BEYOND RECOGNITION: INDIGENOUS LAND RIGHTS AND CHANGING LANDSCAPES IN INDONESIA A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED TO THE GRADUATE DIVISION OF THE UNIVERSITY OF HAWAI‘I AT MĀNOA IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY IN GEOGRAPHY MAY 2019 By Micah Radandima Fisher Dissertation Committee: Krisnawati Suryanata, Chairperson Reece Jones Jefferson Fox Jonathan Padwe Ehito Kimura Keywords: Agrarian change, indigenous [adat] rights recognition, youth studies, social forestry, Indonesia To all the families that took me in, and most of all, to my own: To my mother: Thanks for the unwavering moral compass; To my sister: For believing; To my father: Anything did happen to us; And to Wiwik and Renaya: May you continue to be driven by what matters and by what might be, with passion, joy, and a sense of humor for it all ii AcknowleDgements: The magic of learning new languages I always liked reading acknowledgements. In my imagination, most people skip them. But for me there is always something really personal and vulnerable about reading them. Similarly, writing this is a humbling reminder, realizing just how much help I had along the way. When I first began to undertake this dissertation, I had no idea what I was in for. In a way I knew what I was getting into, but there’s so many elements that range from the logistic to the conceptual, that fitting all the pieces together seems in hindsight more like magic than anything else. In a lot of ways, it begins with a leap of faith knowing I’d be able to hack it out in a small patch of wilderness and not get lost. Some days I really felt I was onto something, other days I felt really lost. But as lonely as writing a dissertation can feel at the best of times, getting to this stage for me has always depended on, and been guided by the magic of learning languages with the people that help you navigate them. It’s about coding, no – learning to code-switch – and all the generosity of the people that help you to learn to listen and to speak. As an acknowledgement section I divide these languages as follows: the language of theory, the language of bureaucracy, the language of languages, and the language of partnership and relationships. First, the language of theory. Even if I never finished, I could at least walk away having learned how to think and I don’t think I could have had any better group of people to help lead me along. For this, I thank my committee: Krisna Suryanata, Reece Jones, Jeff Fox, Jonathan Padwe, and Ehito Kimura. I feel so lucky to have had the opportunity to work with such a breadth of knowledge, experience, and backgrounds, all preparing me to deal with my greatest shortcomings in manifold ways. The comprehensive exams first opened up entire new worlds for me. And sure, overcoming that hurdle may have stated that I was now on my way; that I had the language to engage, to begin to ask the right questions. But this required a great deal of patience from a committee willing to smile at my naivetes at first, believing that I could eventually get there. I always felt, and still do feel the extreme weight of the antecedents; under the thumb of giants that came before, always reminding us how little we know. As if so-and-so already did that decades ago, and has since uncovered so many new layers on the topic that, well, what’s the point? But then, there’s the privilege of being able to reflect and engage on those same issues in slightly different ways, in ways that inspire a truly unique sort of excitement, a pulsating glimmer of possibility, reminding us that well, there are still many important and timely iii questions to ask. For providing me the confidence and the tools, guiding me through the right approaches, I thank my committee profoundly. But a special thanks goes to Krisna. There’s a reason she’s won the top mentoring award at the university and that so many have turned to her. She has a way of providing steadfast support while intellectually opening up entire new worlds of possibility as I moved along. Then there’s the language of bureaucracy, which at first feels like fighting a mosquito in the dark, one that was buzzing in my ear, and over time the voice in the back of my head began to question whether this one carried malaria. My research permit process began as a major setback. Although initially supported by the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR), I was required to re-apply due to a processing error, meaning I had to engage with a dizzying number of institutions. Although at first it felt like nine months of frustration, it turned out to be a valuable lesson not just about doing research, but also about the research topic itself. Learning to enjoy this aspect of research meant a change in mindset, in which I learned not to swat the mosquito, but to befriend her. In the end what this taught me was the importance of the language of the state, its ubiquity in the lives of everyday politics. Undergoing the process was instructive not only in eventually getting me a permit, but also taught me about the key terms of access and exclusion. I could more easily appreciate how large a hurdle it would be for a rural Indonesian without connections to get access to basic services. Dealing with the four ministries and the national police in Jakarta, as well as making trips to embassies in D.C. and Singapore on several occasions was complicated enough, but that was only the beginning. I thank the great staff at the American Institute for Indonesian Studies, Annas Bentari and Johan Purnama for helping me see the layers of the state and walk through the right halls to follow the right procedures. I also thank Professor Pujo Semedi at UGM’s Fakultas Ilmu Budaya for his patience and support. The subsequent roadblock I encountered in the Immigration office in South Sulawesi resulted in creating three crucial partnerships, ones that would go well beyond the administrative. I thank all of the staff at Balang Institute, Oase, and Hasanuddin University that provided tremendous support. Moving down a layer I found myself with new challenges at the district(s), Kajang subdistrict, the villages and hamlets, and the security apparatus that always invariably showed themselves at strange junctures along the way. I thank Ibu Misbawati Wawo former head of the Forestry Agency for all her support. She indeed helped ease the logistics of doing research, but iv also became a close friend and gracious host, opening her office and assigning staff to work with me at every turn. I have profound admiration for her pioneering approach to make government more responsive to local people’s needs. I also thank her intrepid cadre of forest rangers that were fortunately always having fun on the job, making even the work of setting up tables for a meeting full of laughter. Then there’s the work of learning the actual language of languages. I was lucky to speak Indonesian before I began fieldwork, but little did I know of the pre-requisite of learning Coastal Konjo. After two months thinking I was learning it patiently with friends from Bantaeng, it turned out that I had put together a rather thick dictionary of a dialect from a neighboring region, one that in Kajang would only reinforce alliances that I had thought I was breaking down. Key components of language structures changed with surprising regularity over a small geographic region. Dih!? Then there’s the wonderful and revealing language of history. In peeling back the stories of family generations I found myself going further and further back. Learning the importance of history was perhaps the most instructive part of my learning experience. The more I learned the more it seems as today could not be explained without somehow decoding the 17th century, followed by learning the different periods of Dutch colonial policy, the promises of national liberation and independence struggle, and the contestations of nationalist ideology from Islamic movements. In the current revival of adat for example, Willem van der Muur at Leiden University showed me a language of liberation that was profoundly similar to colonial welfare policies of a century ago. Overall, across the centuries, I was moved by how the gentlest scratching of the surface revealed shuddering incidences of violence. So quickly forgotten; so important to remember. On numerous occasions I read about and listened to stories reinforcing the thinness of the scars that cover these wounds, and so are equally thin the narratives that stitch together liberation ideologies, nationhood, and the state. Going around Amsterdam, Leiden, Tanjung Gusta, and Bulukumba mostly on motorbike or bicycle with Willem always revealed new insights into the past that contextualized the present moment. Working with Willem, Jacqueline Vel, and Kathryn Robinson on the adat special issue for the Asia-Pacific Journal of Anthropology gave me tremendous insight about what Indonesia is today. But most of all, the most important language I’ve learned along the way was guided by the language of partnership and relationships. That’s not just where I found my most profound v and humbling discoveries, but also encompasses the spaces that I believe we can mutually continue to cultivate for a long time to come. This, no doubt, has been the greatest lesson of them all for me.