan Siliwangi as Bandung’s natural forest. To summarise, Backsilmove presented strong evidence that the ecological and social functions of Babakan Siliwangi benefited the citizens of Bandung and Jakarta. The environmental activist habitus demonstrated by the scientific rigour of the Backsilmove report indicates a high level of cultural capital in conducting research and exploring legal opinion. It would have been hard for the government and influential citizens of Bandung to ignore the carefully assembled evidence in the report on the value of the city forest.
9.6 Creative Arts Repertoire Not every confident and well-informed activist in the save Babakan Siliwangi movement came up through earlier involvement in environmental NGOs such as Greenpeace. An important campaign leader was Wanggi Hudiyatno, a graduate of the College of Arts. He majored in drama and theatre. His works incorporate political themes based on contemporary
153 cases in Indonesia. He has been active in political pantomime. For example, he often took part in theatrical protest at the entry to Gedung Sate. On one occasion, he was involved in a campaign by Bandung neighbourhood activists to insist that municipalities be more transparent in setting budget funds in West Java. To achieve compliance with protest rules, Wanggi had to go through the bureaucratic procedure of submitting an application for a permit to the City Planning Office. He waited for weeks but the permit did not come. The delay upset him and made him angry. Finally, he ventured to initiate his own protest action with a mime performance at the entry to Gedung Sate. There was no reaction from the government authorities. So, he concluded that this location was already public property and he could perform political protest there. Wanggi firmly believed that his actions did not involve acts of damage and did not disturb the comfort of the public. He continued to stage pantomime as symbolic protest in that public space: The police authorities had no grounds to arrest me, because I never committed any violent acts, nor destroyed any public infrastructure during my protests. Also, there have never been riots. I did not even shout out loud like a demonstrator during pantomime performances. What I did is just stand still, imagining some objects, pouring the powder onto the ground as a symbol of discontent. The powder was my own and when the rain came it would be washed off. So, to me dealing with police authorities and intelligence services was just a piece of cake137 (Wanggi, interview, March 2015).
Wanggi identified pantomime as a ‘counterbalance’ to conventional protest, which often involves activists shouting in the face of opposition or resisting arrest. Yet, Wanggi faced a variety of threats when his pantomime action addressed political issues in a way that could be understood as degrading to the state. On one occasion while he was performing at the gates of Gedung Sate he received an SMS from police that warned him to stop his action. However, this threat actually enabled him to be more resilient and establish a moral conviction that emboldened him in staging the activist pantomimes. Eventually, Wanggi as an activist developed the capacity to map out the risks that were likely to threaten him. In other words, he not only manifested a solid ‘feel for the game’, but a workeable ‘logic of practice’
137 Otoritas kepolisan ga punya alasan untuk nangkep dan memenjarain, bener kan?, karena saya juga belum pernah nglakukan aksi kekerasan atau merusak infrastruktur public selama aksi protest. Saya juga ga terian- teriak kayak demonstrator saat perform pantomime. Yang saya lakukan tu cuma berdiri diam, membayangkan sebuah obyek, naburan bedak ke bawah sebagai symbol kemarahan. Bedaknya juga punya sendiri dan kalo hujan bakal ilang. Jadi buat saya sih ya dealing sama polisi tu urusan gampang lah.
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(Bourdieu, 1997) that enabled predictable risks to be averted and overcome. This distinctive environmental activist habitus was most useful when he became involved in Backsilmove.
Backsilmove activists not only practised scientific research in their campaign, but advocated for Babakan Siliwangi through the repertoires of the long march and pantomime, where Wanggi Hoediyatno was the brains behind the action. The idea of the long march was loosely modelled on a previous long march that formed part of a Greenpeace campaign to occupy public space while conveying a radical environmental message to the public. However, as an independent organisation, Backsilmove had a separate identity from Greenpeace, and they created their own repertoires of performative protest. Wanggi was recognised by Backsilmove as a left-wing activist in Bandung who conducted theatrical action in front of Gedung Sate once a week. Moreover, he already had extensive networks with local media. By involving Wanggi, Backsilmove gained more attention and political recognition from the mass media for their peaceful protests in front of Gedung Sate. The protests therefore had more impact on the government.
9.7 Conclusion This chapter has explored some pathways of young activists to their intense involvement in Backsilmove and eventual success in saving Babakan Siliwangi from commercial development. Most of the leaders in Backsilmove had earlier developed an environmental activist habitus through their active participation in NVDA training and environmental campaigns and protests initiated by Greenpeace, and the other experiences of undertaking political activism in the public space of Bandung. Through elaboration of the above, it can be argued that NVDA bootcamp, for example, instilled a certain doxa of effective political action in young activists. Not only were they presented with various facts about environmental damage, but they learned about suitable methods of protest to arouse public emotions that could have effects of political change. Their ‘feel for the game’ of environmental activism was subsequently honed in various environmental campaigns and protests in public spaces. The distinctive generative dispositions of an environmental habitus were thus formed through involvement with Greenpeace. They became young activists who were well-prepared for movement mobilisation and this was used effectively when they came together to form Backsilmove, against the limiting and conservative backdrop of the Babakan Siliwangi Residents Forum. Chapter Ten will describe the preparation and implementation of
155 the long march and the pantomime in front of the Gedung Sate, and how participation in that public space activism proved to be a source of transformational empowerment for the young activists.
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CHAPTER 10. BACKSILMOVE’S REPERTOIRES OF RESISTANCE
10.1 Introduction The previous chapter illustrated the establishment of Backsilmove as a youth-driven environmental organisation that engaged activists with previous experience in radical movements and related actions in Indonesia. Varied pre-movement experiences shaped the Backsilmove activists’ identity. Those experiences equipped them with skills and predispositions to wage a movement. They were enabled to develop criticism relevant to environmental issues, and consolidated their affiliations for actions of resistance. This chapter gives attention to how activists used social and cultural capital to establish repertoires of resistance. Those repertoires of resistance included the long march from Babakan Siliwangi city forest to Gedung Sate, oratorical speeches on the streets, and performing pantomime at the Gedung Sate in front of the parliament building.
First, I will explore the development of the movement enacted by Backsilmove that took the form of a ‘Long March’ to symbolically reclaim Babakan Siliwangi forest. The ‘Long March’, in combination with theatrical pantomime, was a core action of Backsilmove to demonstrate their resistance in public space. Then I present a review of the pantomime concept and how it can be understood as an instance of the carnivalesque described by Bakhtin. As well, the incorporation of pantomime as an alternative method of conveying political messages to the public about the environmental crisis is explored. The chapter also considers how Backsilmove activists felt about their participation in the ‘Long March’, and how it consolidated their political identity as young radicals. In other words, they are understood to be reflecting on the development of their radical habitus.
10.1.1 Prior Solidarity Forged in Greenpeace Indonesia The repertoires that Backsilmove employed to demonstrate their resistance to the commercialisation of Babakan Siliwangi city forest were very much modelled upon Greenpeace’s campaign actions. This was inevitable because the core committee of Backsilmove had previously participated in the direct actions, training, and other events held
157 by Greenpeace. This chapter argues that Greenpeace cosmology influenced the worldview of Backsilmove activists, thereby determining what forms of high-risk environmental campaign and action were to be enacted. Backsilmove appropriated the ‘cognitive praxis’ of Greenpeace in repertoires of protest. Koch (2001) explains that Greenpeace adopts the information- dissemination method of ‘crumb cake’; a metaphor to explain publicising the root of an environmental problem as part of a larger problem. Using this method, information about an ecological crisis can be absorbed by the public quickly.
For example, Backsilmove first developed a study which was then released as a scientific publication, as explained in the previous chapter. In this effort, Backsilmove sought to influence the public by explaining in simple yet accurate terms the root causes of the Babakan Siliwangi crisis. Secondly, they used a survey of attitudes to the city forest. Using that survey, they argued that resistance to commercialisation is not negotiable because people still demonstrate a sense of belonging to the city forest. Thirdly, following the ‘direct action’ strategy of mass media engagement operated by Greenpeace (Böttger, 1996) Backsilmove involved the mass media in their repertoires of resistance by inviting journalists and even hiring professional photographers to cover protest events. Like Greenpeace, they published photographs of successful actions with dazzling short sentences to attract public sympathy. Finally, Backsilmove organised a traditional form of protest, the ‘Long March’ from Babakan Siliwangi to Gedung Sate. To seize the focus of journalists and media, the ‘Long March’ was enhanced creatively by incorporating a striking theatrical performance, referred to in the discussion below as a pantomime, because words were not used.
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10.2 The Long March and Pantomime as Symbolic Resistance
10.2.1 The Long March
Figure 10.1 A Backsilmove poster publicising the Long March in 2013
Source: Backsilmove’s document
The Long March was very carefully planned and carried out, and it was creatively designed to provoke strong emotions in the public. In this regard, Backsilmove followed the lead of Greenpeace yet again. By the start of the new millenium Greenpeace protest actions had become more detailed, contemplated and considered in detail, and the execution of the action was highly disciplined. The expression ‘ecotage’ appeared. ‘Ecotage’ is an action in the field featuring repertoires such as drama and pantomime to stimulate an emotional reaction from the public and government (Nayan, 2014). The selection of pantomime functions symbolically in the ‘ecotage’ to politically criticise the government in a campaign. Through symbolic representations in the pantomime, Backsilmove intended to disrupt the government by parodying their environmentally devastating politics.
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The peak of the symbolic resistance waged by Backsilmove to save Babakan Siliwangi was the 2013 ‘Long March’, which concluded with a compelling theatrical action in front of the main gate of the Gedung Sate. The name ‘Long March’ has deep significance for the people of Bandung and surrounding areas because it relates to an important historical event. By reviving and revitalising the historical values and the solidarity spirit of the original Siliwangi Long March conducted by the Siliwangi Army Division in 1948, Backsilmove aimed to evoke the collective spirit embodied by the independence movement. The poster above that advertises the 2013 march evokes that original military campaign, which is a source of pride for Bandung people.
In detail, a Long March was carried out by the Siliwangi section of the Indonesian Armed Forces in 1948 by soldiers fighting to establish an independent Republic of Indonesia following Dutch and then Japanese occupation. At that time, after the Renville Treaty138, those soldiers were mobilised to leave West Java and head to the Central Java region by crossing a very dangerous battlefield, during which time they faced direct confrontation with a group of PKI (Indonesian Communist Party) rebels (Soetanto, 2007). To lower the risk of being attacked by the Dutch army, the Siliwangi army was strategically divided into smaller divisions to make their way to Central Java (Soetanto, 2007). This is referred to as the Siliwangi Long March. It culminated in a small military division reaching the Bandung area, to be actively deployed when Dutch attacks peaked again in Java (Soetanto, 2007). For Backsilmove, their Long March was purposefully embedded with the sense of a historical reconstruction of the Siliwangi military struggle. It also echoed, for the people of Bandung, the success of the Indonesian army in expelling Dutch colonialists during the struggle for independence.
However, the Siliwangi Long March had a famous predecessor: The Long March of Mao Tse Tung in China in 1926. While the nationalist Chinese military troops were authoritarian, Mao
138 In the Renville Treaty, it was agreed between the Republic of Indonesia government and the Dutch that Indonesian troops who got secondments in the area of the Dutch colony should be transferred to regions governed by the Republic of Indonesia. After signing the treaty, the Republic of Indonesia became powerless against the Dutch because a majority of the regions were handed over to the Dutch. A further struggle for independence then ensued.
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Tse Tung preferred guerrilla resistance methods such as leading the masses from the country villages to the cities (Tsou & Halperin, 1965). Mao’s Long March mobilisation changed the political direction in the country (Schram, 1966). So the term ‘Long March’ has a double historical meaning for young Indonesian activists. The photo on the Backsilmove poster above shows the Long March of the Siliwangi division in 1948, rather than Mao’s Long March. It appears that this was the primary reference for the Backsilmove action.
10.2.2 Pantomime Backsilmove believed that if they were to call for a mass demonstration in front of the Gedung Sate, similar to mass demonstrations held there by pro-democracy activists in 1998, it might turn violent and bring the image of post-reformation Bandung youth into disrepute. Mass demonstrations in Indonesia in 1998, and just after, often turned violent because they were factionalised along political party lines. Hadi as a Backsilmove director at the time claimed that a mass demonstration of the old kind would not in any way reflect the development of youth creativity in the new millennium, where political freedom opened up a space for art-inspired participation by creative young people. Moreover, the Backsilmove campaign would be at risk of becoming quickly politicised along party lines. According to Wanggi, the problem of potential Babakan Siliwangi commercialisation was politically sensitive in Bandung in 2013 because it was associated with the investigation of corruption charges against Mayor Dada Rosada and the disclosure of conspiracy by parliamentary party elites. That is why Backsilmove developed a new repertoire of resistance to express criticism of the government on the matter of the city forest that would avoid tense political party confrontation. The two chosen forms of protest were the Long March and a pantomime street performance to entertain and inform the public on the street and at Gedung Sate. Before moving on, the concept of pantomime is worth examining in its academic field. In essence, pantomime is a carnivalesque genre of performance; silent dramatic enactment.
The concept of carnivalesque was first applied by Mikhail Bakhtin to refer to political protests in the 1940s while Russia was still under the Stalinist regime. Carnivalesque has been an ancient theatrical form since the Roman era, but was identified by Bakhtin as a subversive activity which mobilised the community to express resistance in a comical critique of the dominant powers (Moser, 2003). Carnivalesque strategies mock the powerful.
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‘Carnivalesque protest has been used to oppose or at least temporarily relieve, various forms of oppressive political culture’ (Bruner, 2013, p. 137). In the carnivalesque genre, art is focused on political issues and can mobilise spectators against the arbitrariness of the government. Steinberg (2004) points out that this strategy depends on persuasion: ‘Bakhtin argues that the lynchpin of mobilization is persuasion [...] that can socialize and radicalize potential constituents’ (Steinberg, 2004, p. 5). Pantomime action by Backsilmove in front of Gedung Sate reflects in principle the concept of carnivalesque mobilisation developed by Bakhtin.
The artists who play in carnivalesque forms of protest typically put on a mask or smear their faces with white powder, as in pantomimes in general, with the intention to remain anonymous so as to avoid reprisals (Ruiz, 2013). Artists as activists cover their faces to trick the state apparatus. ‘The refusal to be seen and categorised by the state is empowering in that it exposes, and then unsettles, the power dynamics that have traditionally structured public space’ (Ruiz, 2003, p. 7). Compared to other protest actions such as mass demonstrations, carnivalesque performance does not encourage activists to get involved in a confrontation, as it is not aligned with the genre. In the case of Bandung, Wanggi implied that the implementation of pantomime by Backsilmove performers was an alternative way of showcasing the environmental battle for the city forest. It presented a symbolic representation of contested power between actors directly engaged in forest commercialisation, and those who will clearly be disadvantaged by that process. In summary, the Backsilmove pantomime performers attempted to demonstrate antagonistic realities that occur in everyday urban politics in Bandung so that passers-by are able to envision the general political unfairness of the commercialisation decision by members of parliament, the same members who sit in the Gedung Sate as the House of Parliament in Bandung.
10.3 On the Day of Protest This section of the chapter describes the actual actions of the Long March and the pantomime in 2013. Prior to mobilising young activists for the Long March to Gedung Sate, Backsilmove activists developed strategies to minimise risks, such as police arrest or attack by unrecognised antagonists. Anticipation of risks was a fundamental component of planning. For example, early in the morning of 20 March 2013, leaders and activists were already at the
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Babakan Siliwangi Art Workshop. Wirdan, the Long March coordinator, repeatedly checked all the required equipment for the action, such as orange vests, megaphones, maps, and first aid items. Meanwhile, Hadi, the director of the action, briefed the activists so they were ready to walk from Babakan Siliwangi to the Gedung Sate. He said, ‘Guys, remember we will march in the left lane and if there are any suspicious parties you don’t need to listen to them’139. He advised them to take full precautions. Another activist in charge of contacting the authorities, Hilman, brought the update that a police officer was ready to escort the action that day on his motorcycle. Although not a prior member of Greenpeace Youth, Hilman’s shrewdness in preparing the security action was without doubt. For instance, he had visited the Gedung Sate a few days before and notified the security forces that on 20 March there would be a theatrical action by Backsilmove outside the gates. Moreover, two days earlier, he had visited the Bandung city police station to deliver a letter of application for security during the Long March to Gedung Sate. Thirty minutes prior to the march, Hadi warned that all activists should take care of each other and should not get out of line, to ensure their safety. Before the march, Canny gave a brief oration: Friends, in today's action we aim to defend this beloved urban forest (she raised her head up as if praying and inhaled the fresh air). Try and grasp that on either side of you are green creatures that breathe and dance like us. They have lives like human beings and we ought to defend them. So, do not hesitate to be loud later on the street. We defend nature today. Be convinced that Allah is with us140.
Although brief, this oration enflamed the spirit of the young activists. When she finished speaking, they yelled ‘Long live Babakan Siliwangi! Long live Backsilmove! Long live Youth!’.141
One of the most memorable things for many young activists was the presence of Danang Prasetyo, a Greenpeace staff member who would lead speeches during the Long March. The day before, Greenpeace Youth activists had attended a gathering called ‘100% Indonesia’
139Guys, ingat kita nanti berjalan di lajur kiri dan kalau ada pihak-pihak yang mencurigakan kalian ga perlu digubris. 140Teman-teman hari ini aksi kita bertujuan untuk membela hutan kota tercinta ini (sembari menengadahkan kepalanya ke atas seolah berdoa dan sekali-kali ia menghirup udara bebas). Coba tengoklah di kanan kiri kalian, makhluk hijau yang bernapas dan menari seperti kita. Mereka punya nyawa seperti manusia dan kitapun wajib membela mereka. Jadi, jangan ragu bersuara keras saat di jalan nanti. Kita membela alam hari ini dan yakinlah Tuhan bersama kita. 141Hidup Babakan Siliwangi! Hidup Babakan Siliwangi! Hidup Anak Muda!
163 where they bonded in solidarity. By participating in the Long March they further demonstrated ‘affective solidarity’ (Juris, 2008, p. 65), developed through shared emotional bonds in pre-activism activities. Without the slightest fear, they enlivened the long march by voicing the need to protect the natural environment, which was under threat from investors in the country.
Activist photographers, Adel and Ratu, stood in front of and behind the row of marchers with cameras hanging around their necks. As action photographers, they were identifying the best angles to take pictures during the march. When all was ready, the young activists walked out of Babakan Siliwangi together wearing orange vests. These orange vests made them easily identifiable as a solidarity group. In addition, it served to grab the attention of the public and the people who passed by in Dago Street because of the exceptionally striking colour. The journey began with alternating speeches by the young activists. For example, Canny, with full euphoria of spirit shouted, ‘Reclaim our urban forests from the grip of capitalism’. Wirdan continued with ‘Nature which is the breath of our future has been shattered because of the greed of the capitalists and the government’s blindness!’142 Nadia, who spends every Sunday morning in the Babakan Siliwangi to do jogging also, provided her call: ‘We have told the city authorities that it’s about time they paid attention to the future of Babakan Siliwangi for young people of Bandung!’143
Then the megaphone was moved into the hands of Hadi. He called out ‘Restore urban forests for the sake of environmental justice in Indonesia’144. Without hesitation, all the marchers raised their hands into the sky, yelling ‘Long live Babakan Siliwangi! Long live Babakan Siliwangi!’145 Immediately, the flow of motor vehicles coming from the west slowed down, and many motorists stopped for a moment to enjoy the visual spectacle of the march. Occasionally, they also captured the journey with smartphone cameras. Cars and motor vehicles behind the march slowed down. Melodi said that the road users did not seem to feel any objection to the presence of these young activists marching along. It seemed as if they
142Alam yang menjadi nafas masa depan kami telah hancur berkeping-keping karena ketamakan para kapitalis dan kebutaan pemerintah. 143Kami minta pemerintah kota sudah saatnya memperhatikan masa depan Babakan Siliwangi bagi anak muda Bandung. 144 Kembalikan hutan kota demi keadilan lingkungan Indonesia. 145 Hidup Babakan Siliwangi” Hidup Babakan Siliwangi!
164 enjoyed the oration. Wildan and Raja were distributing leaflets that read ‘Save Babakan Siliwangi Urban forest. Your Babakan Siliwangi urban forest will be turned into hotels and restaurants by the government and PT EGI. Defend it now or we lose it!’146 While walking towards the Gedung Sate, they distributed leaflets to the road and pathway users. By distributing the leaflet, the young activists opened a discourse with the public. While distributing leaflets, Raja identified the road users’ lack of knowledge about the crisis of Babakan Siliwangi. He recalled: ‘I can’t stop wondering. Almost all the adult citizens who were given these leaflets did not know about this problem, but most of the young people I met already knew the location of Babakan Siliwangi’147 (Interview, January 2015). I asked Raja to tell me more: So we became aware that actually this kind of action is necessary and we must invite the community in even more. Why become an activist if you only proclaim our ideas while the members of the public don’t know that it is also their environment we’re defending148. Raja’s answer indicates a process of deconstruction from the ideology of a social activist disengaged from broader society to one who became more grounded.
The heat of the asphalt-covered streets on the way to Gedung Sate did not deter the spirit of the youths in shouting out ‘Reclaim Babakan Siliwangi for Bandung Residents’.149 To add to the euphoria of the fighting spirit along the way, the Backsilmove activists sang the song Halo-Halo Bandung. They chose this song for a reason. The symbolism inherent in the lyrics had a powerfully reinvigorating meaning for the activists. The important lyric is ‘Now it has become a sea of fire! Let’s seize it back’. In emphasising ‘now it has become a sea of fire’, the activists alluded to the current city forest of Bandung threatened by capitalism, represented by PT EGI. Furthermore, ‘let’s seize it back’ urges the importance of fighting for the urban forest against the threat of capitalism in the modern era. During the Long March, the activists chanted these words with a vengeance, as if they were on a battlefield. Raja spoke about the transformation of emotions with this song. He said ‘Wow, this song fired up
146 Save Hutan Kota Babakan Siliwangi. Hutan Kota Babakan Siliwangi Anda akan dijadikan hotel dan restauran oleh pemerintah dan PT EGI. Bela sekarang juga atau kita kehilangan! 147Heran bener ya Kang. Hampir semua warga yang dikasih leaflet kok tidak tahu masalah ini, tetapi anak- anak muda yang aku temui mereka kebanyakan sudah tahu dimana lokasi Babakan Siliwangi itu. 148Dari situ kita menjadi sadar, ternyata aksi semacam ini perlu dan harus lebih banyak mengajak masyarakat. Buat apa jadi aktivis kalo cuma koar-koar doang tapi masyarakat ga tahu kalo yang kita bela itu lingkungan mereka juga. 149 Kembalikan Babakan Siliwangi kepada Warga Bandung.
165 morale on the road. To me it felt like my emotions were ignited as we sang those lyrics’150 (Interview, January 2015). This suggests the powerful role of a song in evoking collective emotions in social movements, a phenomenon identified by Eyerman and Jamison (1991).
The collective emotions of young activists who were fighting for a new life for the Babakan Siliwangi urban forest were also expressed through speeches made during the journey to the Gedung Sate. The function of this oration, according to Hadi, was to ignite public indignation and frustration. It was also meant to express the disgruntlement of young people over the future of forests in Bandung and Indonesia. Social movement experts Della Porta and Diani point out the effectiveness of oratorical language to the public. They argue that oratorical language can help create a powerful anchor for ongoing resistance (Della Porta & Diani, 1999). This can be seen in the oratorical speech delivered by Greenpeace leader Danang Prasetyo, on the Long March to Gedung Sate: The Bandung Urban forest has already been recognized. It was identified in the Child and Youth Conference on the Environment (TUNZA) 2011 as a world urban forest, and the lungs of the world cannot be eliminated in any way. Furthermore, Babakan Siliwangi urban forest has an area of 3.8 hectares of land which is not only ecologically important but has a social function because the area is used by the community of young people and the Sundanese community to develop and preserve their culture. If the Bandung government and PT EGI resume the forest for restaurants and hotels, then the municipality has ‘licked its own spit’ and reneged on promises made at the TUNZA conference in 2011. Moreover, if this business cooperation agreement goes ahead, the city government will have to lied to the world that witnessed the signing of the declaration of Babakan Siliwangi as a world urban forest. If PT EGI gets permission for construction in the urban forest, our young people will lose a lot of green space for their expression, assembly, exercise, and for developing their talents. In addition, the use of the urban forest for restaurants or hotels will only add to the burden of waste for the city of Bandung in general and cause the environment of Bandung to be worse off than before. When PT EGI signed the cooperation contract, we witnessed the cruelty of world capitalism that cannot be tolerated anymore. Capitalism will degrade the Babakan Siliwangi urban forest and reduce the carrying capacity of the environment in
150 Wah, ini lagu serasa membakar semangat juang di jalan. Saya tu rasanya seperti disulut emosinya saat kita nyanyiin lirik ini.
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Bandung city. Through the action that is held today, we absolutely condemn the Bandung government’s measures and their treatment of our beloved Babakan Siliwangi urban forest. Save Babakan Siliwangi today!151 Through the oration above Danang Prasetyo exposed the government and PT EGI’s actions of commercialising the urban forest to the public. An oratorical speech in a social movement is produced within the context of a particular historical trajectory to which listeners are attached. So direct action orations imbued with emotional expression serve to shape public opinion (Gavin, 2010). Through this and other speeches, Backsilmove urged the Bandung government to look back to the past when they signed a ‘political contract’, in front of youth who came from 65 countries of the world, to make the Babakan Siliwangi city forest become recognised as one of the world’s urban forests. It should be noted here that Backsilmove’s decision to include the 2011 TUNZA declaration in the speech was to expose to the public the political lies told by Dada Rosada and his administration. In October 2011, Dada Rosada, then Mayor of Bandung, and Avi Vivekananda, Vice Mayor of Bandung, had signed the TUNZA Declaration. In his speech from the podium to international youth delegates in 2011, Dada Rosada firmly pledged that all government officials under his reign would care for and preserve the Babakan Siliwangi urban forest. Yet, the city authorities were already negotiating with PT EGI to develop a commercial precinct in the forest.
A few days before that international conference concluded, 15 activists stormed the Merdeka Building where the 2011 TUNZA conference was held. Holding banners that denounced the commercialisation of the urban forest, the activists had urged the city authorities to stop the
151Hutan Kota Bandung telah tercatat dalam Konferensi Anak dan Remaja tentang lingkungan (TUNZA) 2011 telah mendeklarasikan bandung sebagai hutan kota dunia, dan paru-paru dunia yang tidak bisa dihilangkan begitu saja. Selain itu, hutan kota Babakan Siliwangi dengan luasan lahan 3.8 hektar tidak saja berfungsi ekologis tetapi juga sosial karena di area tersebut dipakai oleh komunitas anak muda dan masyarakat Sunda untuk mengembangkan dan melestarikan kebudayaannya. Jika pemerintah Bandung bersama PT EGI melanjutkan pembangunan hutan kota sebagai restoran dan hotel atau salah satunya, maka dengan kata lain pemerintah kota telah menjilat lidah sendiri dan mengingkari janji yang telah dideklarasikan dalam konferensi TUNZA 2011. Selain itu, dengan dilanjutkannya kontrak kerjasama ini maka pemerintah kota juga telah melakukan kebohongan kepada dunia yang telah menjadi saksi dalam penandatanganan deklarasi Babakan Siliwangi sebagai hutan kota. Dengan hadirnya PT EGI sebagai developer dalam pembangunan lahan hutan kota ini kita anak muda telah kehilangan banyak ruang hijau untuk berekpresi, berkumpul, berolahraga, dan mengembangkan bakat. Selain itu, pemanfaatan hutan kota sebagai restoran maupun hotel akan menambah beban sampah bagi kota Bandung pada umumnya dan menyebabkan lingkungan Bandung semakin terpuruk. Dengan hadirnya PT EGI dalam penandatanganan kontrak kerja sama ini, kita sudah melihat kekejaman kapitalisme dunia yang tidak dapat ditolerir lagi. Kapitalisme telah memperpuruk hutan kota Babakan Siliwangi dan mengurangi daya dukung lingkungannya terhadap kota Bandung. Melalui aksi yang digelar hari ini, kami mengutuk tindakan pemerintah Bandung dan perlakuan mereka terhadap hutan kota Babakan Siliwangi yang kami cintai. Selamatkan Babakan Siliwangi saat ini juga.
167 contract with PT EGI. They shouted furious slogans. The criticism directed at the city government excited the participants, organisers, and even overseas journalists. Protests flared up when environmental activists were banned from entering the room. An overreaction was shown by the TUNZA committee when they deployed a police unit to keep the protesters from breaking into a room where a negotiation with Dada Rosada was taking place. Reggi Kayong Munggaran, who had been one of the activists at the 2011 protest, proclaimed in his speech that the Bandung government should not harass and degrade the commonly-agreed principles of the TUNZA declaration. Thus, by incorporating discourse about the government’s commitment to the TUNZA declaration in Long March oration, Backsilmove deliberately put symbolic pressure on the government.
A three-metre long black banner that read ‘Backsilmove: Back to Babakan Siliwangi’ was held aloft during Long March. This action expresses a critical political identity that points to the firmness of young people’s attitudes and their clarity of purpose in defence of the urban forest. According to Wirdan as coordinator, ‘Back to Babakan Siliwangi’ implies the government should restore the function of the city forest as the social and political space used by Bandung youth to develop and set up creative communities. Backsilmove preferred their banners to be written in English. Using English, according to Canny, meant the moral message of Backsilmove in defending the city forest could be exposed to the international community or international mass media. However, perhaps more than that, the use of English speaks to the social meaning of cosmopolitanism for middle-class Indonesian youth. The use of English language can be framed as attaching the city’s middle class to a global and Western idealism (Heryanto, 2006; Heller, 2010).
The English language used by Backsilmove did seize public attention. Lentia admitted that many of the journalists from national media interviewed her after they saw the banner ‘Back to Babakan Siliwangi!’ Lentia asserted that these journalists were impressed and interested by the phrase ‘Back to …’, as if it was implying an instruction for war. In Bourdieu’s terms, the use of English by Backsilmove operated as a powerful form of ‘symbolic capital’ that connected activists to media agencies in the ‘field of struggle’. English language is a powerful form of communication because ‘English has become essential “cultural capital” for an information-driven global world’ (Gee, Allen & Clinton, 2001, p. 176). As a social symbol
168 it is closely associated with a particular social class in a society such as Indonesia. Studies conducted by Smith-Hefner (2007) concerning the use of slang by Indonesian young people in public spaces revealed that the younger generation of post-2000 Indonesians prefer to use a mix of English slang in their daily lives to talk in public. In some cases, young people use English because they desire to emphasise their social identity as individuals who are ‘modern’ and Western-styled (see Parker & Nilan, 2003), just like other young people in developed countries (Lamb & Coleman, 2008). In fact, the prevalence of English use in mundane interactions between Indonesian young people is not separable from the expansive role of social media, where English tends to dominate. In this field, Zentz (2015) claims that young people in public spaces in Indonesian cities, after the emergence of social media, prefer to use English to communicate their thoughts. By following these linguistic practices, it appears that they like to be recognised as individuals who have a ‘global cosmopolitan view’ (Tanu, 2013, p. 59). For all these reasons, the use of English in Long March banners was effective in attracting media attention.
When the Long March was nearing the Gedung Sate, the carnivalesque action of the pantomime took place. In front of two orating activists, three mime dancers who were dressed in green as living plants paraded a 1.5-metre diameter globe. Just before, at the gates of the Gedung Sate, a number of mime dancers had been welcomed while walking backwards. Every performing mime displayed contorted facial expressions. These facial expressions, according to Wanggi, symbolised individuals contesting the threat to the Babakan Siliwangi urban forest. Such street performance uses facial expressions to stage conflict between actors and between parties in the conflict in the real world (Gibbs, 2001). The backward walk was performed by three white-face mime artists dressed in camouflage, four people in plain clothes, and Wanggi Hoediyatno himself with his face disguised with white powder. Black and white striped clothes like prisoners symbolised the corrupt group who during their time in government took people’s money. This personification was a form of satire against the City Mayor Dada Rosada, who previously signed a contract with PT EGI. Some performers wore costumes that represented a group of young people who used the Babakan Siliwangi forest every day. There was also a dancer who wore a sarong with the traditional Sunda head cover and Sunda batik pants. All the sets of performers were moving slowly with their heads down as they approached the Backsilmove activist ranks walking up the road. All of them variously competed for the earth globe as a symbol of the green space that was being contested.
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Through this dramatisation, Backsilmove conveyed the message that Babakan Siliwangi forest was not only wanted by a group of investors, but also by young people of Bandung who were about to lose the space for creative expression and development. The presence of a dancer dressed in traditional Sundanese costume implied the cultural meaning of Babakan Siliwangi as a cultural and historical site for Sundanese people. The meaning conveyed by the presence of these dancers is that the city forest is still used as a cultural space for the community to show the identity of Sundanese culture. After the dancers had performed for ten minutes, the activist ranks stopped. Then the large globe was handed over to the dancers. The dancers who were in the ranks of activists joined the other dancers, and they jointly raised the globe into the air while displaying movements of worship. Later, the globe was deflated by each dancer snatching it from various sides. Shortly after the globe was deflated, the dancers flopped into various positions overlapping one another. This scene narrated a story about the daily struggle for the Babakan Siliwangi urban forest by people, youth, government, and investors. It means that when all the parties contest for the urban forest according to their respective values and there is no unity to save it, the urban forest will not mean anything and will eventually disappear. In that sense the forest was represented to be of ‘vital significance in the construction of indigenous identity’ (Buser et al., 2013, p. 608).
After all the dancers fell down, the activists who were carrying Backsilmove banners in the Long March approached the scene and laid the banners over the collapsed dancers. Media cameras incessantly recorded the young activists’ pantomime and dance. Occasionally they walked too close to the dancers to get the best picture angle. Not only that, cyclists and cars also stopped often to capture those precious moments on their camera phones. After the pantomime concluded, reporters swarmed the activists to ask for interviews. Wirdan utilised the post-action time for interviews with several journalists from Kompas, RCTI TV, Media Indonesia, Tribun Jawa Barat, and so forth. With the presence of reporters in front of the Gedung Sate to witness and perpetuate this peaceful protest, Backsilmove had successfully achieved the goal of showing the influence of their political activism. They had transformed the gate of the Gedung Sate into a resistance space for youth. The attendance of journalists signalled the success of Backsilmove in what Juris (2008) might have described as a serene yet determined resistance.
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A day after the action, news of the Backsilmove activism appeared on local television media such as RCTI.152 A week after the long march, Backsilmove successfully published an account of their struggles in KOMPAS Newspaper.153 In achieving this, Backsilmove incorporated themselves into national environmental discourse. During his interview for this study, young activist Ratu insisted that one of the targets of Backsilmove publicity in this action was through national newspapers. As organised activism, media coverage was the result expected by the activists to demonstrate to the public their worth. Routledge (2012) refers to the shift that transforms television media activism into consumption as ‘grassroots activism’ where activists aim for television, hoping to elevate their actions into a broader, even national public event.
Backsilmove not only wanted to save the city forest, but to communicate to the public and also the wider community the ability of young people to create alternative forms of political participation for the common good. Wanggi Hoediyatno affirmed the intent of participatory alternative politics: ‘With this theatrical pantomime, we can actually engage in politics by way of everyday satirical commentary on elements in the parliament who have no critical awareness of the negative impact of the loss of Babakan Siliwangi’154 (Interview, March 2015). This statement emphasises the moral construction of the parliamentary politicians as ‘other’ to the participation of young people in Indonesia. As a country built on the democratic spirit, unfortunately, Indonesia does not have a system for accommodating the involvement of young people. Wanggi’s explanation commented on this fact: ‘Young people such as us are still considered immature and it’s impossible for us to be invited to parliament to express our disappointment with the Babakan Siliwangi contract!’155 (Interview, March 2015).
152 RCTI is the abbreviation for Rajawali Citra Televisi Indonesia, one of the privately owned television corporations in Indonesia. 153 KOMPAS is one of the privately-owned newspapers in Indonesia. It is famous for its political coverage. Of the newspapers in Indonesia, KOMPAS has the highest rank for its readership and truthful news. 154 Dengan theatrikal pantomime ini, kita sebenarnya bisa berpolitik dengan cara menyindir keseharian oknum- oknum di parlemen yang tidak punya kritisisme terhadap dampak negative hilangnya Babakan Siliwangi. 155 Anak muda kayak kita itu masih dianggap enggak matang dan mana mungkin kita bisa diundang ke parlemen buat nyuarain kekecewaan terhadap kontrak Babakan Siliwangi!
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10.4 Narrative Behind the Symbolic Resistance Actively participating in the Long March, as well as witnessing the pantomime, is a core element in the kind of activism that can generate a subjectivity of resistance. For example, a tacit solidarity among activists was expressed through the repertoire that they demonstrated in the action. Routledge (2010, p. 5) refers to this as ‘sensuous solidarity’. It is a solidarity that comes from the union of movement, speeches, song, and dramatic techniques that animate their activism. It seems that ‘sensuous solidarity’ in this case arises from the ‘performative character’ of a high-risk activist who later manifests a personal transformation after the movement. In other words, being involved in this repertoire of resistance consolidates the radical habitus of the activist.
10.4.1 Getting Political Rights Back The Backsilmove activists were certainly not actors who were isolated from the nation’s history. For them, the Long March turned on the memory of when public space was still controlled by Soeharto’s authoritarian regime. The activists were highly critical of Dada Rosada for not being transparent in signing a contract with PT EGI. In the interviews they conveyed they thought this reflected the mentality of the New Order. For example, Ilham said: ‘Maybe we’ve forgotten the New Order, but the Babakan Siliwangi forest management is clearly the style of the New Order. The mayor arbitrarily signed a contract with PT EGI without the consent of the people’156. Melodi, who took part in the Long March and dealt with the media after the action of the pantomime, commented that: ‘we won without losing. You see, demonstrations in the New Order were like we were trying to terrify the authorities. But now with this pantomime action we try to influence society with surprising and spectacular actions. Smarter!’157. An important narrative put forward by these activists is about the achievement of young people as citizens.
156Mungkin kita udah melupakan orde baru, tapi pengelolaan hutan Babakan Siliwangi ini jelas dengan gaya orde baru Kang. Walikota [Dada Rosada] seenaknya tandatangan kontrak sama PT EGI tanpa persetujuan rakyat. 157Kita menang tanpa harus mengalahkan. Maksudnya tuh gini, kalau demonstrasi seperti Orde Baru kan seolah-olah kita menakuti pemerintah. Tapi sekarang dengan aksi pantomime ini berusaha mempengaruhi masyarakat dengan aksi yang mengangetkan dan spektakuler. Lebih smart!”
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10.4.2 Breaking the Image of Youth as the Politically Marginalised Group For Backsilmove activists, collectively walking in the middle of the main road in protest and organising a pantomime event represented political and social mobility. The Long March and the pantomime performance were achievements in the political struggle to regain the people’s authority over the city forest. Adel affirmed this: ‘the action cannot be compared with others. Clearly, this is a political action, but it was classier than the usual protests. Perhaps if it were the usual protest the government would have already closed their ears, but with this action even though with only 30 people it has proven that the mass media came to us’158 (Interview, January 2015). These accounts indicate that an individual’s participation in activism in public spaces can revitalise their inter-subjectivities, in this case the social collectivism of young people, as a group in Indonesia that is politically marginalised by the government. Thus, the participation of individuals in political mobilisations can revive, ‘affirmation of individual dignity and the search for intersubjective relations as an alternative to those perceived as being controlled by the government’ (Farro & Demirhisar, 2014, p. 180).
Backsilmove activists were fighting against the negation of local people’s rights. Lentia asserted: ‘people today imagine we are apathetic, and never actively protest. Youth is considered not to exist, usually by old politicians. But it’s not really like that, right now we exist here’159 (Interview, March 2015). Lentia’s statement shows not only the contradictory attitude towards the reality of politics in Indonesia, but also youth scepticism towards the success of the older generation in bridging their political aspirations to politics (Nilan, 2002). For example, Wirdan condemned the older generation who have not been able to make a change, ‘old people could criticise us for never being involved in politics, but what have they done? They can’t even take care of the urban forest; we’re trying to give them an understanding that what they said was wrong’160 (Interview, December 2014). From these narratives, we can see that political space was made through the Long March and the pantomime performance by young people, particularly since they received so much media attention.
158Aksi yang ga bisa dibandingkan dengan yang lain. Jelas ini aksi politik, tapi lebih berkelas lah dibandingkan aksi-aksi protes biasanya. Barangkali kalau protes biasa pemerintah telinganya udah ditutup, tapi dengan aksi ini walaupun cuma 30 orangan tuh buktinya media massa aja ada yang datengin kita. 159Selama ini orang ngebayangin kalau kita tu apatis, dan enggak pernah aktif protes. Anak muda dipandang enggak eksis, ya biasa lah sama politisi-politisi tua. Tapi enggak juga, sekarang kan kita eksis disini. Nunjukin kalau kita punya politik. 160Orang tua boleh lah ngritik kita karena enggak pernah turun ke politik, tapi mereka udah nglakuin apaan coba? Hutan kota aja enggak becus diatur. Kita berusaha ngasih pemahaman kalau omongan mereka itu salah.
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Astri commented that, ‘on that day we voiced our anxiety to the parliament, right in front of the Gedung Sate. The era [of reform] is already advanced, and there are many creative actions such as the Long March and the pantomime that are rich in accusations of them [parliament]’161 (Interview, April 2015). Creativity as an experimental effort was undertaken by Backsilmove activists as a form of resistance against the ‘distancing’ by the government from signing the Babakan Siliwangi contract that was not based on public approval. This tactic aligns with the contemporary political strategies identified by Silva and de Castro (2014): While distancing themselves from traditional modes of political behaviour, younger generations have shown a desire to experiment with different ways of living and doing politics that emphasize creativity as well as freedom and autonomy of action’ (p. 7). In the eyes of the Backsilmove activists, staging their actions in front of the Gedung Sate was a manifestation of their courage in recapturing aspirational spaces that were closed by the government through its discourse of hegemony. In the case of Dada Rosada, he masked his corrupt governance through Islamic discourse as if he represented pious governance. The tactics of the Backsilmove activists changed the face of the parliamentary seat Gedung Sate into a kind of spectacle previously identified as a space ‘where the activist can openly criticise the state and other authorities in society, forging a new vocabulary and new repertoire of actions in the process’ (Juliawan, 2011, p. 364).
It was pointed out that ‘the Gedung Sate isn’t just a physical building, but it is also the political seat of the state. Not everyone can be brave enough to create an action before the Gedung Sate. It takes guts and the capability to take risks’162 (Wanggi, interview, March 2015). Wanggi’s point echoes the findings of Juliawan (2011) from his study of a group of Indonesian workers who went out on the streets to voice their demands to the government for a salary raise. Juliawan found the road itself had become meaningful. It was transformed
161Hari ini kita nyuarain kegelisahan ke parlemen, persis di depan Gedung Sate. Zaman udah maju dan banyak aksi-aksi kreatif kayak long march dan pantomime yang kaya akan sindiran buat mereka [parlemen].
162Gedung Sate itu enggak cuma gedung fisik tapi disana juga tempatnya politikus negara. Bikin aksi di depan gedung sate itu enggak semua orang berani, butuh nyali dan kemampuan beresiko.
174 from a public space into a political force for workers. He maintains that, ‘by occupying government buildings and major streets, the activists are able to claim, even if only briefly, ownership of the public space’ (Juliawan, 2011, p. 363). In summary, the accounts from Backsilmove activists bring us into a new awareness of the creative agency of young people in mustering political strength to challenge the city’s infrastructure and save the forest.
10.5 Conclusion The above discussion demonstrates that the Long March and the pantomime performance were experimental and creative actions that built on activism previously conducted in training and campaigns organised by Greenpeace Indonesia. Significant social and cultural capital was displayed by Backsilmove activists as a group of young people from an educated middle- class background. This is tacitly demonstrated through their development of symbolic acts of resistance that attracted great media interest. They mobilised creative models of critical thinking in opposing the planned urban forest development. In this way they demonstrate ‘radical habitus’ (Crossley, 2003, p. 44), sustained through a long and intensive history of environmental activism, and daily interactions with fellow activists. In the Long March event the historical contextualisation of the original Siliwangi long march created a fundamental spirit for the organisation to revive the values of struggle in the past.
The carnivalesque pantomime symbolised forms of political power behaviour in a corrupt government and subjectively presented in public the risks to nature that arise as a result of that corruption. This kind of action reflects the trend of ‘stylizing revolution’ identified by Lee (2012, p. 947). That kind of action has been a hallmark of political activism for young post-reformists in Indonesia. Performance in public space has been a central point in conveying their aspirations and political resistance. As a highly developed, innovative repertoire, the Long March and the pantomime performance successfully opened up new participation spaces for young people in the ‘field of struggle’ (Crossley, 2003, p. 47). Their victory was first demonstrated by success in attracting the attention of the mass media and second, when the commercialisation contract was withdrawn.
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Through exploration of the narratives of activists who were personally involved in the Backsilmove actions, we can see the critical political thinking of young environmentalists who connect on the streets as a public space to challenge the political marginalisation they have faced over the years.
The detailed discussion in this chapter provides us with an understanding of the contemporary political practices of young people who use art as an alternative strategy to take a stand against the government on environmental matters. In the events and actions they launched, it is clear that Backsilmove adopted the ideological praxis promoted by Greenpeace and made it a base to build an organisation to mobilise young people to save the city forest.
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CHAPTER 11. SYNTHESIS OF FINDINGS
11.1 Introduction This chapter synthesises the analysis of the thesis findings so far. It extrapolates on concepts such as habitus and field to understand the process through which young people acclimatised to being in the public space as environmental activists in the Babakan Siliwangi movement. The findings revealed key trends in the life trajectory of young activists from childhood to adulthood. The preceding chapters mapped out some key concepts relating to the emergence of the activists’ identity. This chapter divides the stages of their activist identity formation in three stages: Emergence, Encouragement, and Consolidation.
Emergence refers to the early stage of identity-related activism where they started to establish an ecological habitus. Analysis of interview data depicted early interaction with nature in the realm of school and family. They came to hold a strong support system for ecological conservation. This ‘ecological predisposition’ was evidently nurtured by family and school influences. It was primarily achieved through active participation in nature, reading relevant textbooks as well as fiction and non-fiction literature, and further efforts to better understand natural phenomena. In Bourdieusian terms, an ecological predisposition was built up by the doxa of environmentalism. They gained the cultural capital to talk about environmental issues. Through local activities, they gained a strong sense of place, which was included in the early phase of developing an ecological habitus.
The Encouragement stage saw them connecting with significant others who were involved in the environmental movement, as well as groups and organisations. This encouragement helped them synthesise a radical habitus for environmental activism.
The Consolidation stage was marked by the creation of Backsilmove as a new movement and an organisation with a very specific local goal. At this stage, their ecological habitus witnessed its strongest expression so far. It was consolidated by group action and success.
Before moving on, it should be noted that the findings in this thesis generate a novel understanding of how ecological habitus develops in the life journey of a young person. It will be useful to summarise briefly the concept of ecological habitus. Based on Bourdieu’s
177 concept of habitus, Kasper observed ecological habitus to be the embodiment of a durable yet changeable system of ‘ecologically relevant dispositions, practices, perceptions, and material conditions’ – perceptible as a lifestyle, shaped by and helping shape, socio-ecological contexts (Kasper, 2009, p. 319). Furthermore, Haluza-Delay (2008) claims that ecological habitus is embedding sustainability as lived quotidian practices that operate at the individual and collective levels. This is manifest in everyday discourse and practice underlying the importance of the human-nature nexus. In order for green activism to develop, the individual must radically shift from thoughtful awareness and decision making to internalised habitus. In other words, ecological habitus becomes ingrained as a ‘mental disposition’ (Swartz, 2002, p. 65). In short, ecological habitus is located underneath the level of human consciousness. It works to build a ‘practical sense’ (Bourdieu, 1993, p. 5) in relevant fields. The formation of ecological habitus as elaborated in this synthesis chapter, prompts ‘agents to cope with unforeseen and ever changing situations’ (Bourdieu 1998, p. 72) of environmental crisis.
The exercise of concentrated forms of cultural and social capital is necessary to render socially acquired and embodied systems of durable generative disposition operational in the field of environmental activism. This happens primarily in groups of like-minded young people. The study findings suggest that ecological habitus is not only developed together with, but contested and fought for through, habituation of ecological awareness or environmental activism. As a resistance movement, environmental activism takes a concerted acquired doxa used by activists into practice. Thus, the concept of ecological habitus here lies beyond ecological values and cognition. Gäbler (2015, p. 78) confirms that ecological habitus builds ‘a feel for the game’ in the environmental movement. ‘Feel for the game’ is interpreted as an engagement to attain idealised integrity in reaching for goals. The illusio of activists emphasises that the relation between human beings and nature should be preserved and maintained in a rigorous manner. Haluza-DeLay (2008, p. 213) specifies ecological habitus as the practical logic for meaningful living in a certain place - ‘a modus vivendi, a sens pratique’. At this level, the disposition of ecological habitus generates particular social practices to ‘fit the field’ of local circumstances (Gäbler, 2015, p. 81), including the ability to play out strategies in local politics. In other words, pro-environmental groups with specific goals carry out practices of struggle by adjusting their environmental campaigns to the cultural, social and geographic conditions of local issues.
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11.2 Emergence Using Bourdieu’s framework, environmentalism is understood as a field of struggle in which individuals position themselves according to accumulation of capital and the logic of habitus. The findings suggest that the environmental activism of Backsilmove youth emerged from childhood influences that shaped an ecological habitus. Here, the early development of an ecological habitus is seen as constituted through available cultural capital in the middle-class habitus of young activists. This emerging ecological habitus was then enacted, maintained, shaped and rejuvenated in schooling as well as in the everyday life of family and leisure activities. This section of discussion acknowledges that unconscious internalisation of ideals during childhood and later schooling exposes individuals to the discursive opportunities and constraints available to them (Swartz, 2002, p. 64).
11.2.1 Childhood The profile of young activists demonstrates that many grew up in families where their fathers worked in relevant sectors. They possessed a stock of books at home and undertook tertiary education. They also had sufficient access to online technology. In short, these young activists grew up in a ‘middle-class habitus’ (Reay, 2007, p. 191). Later, they developed resources through the utilisation of cultural capital. This indicates that middle-class habitus is a fertile ground to get transmuted into ecological habitus. Smith (2001) argues that ecological habitus is formed as part of the process of human-environment relationality - ‘in the biography of social agents and in everyday practices generated within social fields’ (p. 198). However, not all middle-class habitus can be instantly converted into ecological habitus (Smith, 2001). The conversion process or exchange cannot occur on a transactional basis, but depends on the degree of meaning-making attached to ecological or pro-environment practices developed at home or school.
Referring to previous chapters that focus on the life trajectory, it appears as if the family holds a strong role as a learning arena. The family is a strategic domain for the formation of habitus. As elaborated by Crossley (2001, p. 88), ‘habitus is important in this respect because such agreements are precisely rooted in habit’. To elaborate, a family is the space where these young people find a ‘sense of place’ (Bourdieu, 2002, p. 33), which can be further explained as a ‘practical logic of how to live well in this place’ (Bourdieu, 2002, p. 34). It is possible that the sense of place is nurtured simultaneously with pre-socialisation activities, thus
179 resulting in environmental conservation in the family. For example, one activist explained that spending time with her grandmother instilled in her a greater level of pro-environmental behaviour and subconsciously made her accustomed to managing domestic waste effectively. Moreover, emotional bonds to the environment were sustained within the family setting when parents took their children to undertake outdoor activities. Moreover, egalitarian interaction amongst the family members also facilitated the formation of a sense of place that led to emotional proximity to nature and the shaping of ethical behaviour.
In several cases, these young activists had been intensely involved in gardening activities or pet care as children. Emotional attachment to the environment, therefore, has implications for the growth of ethical consumption. For example, one activist pointed out that now while shopping for chickens, she thoroughly examines the slaughtering process and the location where they are raised or purchased. Furthermore, outdoor activities as children helped inculcate a strong sense of place amongst these young activists. One had been born in a coastal area, spending a childhood on the beach and the hinterland. He claimed that his later concerns over this environmental crisis were influenced by the memories of his childhood. It is apparent that early childhood context contributes in an everyday manner to understandings of environment.
Another strong influence on emerging ecological habitus was early concern for animals. A number of young activists revealed that their concern for the extinction of wild animals was spurred by childhood memories of zoo visits. The zoo is where they learnt about animal life. The young activists were children in the period between 1995 to 1999 when there were not too many shopping centres in Bandung. At that time, the Bandung zoo and the urban forest were playing and learning grounds for primary school-aged children. Primary school age is a formative period where the ethical behaviour and a sense of humanity begin to manifest in a child. Another activist reported that a humanitarian sense was evoked quite early on in his life when he saw a film about the killing of an orangutan by a local community. Spatial cognition emerged from a sense of place, such as in the narratives of a young activist who regularly frequented the mangrove forest. That kind of experience was recalled later when he became aware of forest fires and illegal logging.
The study so far reveals that for the young activists, cases of environmental degradation they encountered later revived their childhood memories about places. This supports the claim that
180 people often participate in activism ‘due to disruption, a life event or a series of circumstances that collide and motivate them to act upon an issue of concern’ (Ollis & Hamel-Green, 2015, p. 205).
Scouting activities at school were recognised as an early learning space about the natural environment. According to Sandlin, Schultz, and Burdic (2010, p. 2), scouting is a ‘public pedagogies’ institution where information about nature can be learned in settings outside of school. The activists’ early ‘sense of place’ was highlighted when the scouting session taught them about survival skills that they later used in the state of an emergency by utilising available resources. One activist said that camping in the wild helped develop a sense of openness to nature, thereby inculcating the awareness that mother earth should be preserved for sustaining life. In addition, participating in an outdoor camp influenced a simplified, non- consumerist attitude. For some, outdoor camping activities created a leadership disposition in them, taking them away from the urban environment.
11.2.2 The Local Context When they were young, many who later became Backsilmove activists were immersed in moments of crisis when confronted with a negative experience about environmental issues in their neighbourhood. In other words, their subjective experience exposed them to the facts of environmental inequalities occurring in an urban setting. In Bourdieu’s (1977, p. 80) terms, they experienced ‘social dissonance’. There was a disjuncture between ‘expectations of subjective and objective outcomes’. The local issue ‘stimulates the possibility of critique and protest’ (Crossley, 2003, p. 47). For example, one activist grew up in a house near an oil palm plantation, and was able to make direct sense of the danger that oil palm plantations pose to indigenous wildlife. The company was rich, but there was local poverty surrounding that oil company. For the young man in question, environmental activism implied that he could express his past grievances. Later, Backsilmove provided a space for expressing his accumulated emotions. His early life experiences gave him a bond to the moment of crisis perpetuated by industrialisation that spoils nature and threatens local wildlife.
Other activists similarly associated themselves with earlier moments of local crisis. For example, direct experience of being part of a community of victims of mall development later generated resistance towards land privatisation policy in Bandung. For example, some
181 reacted strongly when they spotted severe damage to the street because of the opening of a new access road for motorbikes leading into the public forest. A similar moment of crisis was experienced by another sensitised activist with a hobby of mountain hiking. Returning home after five years made him realise how economic liberalisation has destroyed the natural landscape of Bandung. He made use of a chance to voice his disgruntlement through environmental activism. Subsequent to the Backsilmove activism, activists reminisced about their past experiences that ignited their passion for protest. The connection between the two different temporal experiences imply that development of pro-environmental ‘illusio’ is powerful. It attributes ‘importance to the social game, the fact that what happens matters to those who are engaged’ (Bourdieu, 1998, p. 76).
Some activists had read literature about the past of the natural environmental condition of Bandung. This reading assisted their knowledge of how local conditions used to be, when hotels and shopping centres were not so common. Local knowledge also helped when they read books about the history of protest against the Bandung municipal government. Here, they found out about the creation of green spaces by the Dutch government in the past. This later boosted their activism to regain early urban planning. They could imagine the Bandung public landscape during colonial times. This argument is in line with Bourdieu’s claim about the effect of doxa as an apparently ‘natural attitude’ which is actually ‘a politically produced relation’ (Bourdieu, 1998, p. 57).
11.2.3 Political Pre-Socialisation The data analysed earlier in this thesis indicates that political pre-socialisation is an important element in shaping the environmental activism of young people. Parents played a vital role in their political pre-socialisation, especially when their children came along to meetings to discuss organisational issues associated with injustice and social welfare. The meeting ambience was filled with debate that left them with memories about being assertive yet well- mannered. In short, political pre-socialisation influenced their predisposition as an activist. This finding is congruent with a report from Kennelly’s (2009) study, which used the habitus concept to explore youth protest in Canada. Young activists tended to come from ‘left- leaning families’ (Kennelly, 2009, p. 301; see also Arnold, Cohen & Warner, 2009). Thus, for some young activists in Backsilmove, parenting needs to be understood as a critical
182 element in the formative stage of developing their political identity as an environmental activist.
Political pre-socialisation also came from other sources. Doxic belief in social movement as a driving force to challenge injustice was found in radical texts of various kinds. As we saw, one young activist was influenced towards civil resistance by reading a book about the legendary activist Soe Hok Gie and his political struggle against the state. Another young activist’s self-transformation was influenced by Sarongge, a novel about the life of a ‘rainbow’ knight who changed the fate of the poor and oppressed in his village. The writing of Ayu Utami, a notable feminist activist, also gave a transformational message to female activists about alternative paths to challenge political oppression by the state. In short, it seems that those who read books about challenging injustice in everyday life later on demonstrated strong idealism to enter the environmental movement. For example, another book about an Indonesian youth travelling across the continents built doxic belief about the ideal character of an activist. Although all those books were substantially different from each other, they taught a shared common doxa on building the power of activism in the community through the critical examination of unequal power relations within the setting of Indonesia. It seems that literature on activism has a contributing effect of ‘consciousness raising’ (Crossley, 2003) for young activists. They were able to develop their politically oriented habitus through reading about the everyday lives of progressive activists.
In interviews, the young activists in this study emphasised that they needed bravery to communicate the political importance of struggle against injustice to cross-generational local communities. To develop such an identity, they had established doxa about how activists fitted into achieving environmental justice through political challenges. By reading relevant books, the young activists gained an ideal figure of the activist as a doxa in themselves. The young activists developed an early conviction that activism should ideally begin from inner commitment. Externally, they should be able to demonstrate sociable attitudes, readiness in overcoming cultural differences, great ability in clearly communicating ideas and action based on careful planning. Besides literature, songs and movies also functioned as political pre-socialisation doxa for the young activists who subsequently created Backsilmove.
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11.2.4 Science Learning Doxa refers to ‘long-held beliefs, thoughts, ideas and practices that seem to be orthodox, correct and natural’ (Bourdieu, 1998, p. 56). The doxa of science is important as a resource for young people to develop a sense of environmental awareness. The findings of this study suggest that many core beliefs of young activists about natural phenomena were learnt in science classes at school, despite the curriculum limitations (Parker, 2016). Firstly, the science lesson in this context serves as a form of doxa implanted in the learners’ memory so that they can demonstrate appropriate examination performance that matches the curriculum. Science is a subject in Indonesian schools that mainly teaches about the causality of general phenomena in the universe, for example, by studying the logical sequence of volcanic eruptions through chemical reactions. Yet, some valuable early understandings were imparted. One informant said they came to understand the process of plant growth by growing sprouts in the school laboratory. Another experiment pertained to the making of a two-way communication device with cans and rope, which allowed them to learn the propagation of sound waves. Through this kind of science experiment, the young activists gained credible knowledge about the phenomena of their surrounding environment, which is integral to the everyday life of human beings.
Secondly, knowledge about wildlife conservation fostered their commitment towards animal conservation and protection. Once again, this was a science-based doxa accessed through textbooks and storybooks. Through certain books, they were exposed to the idea of treating animals humanely. The activists talked about reading textbooks on nature and watching videos that taught them about animal reproduction, getting food from nature, habitats adapted for their survival, and even the extinction of rare animals due to anthropogenic activities. This knowledge created a doxic belief that made them understand the environmental crisis better, as early as when they were still at school. In short, the doxa about the science of natural phenomena shaped their way of thinking about how nature should ideally be preserved, and reinforced the idea that humans are not entitled to interfere with nature. A sense of responsibility for nature gradually developed in them along with the increase of their access to the discourse on environmental damage. By embodying such idealism about conserving nature and taking it as a discrepancy that does not clearly fit current environmental circumstance, young activists have generated reflexive initiatives to reclaim that desired outcome. Such thoughtful idealism becomes the future driver for environmental activism. It echoes Crossley’s assertion that ‘a dissonance emerges between subjective expectations and
184 objective outcomes which, in turn, stimulates the possibility of critique and protest’ (2003, p. 47)
Early knowledge about science contributed towards the research capacity of activists. Bourdieu proposes the idea of ‘scholarly doxa’ (Bourdieu & Wacquant 1992, p. 88), implying that doxas of knowledge can change the discourse in social movements. In the field of activism, disseminating objective scientific proofs against socio-political claims was a central strategy for Backsilmove. This required relevant skills and specific experience. The Backsilmove activists had accumulated the relevant cultural capital for these tasks earlier in their lives, by learning in particular ways about science/social science at school and university, and through political pre-socialisation of various kinds as detailed above. They were able to use that cultural capital as a component of an ecological habitus to make environmental injustice observable to the public. Through utilisation of ‘scholarly doxa’ built up earlier in their lives, Backsilmove activists were able to effectively educate the public about the importance of conserving the urban forest, to make urban life in Bandung sustainable.
With regard to the emergence of ecological habitus, the findings of this study demonstrate the significance of early socialisation in the family and school. It produces the primary habitus. Those arenas provided abundant capital; knowledge, literature, habituated attitudes, literary readings, and access to technology. Those capitals then enabled the individuals to move into higher-level fields of struggle.
11.3 Encouragement This section explores the process of making social connections that encouraged ecological habitus formation and predisposition. It seems clear that their relevant cultural capital and familiarity with authoritative doxa allowed the young activists to position themselves in environmentalism as a field of struggle using their social capital. The encouragement stage illustrates the formative experiences of young activists through their engagement in Greenpeace activism, which generated a more radical habitus as a predisposition for new models of activism. In becoming an environmental activist, Greenpeace offered a broader structure of personal development for them. The organisation played the role of a
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‘pedagogical agent’ (Bourdieu & Passeron 1990, p. 15) to encourage their radical cosmology and repertoires of resistance.
11.3.1 Gravitating to Greenpeace As they grew older, they embraced a certain set of environmental values that were encouraged by the organisations they were involved with. This is logical because by choosing a certain organisation, they were able to maintain, develop, or change the cultural capital that had become the core component of formation in their ecological habitus. Besides that, an organisational affiliation made their cultural capital more productive and instrumental. Some previous studies confirm that individuals who grew up developing an ecological habitus have a greater tendency to select environmental organisations that allow space for their expression (Almanzar, Sullivan-Caitlin & Deane, 1998; Smith, 2001). This is consistent with the findings of this doctoral study in that the young activists had a strong predisposition to participate in an environmental organisation such as Greenpeace which allowed a measure of independent action.
As indicated earlier in the thesis, the young activists joined Greenpeace as teenagers through various paths. Their early development of ecological habitus was formed through a constructive dynamic between their cultural capital from middle-class origins and their interrelated doxic beliefs developed in the family, at school, and from popular culture sources. A strong sense of location enhanced their ecological habitus (Gäbler 2015) and strengthened the social capital bonds of these young activists as well as their bonds with the natural environment. Crossley asserts that (ecological) habitus ‘leads the activist to continue in activism and thus to contribute to the perpetuation of activism as social practice’ (2003, p. 51). Before joining Greenpeace, these young people had certain specific social predispositions regarding the kind of organisation with which they wanted to be associated. They wanted social activity, rich environmental themes and the flexibility of identity as teenagers expressing themselves. Greenpeace was diverse enough as an organisation to interest them. Notably, they were invited to be associated with Greenpeace through close social networks. In other words, they were encouraged to join Greenpeace by friends who were active in Greenpeace campaigns. By interacting with a highly encouraging social network, they freely accessed the experiences of activism. They also fitted themselves into the pre-existing ecological habitus of Greenpeace supporters.
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11.3.2 The Formation of Radical Activist Disposition In Greenpeace these budding activists got the chance to freely explore ideal activist identity among their peers through inclusive social networks; strong social capital resources. The informants often mentioned personal engagement with activists who were already actively involved with Greenpeace campaigns. They formed close friendships and allowed older activists to transfer knowledge and values through daily encounters. With regard to the persuasion for recruitment, they were drawn to the branding of Greenpeace, not so much as a radical environmental organisation with protest as their core struggle, but rather as a group that accommodates the needs of young people for expressing social identity and networking through the non-campaign or non-protest activities. This finding is consistent with previous studies about the pathways taken to enter new activist environmental organisations or radical environmental movements. For example, the study conducted by Ollis and Hamel-Green (2015, p. 215) proposed that prospective activists are commonly pulled into ‘high risk/cost activism’ through a social networking circle with established environmental activists who had joined in previous fields of protest.
Judging by common practices in the environmental movement, Greenpeace makes use of human capital commonly found in the ‘conscious middle class’ (Crossley 2006, p. 7). In other words, the organisation reaches out to those who have the expertise and specific skills to potentially promote activism. For example, those with information technology expertise can aid in advancing the activism by communicating with the public through social media. Other well-educated activists with a science background can appropriate science to study environmental problems such as waste pollution, deforestation, sea and river contamination, and the impact of climate change. The findings of this thesis project confirm the same. For activist recruitment, Greenpeace tended to approach potential members with rich academic capital, as that could become an instrumental resource for their campaign. Despite the fact that new activists are not recruited through a formal selection process, identified candidates often already had the necessary cultural capital for Greenpeace activism such as blog skills and specific expertise in field research, graphic design or web development. Importantly, they had also dedicated time for campaigning or joining in organised protests. Above all though, they had developed an ecological habitus that could be further encouraged, and this is what was nurtured through their involvement in Greenpeace.
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As previously indicated, Greenpeace conducts induction training that acts as a ‘cognitive opening’ (Wiktorowicz, 2006, p. 23) for the potential activists to recognise a factual, scientific visualisation of the negative effects of environmental damage in Indonesia. For example, when the young activists were shown the dramatic footage of the killing of orangutan in Borneo during induction training, they developed a stronger motivation to fight the concerned corporation. Such cognitive openings were functional in shaping the young activists’ disposition to embody a radical ecological habitus. Non-Violent Direct Action (NVDA) training was provided to young activists to help equip them with strategic attitudes when performing campaigns or contentious protests. In terms of encouraging their ecological habitus, NVDA gave a space for enhancing the radical disposition of activists that prepared them to fight on the battlefield of Greenpeace actions. This finding echoes Bourdieu’s (1977) assertion that habitus is manifested in ways of behaving, speaking, dressing, and interacting with others in the field. The actual Greenpeace protests further validated the cognitive praxis of their ecological habitus. Involvement in the carefully planned protests marked a new phase of transformation, bringing together environmental and political concerns. At such events, the activists embodied ‘incarnate intelligence’ (Sanders, 2005, p. 438). Incarnate intelligence is the practice of thought that inheres in an individual who is accustomed to, and comfortable with, the ideal worlds they advocate. In other words, in Greenpeace protests, the young activists moved beyond self-conscious decision-making about being an environmentalist into the praxis of an ecological habitus (Lewis, 2015).
The informant who had long used his art as a tool to display resistance and carve his identity as a radical environmental activist, shared an example. After joining Greenpeace, he gained a strong ‘feel for the game’ during the NVDA boot camp. He developed the doxic belief that a protest staged in a high profile public space, such as the gates of Gedung Sate, could be instrumental in broadcasting a political message and mobilising like-minded activists. He believed that this kind of protest could invite the public to be more critical of the government’s failure to protect the environment. This particular formation of ecological habitus points to Bourdieu’s argument that a ‘mysterious efficacy’ derives from ‘performatives’ (Bourdieu, 2000, p. 169), signifying the (symbolically violent) force of a specific habitus - of resistance in this case. The informant’s account of how he developed this disposition echoes the identification of ‘politicized reflexivity’ (Crossley, 2001a, 2001b), which comes out of someone being habituated to dealing with injustices. In summary, the
188 informants’ involvement in the Greenpeace NVDA boot camp, their induction training, and early involvement in staging contentious Greenpeace protests, encouraged them to become active agents with a radical ecological habitus. This meant that they were readily able to jump into a broader field of struggle. NVDA is a mechanism aiming at building the commitment of young activists in order for them to become resourceful and well prepared human resource that can be used for mobilisation for a risky environmental campaign when needed.
Commitment is not just a mere outcome but also the moral mechanism to rope in engaged individuals to social movements (Becker, 1960). NVDA was part of this mechanism. As previously described, following the NVDA boot camp, the young activists gained a feeling of being politically empowered, having a driving force, and having the persistence to defend the environment. This finding reinforces our understanding of committed activism, that a sense of protest politics can be nurtured through pre-movement socialisation in relevant inductive training (Cress, McPherson & Rotolo, 1997).
It seems that their radical ecological habitus was built on elements of a doxa of political environmental activism and cultural capital accumulation, encouraged by social networks and joining an environmental organisation such as Greenpeace. Such preparation represents a potentially major force for creating a new movement. This radical environmental habitus was embedded in Backsilmove activists through their earlier involvement as outlined above. This evolution of consciousness and strategy is congruent with Crossley’s ideas (2005, p. 22) about how environmental movements evolve: ‘the movement habitus constantly evolves as the contexts of activism demand innovation, improvisation and intelligent adaptation’. Any new movement is an innovative action performed by embodied agents to reconstruct the existing structure and establish a new assemblage of protest through a new repertoire of actions. Creating Backsilmove as an independent environmental action group consolidated the evolution of their radical ecological habitus.
The formation of radical habitus as presented in this section on encouragement is evidently complex and multilayered. The socialisation space of the environmental movement organisation acted as fertile ground for the encouragement and further development of an ecological habitus. This fertile ground in turn attracted other young activists with interests and social tastes in common. Greenpeace facilitated the collective structuration of ecological
189 habitus. It stands as a resourceful institution that encourages radical action. It helped shape a radical disposition for young activists to set out and create a new environmental movement.
11.4 Consolidation The previous section argued that the ecological habitus, which was already present for the young activists, was later developed to include an expanded radical disposition. This generative disposition was applied to subsequent activism in Greenpeace’s environmental campaigns. Their active participation in Greenpeace activism in turn constructed the conditions for subsequent success of the Backsilmove campaign. As a newly emergent local movement, Backsilmove can be identified as a new field of struggle that the young activists established in Bandung. To create it, they used the particular worldviews and perceptions about the environmental phenomena they had already developed, ‘by way of habits inherited from social locations in which they have been socialized’ (Crossley, 2002, p. 175).
It can be argued that the creation and success of Backsilmove consolidated the ‘common logic’ (Kinsella, 2015) of their radical disposition of an ecological habitus. They used their collective experience to create a new and specific environmental movement. They did this by exercising their cultural capital and by transforming their political aspirations into creative public space resistance. What they fought for in the new movement organisation was congruent with their earlier cultural trajectory as committed activists. Saunders’ (2012, p. 264) findings on committed activists reveal that committed protesters tend to have a structurally long engagement with activism, and this can fuel their motivation and assist them to generate another radical movement.
11.4.1 Gaining Movement Capital In general terms, Backsilmove’s campaign seemed to be modelled on Greenpeace environmental campaigns, including the use of scientific publications to influence public opinion. In relation to the emergence of Backsilmove, Greenpeace might be understood as a ‘pedagogical agent’ (Bourdieu & Passeron, 1990, p. 4) that affected the worldview of the activists who created the local movement. For example, in conducting and publishing Backsilmove’s own research on the local urban forest, the young activists showed that they had gained research experience through their previous involvement in national biodiversity
190 studies by Greenpeace. This earlier experience provided them with valuable academic capital as well as scientific skills and research methods.
The ‘objectified cultural capital’ (Bourdieu, 1983, p. 243) of a scholarly education was most important. For example, activists with a background in communication studies were able to succeed in spreading the protest message to the public through publishing in a national newspaper and bringing journalists to cover their action. Additionally, those with a background in information technology and design contributed greatly in developing attractive websites and designing leaflets and posters, which appealed to the public at large. Activists with a journalism major worked as photographers in the protest campaign and managed Backsilmove’s website. An activist with a psychology qualification devoted her expertise to leading a survey-based study on public response to Babakan Siliwangi urban forest and the importance of this urban forest to local resilience. The research was effective for Backsilmove because it provided enough evidence to justify the importance of peaceful protests. The local community understood the benefits of these protests. Overall, in the Backsilmove campaign, it was obvious that the protest repertoire selection was based on the style of resistance favoured by Greenpeace.
11.4.2 The Appropriation of Cultural Capital for Backsilmove As a new movement, Backsilmove was formed by mobilising the cultural capital and network connections of young activists who had been involved in the Greenpeace environmental movement, including Greenpeace Youth Bandung and Greenpeace Youth Jakarta. Despite the fact that these two organisations were located in different geographical places, they had worked together under the deployment of Greenpeace Indonesia. In fact, the activists who came from outside Bandung were successfully recruited at short notice and thus were able to participate in the Long March. In short, Backsilmove appropriated the cultural strength of the Greenpeace movement in Indonesia. The activists themselves consolidated their radical ecological habitus while creating Backsilmove on the foundation of Greenpeace Indonesia. Putting it in the analogy of fire, the radical ecological habitus was the burning energy that allowed this new flame to come alive. That energy was obtained through a wide social circle in the form of a subterranean network of young environmental activists. This finding echoes Crossley’s claim (2005, p. 22) that the environmental movement in general ‘involves both the spatial diffusion of the disposition/schemas generative of the movement into ever wider
191 social circles and their reproduction across time’. In this case, the new movement Backsilmove emerged as the sedimentation of a former movement. Its creation was reinforced by the dispositions developed through the young activists’ previous involvement in Greenpeace. The former radical ecological habitus of activists became a consolidated radical disposition in the new local environmental movement.
11.4.3 Space of Resistance for Regaining Youth Power Notably, the activist doxa that was deployed in Backsilmove can be attributed in part to the young activists’ disgruntlement with Greenpeace, which denied them the freedom to develop a new environmental movement on the basis of the local issue of threat to Babakan Siliwangi. This budding sense of grievance was aggravated when young activists attended the Bandung Forum meeting held by senior activists who did not want them to assume leading roles in the campaign to save the forest. The young activists felt that they were being treated as mere passive followers in that forum. The young activists’ disappointment in turn led to their decision to make a brand new organisation to save the forest. This was an emotional boost for them. The creation of Backsilmove allowed these young activists to consolidate their activist expertise by employing the protest methods of the Long March and theatrical pantomime that they knew could result in a breakthrough to affect public opinion.
In practice, Backsilmove consolidated a range of techniques to widen their influence. All of those persuasive strategies enabled them to shape public opinion. One particular achievement was portraying the organisation as a middle-class-based movement by exercising their cultural capital. For example, the non-violent theatrical action demonstrated the well- developed creative ability of young activists to translate symbolic politics into an art form that could ignite public emotions. By the same measure, they succeeded in attracting the attention of online mass media, newspapers and television shows. In short, as middle-class youth they were a powerful asset in this particular environmental movement. Concisely, they were able to turn Backsilmove into an instrument of ‘symbolic power’ in the local community.
The consolidated commitment of these activists as demonstrated in the Long March is a manifestation of the radical disposition vividly ingrained in their ecological habitus. Their previous intensive experiences in Greenpeace equipped them with specific doxa to anticipate
192 risks when conducting protests in public spaces. The risks were visible to the young activists. Yet, they were preventable by rigorous anticipation, learnt before the protest through NVDA boot camp and previous campaigns. Hence, the participation in such skills-enhancement activities formed the strength of doxa for the young activists in Backsilmove protest. They had reached the stage of a highly developed ecological habitus, which favoured careful radical action.
Moreover, Backsilmove activism also reflects a middle-class orientation in the choice of physical spaces where they designed and organised the campaign, such as trendy cafés that represent the lifestyle of middle-class social groups. Furthermore, their everyday lifestyle and appearances in public spaces consolidated their orientation to middle class tastes. For example, they used water bottles with Greenpeace stickers on them. They wore clothes with international brands. Their way of speaking was a correct rhetorical style of speech. They manifested a public identity based on the ‘existence of ethical aesthetics’ (Maffesoli, 1996, p. x). These were tribal-like solidarity symbols that facilitated more intense daily interactions. Ecological habitus implies a quotidian practice of taking nature into account. The chapter on this reveals that these particular lifestyle practices had a rationale in terms of looking after the natural world – whether through careful consumption (fair trade coffee) or as accessories for a practice of being in nature (carabineers, water bottles, etc) or through a promotion of environmental values (Greenpeace stickers).
To maintain collegial solidarity amongst the activists, a congenial exclusive meeting was organised every week. These jumpa militan (militant meetings) were aimed at cultivating their radical disposition of ecological habitus. They not only debated Backsilmove issues, but also discussed particular cases related to social injustice and humanitarian problems that had recently occurred in Indonesia. At each meeting they were updated with the latest news about environmental cases in Indonesia, and the role played by fellow activists in these protests. In other words, the jumpa militan consolidated their mature ecological habitus at the national level.
The Long March was a mediating space for these young activists to voice their demands to the government. By using this historically meaningful mode of protest, they were reclaiming the political rights of young people in Indonesia for voicing their political aspirations in the public sphere. In such ways they were breaking the image of youth as a politically
193 marginalised group. Their protests were far from disorganised outbursts of dissatisfaction, but the domain of the politically active, well-educated middle class (Hooghe, 2005). In this context, their protests functioned as a form of counterculture activism that challenged views of contemporary Indonesian youth as apolitical. As courageous, well-educated young activists, they opened up a new chapter of activism in Bandung. Compared with previous anarchic protests which often turned violent, as members of the educated middle class they used non-anarchist symbolic actions to demonstrate their cultural capital, such as public discourse, political education, art performances, the Long March and non-conventional media such as social networking. In the frame of cultural citizenship, the young activists of Backsilmove demonstrated their well-developed ecological habitus for engaging the public to save the forest.
11.5 Conclusion The findings of this doctoral study strongly indicate that the development of an ecological habitus underlies the ‘formative process’ of young people who later become environmental activists. The socialising effects of their individual environmental experiences at a young age had significant impact on their thinking later in life, when they were drawn to high-risk activism. The success of Backsilmove protests demonstrates that their earlier developed ecological habitus was transforming into a supporting core for radical environmentalism. It was a field of struggle for these Indonesian middle-class youth. It is possible that the Backsilmove environmental movement marks a newly emerging model of Indonesian youth political engagement, one which employs multiple forms of capital to succeed. The Backsilmove activists clearly used their middle-class habitus as an asset for accelerating a sophisticated campaign of protest. The assets of their ecological habitus included educational and intellectual capital, which intersected with creative capital such as social media capability. The effectiveness of social media was appropriated to reach out to those who were beyond the local geographic region and enabled the movement to attract a wider mass of support. The conceptual framework provided by Bourdieu allows us to understand how the acquired and inculcated dispositions of their ecological habitus were structured in family, school, and movement involvements. This synthesis chapter demonstrates the usefulness of the concept of ecological habitus. Yet, it also breaks new ground in identifying the three phases of emergence, encouragement and consolidation.
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CHAPTER 12. CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATION
12.1. Conclusive Findings This doctoral thesis has investigated Indonesian young people who were attracted into high risk environmental activism. It is appropriate to review the key findings against each research question in turn.
1. What was the process by which an environmental activist habitus was formed in their early life experiences in the family and in the school, and in relation to the development of cultural capital?
Their ‘primary habitus’ was instrumental in the process of providing them with an applicable cultural capital to navigate into and create pathways to pro-environment practices. The activists’ childhood experiences throughout their schooling and their family lives played out as a space for them to learn about plants, animals, and other ecological components. In addition, the process of political exposure at a young age was found to be important in shaping their path to environmentalism when they attained adulthood. When they were young, their families and schools shaped their sense of place in regard to the natural world. In some cases, they had witnessed first-hand environmental damage, deforestation, and economic inequality. Influential childhood experiences helped form their sense of injustice and the need for political challenge.
2. How did the young people develop pro-environmental values in their early social milieux and later organisational memberships that fostered a sense of affinity to the environment and a desire to actively defend it in the field?
Findings here pertain to the development of secondary habitus. In terms of education, the activists narrated a sense of affinity towards their living place, the lived experience that unites them with nature and politics. At this stage in their lives, their expansive socialisation allowed them to network with social activists and also to read left-wing literature. They became oriented towards critical thinking about environmental justice, humanity, adventure, and the landscape of Bandung in the past. Their acquisition of cultural capital saw them
195 becoming an environmental ‘at risk’-activist, with a concerted set of skills and a distinctive disposition which was attractive to Greenpeace.
3. What was the nature of the social learning that many of them experienced during earlier training and activities with Greenpeace Indonesia, which served as a pedagogic agent and gave them a feel for the game of public activism?
The learning that took place in Greenpeace training and campaigns reflects the intersectionality of middle class habitus, ecological habitus, and cultural capital. They gained the resilience and capacity to fight in a multilayered field of protest. Their participation in Greenpeace activism sharpened an early ecological habitus into a more radical habitus. Backsilmove was formed as the result of that learning. It consolidated their activism in the field of struggle in Bandung. They set out to change people’s minds; ‘by changing minds they expect to put pressure on the institutions of governance and, ultimately, bring democracy and alternative social values to these institutions’ (Castells, 2004, p. 157). In a wider sense, the creation and success of Backsilmove may indicate a reinvention of radical youth culture in Indonesia. It showed they can build a creative community to demonstrate their social identity and conserve important green space.
Backsilmove was built upon the creativity of the youth, consolidated over their cultural capital, social networking, education, criticism, and public space. In contrast to environmental movements in the New Order that took hardcore resistance against the government’s mainstream policy, the environmental movement in the Post-New Order would appear to be more inclusive and egalitarian. Because the environment is a global issue and has now seized public attention, young people take advantage of these opportunities as a space of expression and to gain appreciation. They choose alternative political space, which is facilitated by the community and even built by their peer group or developed by an organisation or non-profit network that opens up opportunities for them to speak up. This, according to Aspinall (2016), is a reflection of contemporary Indonesian nationalism which is marked by the ‘non-ideological form’ (p. 72). In fact, digital media has created many opportunities for young activists, and Backsilmove used them to good advantage, based on the mainstream and alternative learning of its founders.
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12.2 Theoretical Implications The findings in this doctoral study engender implications for conventional social movement theories widely used in analysing activist mobilisation in environmental movements. It confirms that the success of a social movement may be attributed in part to resourceful innovation. Mobilisation of key resources and people, especially young people, can lead a movement to a higher success rate in campaigns. In this view, protesters who hold agentive roles should not be isolated analytically from local culture. Rather, the cognitive and biographical aspects of the activists should be integrated as personal attributes leading to mobilisation success. I propose that it is necessary to integrate the ideological context and the structural emergence of a social movement with the cultural experience of the activists. The cultural experience must be acknowledged as an alternative communication medium to build the epistemic community of a local environmental movement. With the extensive development of digital information technology, social movements are increasingly reaching for an egalitarian ethos, so social and cultural practices should be a significant locus of analysis for any contemporary social movement, such as a local environmental movement.
By applying Bourdieusian concepts in this thesis project, I was able to provide insights into the logic of becoming an environmental activist. The definition of 'activist', as it emerges from this doctoral thesis, is ‘culturally hybrid’, ‘contextual’, and ‘generational’. Cultural hybridity was illustrated by the experience of young activists who joined the Greenpeace organisation driven by a passion for the environment as well as the desire to find a space to manifest their identities as politically precarious youth. ‘Contextual’ means acknowledging the positioning of the Backsilmove activist identity as primarily local, even while globally connected in appropriate social settings. Finally, they represent activism in the ‘digital generation’.
These findings reconfigure the definition of contemporary Indonesian activists in contrast to New Order activists. They are no longer so much reliant on the solid structures of organisation and institution. Their radical ecological habitus is both flexible and still growing.
12.3 Limitations of the Study The research design chosen for this study has been successful in exploring meanings in the expressed narratives of activists. However, I am aware that there are some shortcomings and
197 limitations experienced throughout the fieldwork, particularly related to gender differences, linguistic habitus, and the research time frame.
12.3.1 Gender Differences amongst the Activists Becoming an activist involves a complex life trajectory. The ecological habitus is reshaped through internalisation of cultural capital that begins with the family, and is then shaped and sharpened in schools, and environmental organisations. Both male and female Backsilmove activists were interviewed. Yet, their stories of influence and growth on the trajectory towards becoming an environmental activist did not show much difference in terms of gender. Of course, if different questions had been asked, then variation in experiences according to gender might have been quite marked given the distinctive gender order of Indonesia which enshrines very different roles for men and women.
12.3.2 Linguistic Habitus When the student researcher was a teenager, the internet was still very rarely used in Indonesia, and interpersonal interaction was through direct communication and without social media. I grew up in a period when the standard Indonesian language was used by educated people. In that period, even young people who were well-educated did not use much slang - bahasa gaul. Yet, the majority of respondents in this study, who were university-educated and still in their twenties, spoke to their peers and informally to the researcher eloquently using bahasa gaul, without any sense of awkwardness. This is perhaps due to the influence of cosmopolitan Jakarta style.
In the interview process, the awkwardness of some respondents in answering the questions may have been due to the standard Indonesian that was used in the questions posed by the student researcher. It was noted that the respondents would often take a concerted pause while thinking and choosing formal words throughout the interview, which caused the interview to last longer than scheduled because the researcher gave more time to the respondents. However, there is not much indication that the respondents were inhibited in the sincerity of their responses due to the use of standard Indonesian.
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12.2.3 Research Timeframe A relatively short time frame for the field work in the project did not allow the researcher to explore social inequality among the activists who joined Backsilmove. Social inequality may have been present in the form of knowledge gaps, including the content of the movement, the movement goals, and the skills gap in governing activism. For example, those who had a thorough knowledge of the purpose of the movement and techniques in running a campaign may have possibly achieved leadership positions more easily compared to those who were followers in the movement.
In addition, the limited time frame of the research meant that it was hard to find out about their current and future environmental activism. The time to explore their individual life trajectories in more depth could have provided an appealing picture about whether their perceptions can shape their reality in the future. That would allow a deeper and more grounded analysis of the radical habitus as it changes as the result of influences from contemporary social transformations.
12.3 Implications for Further Study Through this study, I have provided only brief hints of the social class of the families from which Backsilmove activists came. Regarding the importance of the parents in shaping habitus and cultural facility, further study could involve parents as informants, focusing on their experiences in relation to encouraging the environmental activism of their grown-up children. These experiences could inform child-rearing advice for parents to inculcate environmental values to children. I highlight the importance of exploring that idea based on previous studies of ecological habitus, which highlight the connection between models of child-rearing and children’s environmental attitudes.
Previous studies found that parents are formative in the process of shaping their children’s behaviours as adults when given appropriate social stimulus in the direction of activism. In the context of the growing environmental problems in Indonesia at this time, it is important to look at what young people are doing in terms of collective action to preserve the natural environment and promote resource sustainability. The favoured models of child-rearing in the Indonesian family could affect the degree of openness of young people on issues of environmental problems and other forms of creative action to make positive change. Previous
199 studies suggest that environmental activists who use creative action to convey a campaign message to the public tend to be born into a middle-class family that practises more egalitarian communication and interaction. Egalitarian interaction refers to the availability of a discursive space for dialogue between parents and children, and the absence of formal barriers of distance between the generations of children and parents. In Indonesia, the norm of conservative family-authoritarian parenting is characterised by dominance to which the child submits, and by distance from the father. This does not favour the development of open and flexible communication as they become adults. The continuation of that traditional authoritarian model of parenting may result in future generations that are either passive and less critical of changes, or tend to use rebellious action or violence as an expression against political repression.
Given the importance of the family in the process of forming the habitus of children, it is necessary to conduct further research on styles of parenting and on social class patterns of family communication. That research could reveal much about the lives of environmental activists raised in a middle-class family. Considering the significance of environmental issues, that proposed research would contribute to our knowledge about young people and activism in Indonesia and worldwide.
12.4 Postscript on Environmental Crisis in Bandung In early 2017, while writing this concluding chapter, I regularly received reports on flash floods, landslides, high winds, and spatial damage in Bandung, which were allegedly caused by climate change event such as El-Nino. The annual heavy rain was worse than usual in that city of hills and valleys. It was a test for the Bandung municipal government to see how vulnerable their city is. The extensive infrastructure damage was reportedly due to poorly constructed drainage and inadequate green space to hold and reserve the rainwater. As a result, hundreds of houses were submerged and cars were washed away and even stuck in the fallen trees. Also, several points in the city were destroyed by landslides. I could imagine how terrified the citizens of the city of Bandung must be by the risks engendered by poorly controlled development driven by minimally-controlled market liberalisation. I thought about what would happen to the future of youth living in this city in 10 or 20 years time. There is an overwhelming need for more environmental organisations like Backsilmove to work for change.
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Appendix 1 List of Respondents
No. Name Gender Age Original Role in Main Activity at Time of Backsilmove Interview
1. Canny Female 24 Co-Founder & Completing Bachelor of Networking Management Thesis at Coordinator University of Padjajaran 2. Lentia Female 22 Co-Founder & Completing Bachelor of Social Media Communication Studies Thesis Coordinator at Institute of Political and Social Sciences Jakarta (IISIP) 3. Hadi Male 24 Co-Founder & Completing Bachelor of Director of Communication Studies Thesis Mobilisation at Indonesia Open University (Universitas Terbuka) 4. Melody Female 20 Logistics Undertaking 1st semester in Bachelor of Anthropology at University of Indonesia 5. Adel Male 23 On-Site Completing Bachelor in Photographer Communication Studies Thesis at Public Islamic University Bandung (UIN-Bandung) 6. Ratu Female 23 On-Site Completing Bachelor in Photographer Communication Studies Thesis and Media at Public Islamic University Reporter Bandung (UIN-Bandung) 7. Wanggi Male 26 Creative Arts Just graduated from Bachelor of Coordinator Arts and Theatrical Performance programme at Arts College Bandung 8. Wildan Male 23 Webmaster & Completing Bachelor in Poster Designer Informatics Final Project at Computer Studies University Bandung (UNIKOM) 9. Raja Male 22 Logistics Completing Bachelor in Informatics Final Project at Computer Studies University Bandung (UNIKOM) 10. Ilham Male 22 Logistics Completing Bachelor in Informatics Final Project at Computer Studies University Bandung (UNIKOM) 11. Pipin Female 20 Logistics Undertaking 1st year of Bachelor in Sports Education 12. Faisal Male 20 Logistics Undertaking 1st year of Diploma in Tourism 13. Reza Female 21 Logistics Undertaking 1st year of
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Communication Studies Undergraduate 14. Harris Male 24 Logistics Undertaking 1st year of Communication Studies Undergraduate 15. Hilman Male 22 Liaison Officer Undertaking Final year of Bachelor of Marketing at a private university. 16. Astri Female 23 Creative Arts Completing Bachelor in Coordinator Performance Studies Thesis at Jakarta Arts Institute (Institute Kesenian Jakarta/IKJ) 17. Apri Female 22 Activists Completing Bachelor of Coordinator Psychology Honours Thesis at Semarang Public University 18. Febri Female 22 Activists Completing Bachelor of Coordinator Psychology Honours Thesis at at Semarang Public University 19. Rayi Male 24 Activists Completing Bachelor of Coordinator Journalism Honours Thesis 20. Rama Male 22 Mobilisation Just graduated from Applied Coordinator Diploma in Informatics 21. Nadia Female 24 External Just graduated from B.A in Networking English Literature at University Coordinator of Padjajaran 22. Tio Male 23 Social Media Just graduated from Bachelor of Reporter Economics at Widyatama University Bandung 23. Fadli Male 22 Logistics Undertaking Bachelor of Marketing Programme 24. Wirdan Male 22 Webmaster Completing Bachelor of Informatics Thesis at Computer Studies University Bandung (UNIKOM) 25. Puspita Female 23 Survey and Just graduated from Bachelor of Publication Psychology at University of Coordinator Indonesia 26. Gerry Male 23 Logistics Just graduated from Bachelor of Coordinator Management at Widyatama University Bandung
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Appendix 2 Human Research Ethics Document
HUMAN RESEARCH ETHICS COMMITTEE
APPROVAL TO CONDUCT HUMAN RESEARCH
To Chief Investigator or Project Supervisor: Professor Pamela Nilan Cc Co-investigators / Research Students: Mr Meredian Alam Doctor Terrence Leahy Re Protocol: When the City Forest is Ours: Urban Environmentalism and Youth in Bandung, Indonesia Date: 17-Oct-2014 Reference No: H-2014-0194
Thank you for your recent application to the University of Newcastle Human Research Ethics Committee (HREC) for approval of the protocol identified above.
Details of previous approvals for Initial, Renewal and Variation applications are available upon request.
A Certificate of Approval is enclosed.
THE CERTIFICATE AND THIS ADVICE ARE TO BE RETAINED THEY ARE IMPORTANT DOCUMENTS
Note any comments related to the approval. Where the HREC is the lead or primary HREC, if the research requires the use of an Information Statement, ensure the Reference No. is inserted into the complaints paragraph in the approved document(s) prior to distribution to potential participants. Where the research is the project of a higher degree candidate, it is the responsibility of the project supervisor to ensure that the candidate receives this approval advice.
Conditions of Approval
This approval has been granted subject to you complying with the requirements for Monitoring of Progress, Reporting of Adverse Events, and Variations to the Approved Protocol as detailed below.
PLEASE NOTE: In the case where the HREC has "noted" the approval of an External HREC, progress reports and reports of adverse events are to be submitted to the External HREC only. In the case of Variations to the approved protocol, you will apply
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to the External HREC for approval in the first instance and then Register that approval with the University's HREC.
Monitoring of Progress
Other than above, the University is obliged to monitor the progress of research projects involving human participants to ensure that they are conducted according to the protocol as approved by the HREC. The Certificate of Approval identifies the period for which approval is granted and your progress report schedule. A progress report is required on an annual basis, you will be advised when a report is due.
Reporting of Adverse Events
1. It is the responsibility of the person first named on the Certificate to report adverse events.
2. Adverse events, however minor, must be recorded by the investigator as observed by the investigator or as volunteered by a participant in the research. Full details are to be documented, whether or not the investigator, or his/her deputies, consider the event to be related to the research substance or procedure.
3. Serious or unforeseen adverse events that occur during the research or within six (6) months of completion of the research, must be reported by the person first named on the Certificate to the (HREC) by way of the Adverse Event Report form within 72 hours of the occurrence of the event or the investigator receiving advice of the event.
4. Serious adverse events are defined as: Causing death, life threatening or serious disability. Causing or prolonging hospitalisation. Overdoses, cancers, congenital abnormalities, tissue damage, whether or not they are judged to be caused by the investigational agent or procedure. Causing psycho-social and/or financial harm. This covers everything from perceived invasion of privacy, breach of confidentiality, or the diminution of social reputation, to the creation of psychological fears and trauma. Any other event which might affect the continued ethical acceptability of the project.
5. Reports of adverse events must include: Participant's study identification number; date of birth; date of entry into the study; treatment arm (if applicable); date of event; details of event; the investigator's opinion as to whether the event is related to the research procedures; and action taken in response to the event.
6. Adverse events which do not fall within the definition of serious, including those reported from other sites involved in the research, are to be reported in detail at the time of the annual progress report to the HREC.
Variations to approved protocol
If you wish to change, or deviate from, the approved protocol, you will need to submit an Application for Variation to Approved Human Research. Variations may include, but are not limited to, changes or additions to investigators, study design, study population, number of participants, methods of recruitment, or participant information/consent documentation. Variations must be approved by the (HREC) before they are implemented except when Registering an approval of a variation from an external HREC which has been designated the lead HREC, in which case you may proceed as soon as you receive an acknowledgement of your Registration.
Linkage of ethics approval to a new Grant
HREC approvals cannot be assigned to a new grant or award (ie those that were not identified on the application for
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ethics approval) without confirmation of the approval from the Human Research Ethics Officer on behalf of the HREC.
With best wishes for a successful project.
Professor Allyson Holbrook Chair, Human Research Ethics Committee
For communications and enquiries: Human Research Ethics Administration
Research Services Research Integrity Unit The Chancellery The University of Newcastle Callaghan NSW 2308 T +61 2 492 17894 F +61 2 492 17164 [email protected]
RIMS website - https://RIMS.newcastle.edu.au/login.asp
Linked University of Newcastle administered funding:
Funding body Funding project title First named investigator Grant Ref
HUMAN RESEARCH ETHICS COMMITTEE Certificate of Approval
Applicant: (first named in application) Professor Pamela Nilan
Co-Investigators / Research Students: Mr Meredian Alam Doctor Terrence Leahy
Protocol: When the City Forest is Ours: Urban Environmentalism and Youth in Bandung, Indonesia
In approving this protocol, the Human Research Ethics Committee (HREC) is of the opinion that the project complies with the provisions contained in the National Statement on Ethical Conduct in Human Research, 2007, and the requirements within this University relating to human research.
Note: Approval is granted subject to the requirements set out in the accompanying document Approval to Conduct Human Research, and any additional comments or conditions noted below.
Details of Approval
HREC Approval No: H-2014-0194 Date of Initial Approval: 24-Sep-2014
Approval
Approval will remain valid subject to the submission, and satisfactory assessment, of annual progress reports. If the approval of
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an External HREC has been "noted" the approval period is as determined by that HREC.
Progress reports due: Annually.
If the approval of an External HREC has been "noted", the reporting period is as determined by that HREC.
Approval Details
Initial Application
15-Oct-2014
Approved
The Committee ratified the approval granted by the Deputy Chair on 24 September 2014 under the provisions for expedited review.
Authorised Certificate held in Research Services
Professor Allyson Holbrook Chair, Human Research Ethics Committee
file:///C|/.../tsl763/AppData/Local/Microsoft/Windows/Temporary Internet Files/Content.Outlook/LQQYHU80/BC03 Short Certificate.htm[20/10/2014 10:38:33 AM]
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