The Making of the Sundanese Peasant Union (SPP), the Biggest Contemporary Agrarian Movement Organization in Java, Indon

Noer Fauzi Rachman*)

 

The Making of the Sundanese Peasant Union (SPP), the Biggest Contemporary Agrarian Movement Organization in Java, Indonesia**)

 

Critical self-consciousness means, historically and politically, the creation of an élite of intellectuals. A human mass does not 'distinguish' itself, does not become independent in its own right without, in the widest sense, organising itself: and there is no organisation without intellectuals, that is without organisers and leaders... But the process of creating intellectuals is long and difficult, full of contradictions, advances and retreats, dispersal and regrouping, in which the loyalty of the masses is often sorely tried."

 (Gramsci 1971:334)

 

Sundanese Peasant Union (SPP) provides an exemplar on the way rural local leaders[1] and urban educated activists[2] able to reorganize dispossessed peasants and to revive agrarian reform politics before and after the Indonesia bureaucratic-authoritarian-military regime downfall in 1998. To understand the ways SPP emerged through the establishment and the situated practices of this nexus, I have been convinced by Gramsci (1971:16) approach to do “a concrete historical analysis of how both organic and traditional intellectuals categories have developed” [3] in the context of trajectory of land struggles in West Java upland, and in that of changing political conjunctures, before and after the fall of authoritarian regime in 1998.

 

My focus in this chapter is to show the condition under which SPP emerges, and the ways the rural local leaders and urban activists, and the nexus between them, change their situated practices over time, and simultaneously create better spaces that allow them to grow. An SPP activist cum educator popularized a motto in Sundanese “ngajien jalan bari ngalangkah” (we make the road by walking), that definitely are inspired by a title of a conversation book between Myles Horton and Paulo Freire (1990). That eloquent motto perfectly reflects the ways they are shaped dialectically by the actualization of their situated practices, and by social relations that they produce and the spatial context within which they operate, including their specific relations with its opponents. Aside from the centrality of agency in showing the ways their social practices shape political spaces within which they are working, I will be also sensitive to complexity and diversity of the multiple forms of their struggle as well as their multi-scalar sites of struggle. (Turner and Caouette 2009a, 2009b).[4]

 

Authoritarian State, Land Grabbing and New Rural-Urban Activism in West Java  

 

The moment of SPP emergence in 2000 was after a thirty-five hiatus fraught with violence, human tragedy, and unfinished business. The killings of hundreds of thousand of members, sympathizers, and people accused of being members and sympathizers of the Communist Party of Indonesia (PKI) and other leftist organizations, and the subsequent events of 1965-1966, included the banning of the PKI and other leftist mass organizations and the ways tens of thousands of leftist activists were tortured and thrown in jail without trial by military, had terrorized rural villagers in Java (Cribb 1990, 2001, 2002). Landlords took back the lands that previously were redistributed to landless villagers in the implementation of land reform program since 1962 (White and Wiradi 1979, Utrecht 1979). Land redistribution that since the beginning was stigmatized by its opponent as a product of PKI, was fully stopped. The Basic Agrarian Law 1960 and its land reform programs are frozen and turned into history. 

In his recent works, Farid (2005a, 2005b) suggest to conceive the great upheaval of 1965–66 as one of what Karl Marx calls ‘primitive accumulation’ moments, a process ‘whereby the social means of subsistence and production are turned into capital, and the immediate producers are turned into wage-labourers’ (Marx 1867:874 as quoted in Farid 2005a:9).[5] In national level the 1965-1966 upheaval allowed General Soeharto came to power as president in 1967 as a result of the coup. As part of the Cold War strategy, CIA and US foreign policy fully supported the coup and the way President Soeharto led Western-educated technocrats, labeled as the “Berkeley Mafia” (Ransom 1975, Wardaya 2001, 2007, Budiawan 2006). At the national level, the new regime succeeded to set up new macro economic policies that reversed the anti-imperialist and socialist ideals of an entire generation of nationalists. All of the policies were tied with interest to bring Indonesia into global capitalist economy through foreign investment and international Development projects included green revolution, forest logging, mining extraction, large plantation estates, and Import Substitution Industrialization (ISI). 

The successful implementation of these policies was made possible by a full back up of militaristic-bureaucratic-authoritarian controls over an entire rural population (Fauzi 1999, Mortimer 1973, Mas’oed 1983; Robison 1986, White and Husken 1989). Through the politics of depoliticizing rural masses, the regime succeeded to detach or alienate the grass-roots population from political party. The tighter control over the rural population in West Java upland were implemented also because of what the Indonesian military identified as their two latent enemies (bahaya laten) which they believed had worked underground and never stop to destabilize the existing government regime: (a) thousands of ex-Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) members, who released from prison since 1979. The Indonesia Peasant Front (Barisan Tani Indonesia) was the biggest rural mass organizations affiliated to the Communist Party, and had many chapters in West Java upland villages (Huizer 1972, 1985, Mortimer 1972, 1974:22-44, Edman 1987:67-93); and (b) thousands ex-Darul-Islam/Indonesia Islamic Army (DI/TII) movement followers. The DI/TII movement used guerilla-armed struggle as their main tactic to fight for an Indonesia Islamic State (Negara Islam Indonesia) in the late 1950s until early 1960s (Horikoshi 1975, Jackson, 1980; van Dijk, 1981). For those who were identified to conduct oppositional political moves, the Indonesia military would punish them, during which process the uses of violence were not infrequent (Southwood. and Flanagan 1983).

All of those forces produced disappearance of rural social movements in Java, which had once flourished during those periods between the late forties to the early sixties, a decade where rural people being directly involved with mass mobilization, and political affairs through their participation as members of certain political parties and affiliation to social organizations (Hefner 1990, Huizer 1972, Lyon 1970, Mortimer 1972, Sulistyo 1997). Until the end of 1970s, the regime seemed maintaining an overwhelming political control over the whole rural society in Java, and successfully incorporated rural elites into government sectors through its corporatist strategy and development projects (Fauzi 1999: 153-163, Husken and White 1989, Antlöv 1994). This overwhelming political domination was fully used and enjoyed by private and state owned plantations and State Forest Corporation (SFC) in West Java to strengthening their control over land and labor and their surrounding villages, included to do land grabbing. 

Land grabbing cases in West Java in 1980ies and 1990ies enabled me to see how dispossessed peasants perceived the state as a contradictory entity. They experienced brutal repression and deceitful manipulation in the land grabbing processes, and conceived it as the use, abuse and misuse of the state power by state apparatus.[6] Land grabbing, and its associated repression and deceits, as many West Java upland villagers experienced, certainly provided severe misery for their victims. The brutality and the deceits were visible. But because of the nature of the land grabbing as a State project, the visible brutality created huge discrepancy between the "as-is" and the "should-be". The perception of the State as contradictory institutions in turn provided a possibility for rural-urban activisms of legal aid, human right and environmental NGOs and students groups. These activisms had enabled rural local leaders to walk new pathways, through reworking the dispossessed villagers experience and their local covert acts of resistance, to transform those toward publicly overt collective actions. In turn they broke the state stranglehold. 

A theorization of legal aid beyond conventional practice by leaders of Indonesia Legal Aid Foundation (YLBHI) notably Adnan Buyung Nasution (1982) and Todung Mulya Lubis (1986) contrasted conventional legal aid with what they call Bantuan Hukum Struktural (literally Structural Legal Aid), which is oriented to actively develop human right based social movements through what he call “legal empowerment” in urban and rural areas to confront structural injustices that are caused by unequal power relations. YLBHI that has thirteen legal aid (LBH) offices in provincial cities, viewed and handled land disputes cases, along with labor, environmental and political cases, as high-priority areas – what they called “structural cases” (kasus-kasus struktural) where campaigning could most enhance “collective rights” against authoritarian regime, development agencies and capitalist enterprises. 

Since 1981 YLBHI had worked closely with other human right oriented NGOs to producing outstanding yearly human right reports, including special chapters on land issues (YLBHI 1981; 1983; 1984; 1986; 1987; 1989; 1990a; 1990b; 1991; 1992; 1993; 1994; 1997). The legal aid offices (LBH), including its office in Bandung, the capital city of West Java, had provided an institutional support and protection for the student activists to conduct their rural-urban activism. Many of these student activists had been radicalized by their involvement in land dispute cases that were assisted by the LBH. As noted by Aspinal, “(I)n some cases, student activists’ first contacts with rural communities were as voluntary researchers for NGOs like LBH. Elsewhere, student activists independently visited villages where land disputes were occurring, collected information and then organized seminars or protests on their own campuses. Some formed ad-hoc campaign committees and stayed in affected villages for months at a time. The aim was typically to impart to the farmers basic political education and practical skills for organizing resistance campaigns (pemberdayaan, or empowerment, as one of catch-phrase of the early 1990s put it)” (2004:79). 

            A case that arouses national-wide controversy and heated public debate at the time period was land expropriation for Kedung Ombo dam in Central Java (Stanley 1994, Aditjondro 2003). Aspinal (2004:77) mentioned that “(t)he Kedung Ombo case became a cause celebre of the late New Order.” The Indonesian government attempted to relocate approximately thirty thousand people from twenty villages to make way for a dam, covers an area of 6,700 hectares, which was being built with funds partly provided by the World Bank (US $166 million loan). This case became an example of what Keck and Sikkink (1998) theorize as “boomerang strategy”: when Indonesian Government blocked various complains about Kedung Ombo case, environmental and human right NGOs activists through International NGO Forum on Indonesia (INGI) had used their transnational network to pressure the World Bank and Indonesia Government to change their policy and practices (Rumansara 1998).

In the end of 1980s and the beginning of 1990s student and NGO activists in West Java cities such as Bandung, Cianjur, Bogor and Garut were enabled by land grabbing cases to learn how to organize popular protests to government offices and develop underground organizing works (turun ke bawah or turba) in major land grabbing cases (see very brief description of seven major land grabbing cases in the table # 1). 

 

Table No.1. Seven major land grabbing cases in West Java 

No	Name and location of case	Short Description of the case
1.	Sagara, Garut district	The Sagara case involved 776 households in Sagara dan Karya Mukati Villages, Cibalong Cibalong district. They claimed the rights to some 1,100 hectares of land and the teak trees growing upon the land. The State Forest Company (SFC) had controlled the land and area since 1980.  The dispute was also about the capture and detention of the village head because of his leadership in organizing villager to occupy the disputed land. This case ended with the SFC losing, when the decree of the National Agrarian Ministry and the Head of the National Land Bureau (No. 35-VI/1997) determined that the state land in question could be subjected to land reform. This amounted to nearly 580 hectares in the Sagara and Karya Mukti villages.
1	Badega, Garut district	The Badega case was a dispute between a private company (PT Surya Andaka Mustika) and 579 households on Mount Badega in Garut, who had a claim to 498.416 hectares of land that had formerly been leased to PT Sintrin. As Sagara case, this case also involved the jailing of thirteen village leaders. This case became a central concern of many student and NGO activists, who campaigned broadly about it in the 1980s. In 1990, the villagers succeeded to control 350 out the 400 hectares of the disputed land.
3.	Cimerak, Ciamis district	The Indonesia Government developed a Nucleus Estates and Smallholder (NES) project on 2,000 ha mixed-garden land, including valuable clove and other trees. They expropriated the land without any compensation and bulldozed it for the planting of monocrop hybrid coconuts. This is one out of seven the World Bank’s NES projects in Java in 1977-1983 for total $655 million loan.
4.	Cikalong, Cianjur district	The Cikalong case involved 403 households and the SFC that claimed over 400 hectares of land in Ciramaeuwah Girang dan Cigunung Heurang villages. In 1989 the SFC started to plant the land with teak and magohany. Under the SFC’s social forestry project villagers were organized within forest user groups and were allowed to restrictively access the land for food production through sharecropping. Because of their leadership in resisting and sabotaging the project, seven village leaders were arrested. In 1995, their struggle succeeded to kick out the SFC from the land.
5.	Cimacan, Cianjur district	The Cimacan case involved 34.5 hectares of fertile agricultural lands that were expropriated for golf park owned by PT. Bumi Asri Mulya (BAM) since 1998. Without any consent and compensation the company bulldozed the lands owned by 287 households. Many environmental and human right NGOs and student activists had engaged with various aspects of the case.
6.	Gunung Batu, Sukabumi district	The Gunung Baru case started in 1984 when Ministry of Internal Affairs released an official decision to give a 25 year concession right to PT. Bumi Lestari Abadi (BLA), a private plantation company, over 498, 3617 lands and to redistribute 331 hectares for villagers. The plantation bulldozed those lands that previously were cultivated by 1.200 villagers since 1950ies after the Dutch colonial plantation abandoned the lands, and the villagers never able to access the lands that supposedly are for them.
7.	Jatiwangi, Majalengka district	Jatiwangi case involved 1.043 hectares of lands and 2,247 villagers from seven villages (Beusi, Beber, Cibogor, Buntu, Wanasalam, Salawana, dan Jatisura. According to villagers, in the period of Japanese annexation (1942-1945) the lands were leased by villagers for military airport. After independence 1995, the villagers had reused the land for agricultural purposes until the lands were control by Indonesian Air Force – Military Airport in 1970. During 1980 – 1990 villagers have struggled to take back the land.

 

The land grabbing cases in West Java radicalized NGOs and student organization.[7] Various forms of state sponsored violence and discrimination in relation to land grabbing for private and government development projects, such as golf courses, military facilities, plantation and forestry projects, and the like, were perceived as the way the state repressive apparatus uphold the interests of the ruling class. The student and NGO activists perceived and were perceived as ‘moral force’ to control the authoritarian State. Using this privilege they had provided continual support for land protests that were directed to local and national parliament offices. Land protest always got a central coverage in local and national newspapers as well as in electronic medias. Before making a protest the NGO and student activists usually assist them to draft their demands and list of chronological events related to the case, and train them how conduct protest in government office, included to speak publicly to the officials and the press. Some paralegals helped the protesters to calculate further repression and other political risks that usually come after the protest event, and provided some legal assistance to protect their rights if the repression happened. Sometimes activists also make art performances to make the protest more colorful. The activist also did open and public campaign against land grabbing. For example, working with a painter-activist (from Bandung, West Java) and a poet-activist from Solo (Central Java), they launched a poster-calendar “Tanah untuk Rakyat” (literally Land for People) that shows brutal forms of state sponsored repression in various land expropriation cases, and a political poetry that articulate the urgency to build social movement (see Figure #1).[8]

The new activism allows me to grasp the centrality of the relation between urban based activists and local rural leaders to anchor new trajectory of land struggle in West Java upland, and also in other areas. What Gramsci (1971:5-23) calls the unity of “traditional intellectual” and “organic intellectual” could be found in their situated struggles over resources and meanings in multiple and interrelated arenas. In 1991, after six years maintaining cycles of contention, they able to set up an embryo of peasant mass organization in provincial level, i.e. West Java Peasant Union (SPJB, Serikat Petani Jawa Barat). The SPJB started with seven major land cases in 1991 (see the table 1) and had been expanded through what activists called “expansion” to other land cases and then “live in” with victimized peasants.[9] The activists were inspired and equipped by Freirian popular education methodology for trainings and workshops that they conducted for help local leaders to understand the larger context of their land struggle, and in turn would strengthen their effort to develop solidarity (rasa senasib dan sepenanggungan) between dispossessed peasants, and also to improve their organizational and leadership capabilities (Fauzi and Bachriadi 2006). Bandung based activists had promoted the SPJB as an example for a new mode of rural organizing called “from local actions to the formation of mass organization” (Fauzi 1998, Faryadi 2007). Through a series of traveling and inter-regional workshops from 1991 to 1994, the land activist network from Sumatera, Java, Bali and Lombok spread “the initiatives to strengthen peasant associations” in provincial levels. This initiative turned into the formation of Federation of Indonesia Peasant Union (FSPI, Federasi Serikat Petani Indonesia) in 1998 under the leadership of Henry Saragih. In its first congress in Medan in February 1999, the FSPI leaders concerned with national agrarian problems with the strong demand for national government to solve local land issues. But it shifted after their participation in the Via Campesina Third International Assembly in Bangalore in 2000, when Hendry Saragih was appointed as a regional coordinator for Via Campesina Asia-Pacific. Then in the Fourth International Assembly in Sao Paulo in 2004, Hendry Saragih are appointed as General Coordinator of Via Campesina, and moreover the International Operative Secretariat of Via Campesina moved to Jakarta in 2005. These institutional alliance have tremendously shaped their social practice, becoming transnational movement activists who amplify the discourse of anti-neoliberalism, anti-imperialism and pro agrarian reform and food sovereignty. Hendry Saragih (and other Via Campesina leaders) are exemplified of what Tarrow  (2005:5) argues about “rooted cosmopolitans”[10] within “transnational agrarian movements confronting globalization” (Borras et al 2008, Edelman 2009). 

 

“Agrarian activist” and their politics of signification over land grabbing

The creation of “agrarian activist” as particular category in civil society activism in Indonesia is shaped by the way they have been deeply engaged with local land struggle, and also with ceaseless campaign for agrarian reform working through signifying land grabbing. Land grabbing is deeply shaken experience for dispossessed peasants and also for activists who witness and try sympathetically to build collective actions with them. It is “problematic (that is, where they are unexpected); where they break the frame of …  previous expectations about the world; where powerful social interests are involved; or where there are starkly opposing or conflicting interest at play” (Hall 1982:69). Their ‘common sense’[11] was no longer adequate to signify the land grabbing as total disruptive events. Land grabbing probably can be an event in one time, but resistance against land grabbing probably makes them as periodic predicament that needs to be “recurrently signified in particular ways”, to use Hall (1982:70). 

In the end period of the authoritarian regime in 1990ies, I find three ways activists signify land grabbing, i.e.: (a) those who signify land grabbing as land dispute (sengketa tanah); they tend to use court system, and alternative dispute resolutions if possible, to help victimized peasant defending their rights; (b) those who focuses on the use, the abuse and misuse the state institutions and power in state sponsored violence; They tend to use human right repertoires to campaign against “state violence” and to promote the state’s responsibility to protect and to fulfill peasants’ rights; and (c) those who signify land grabbing as mechanism through which Capital accumulation is facilitated by the state actions. They tend to promote land redistribution as part of larger agrarian reform policy on one hand, and to organize dispossessed peasant to do land occupation on the other hand. These are not exclusive one to another. The ways activists invoke these sets of ideas to diagnose the land grabbing are important symbolic social practice that shows struggles over meaning through which collective understanding and visions are forged by “the politics of signification”, to use Stuart Hall. More over, “(t)he signification of events is part of what has to be struggled over, for it is the means by which collective social understanding are created – and thus the means by which consent for particular outcomes can be effectively mobilized” (Hall 1982:70). 

In the high tide period of campaign against land grabbing,[12] on December 1995 sixty-five NGOs and six community-based organizations took a further step to set up a national wide network of NGOs, Consortium for Agrarian Reform (KPA, Konsorsium Pembaruan Agraria). This step allowed various activists with varied framings over multiple forms of land grabbing cases that they have assisted in various places are discursively and institutionally form a more unified collective action frame[13], i.e. struggle for agrarian reform. This framing activity intentionally was oriented to deal with the need of activists who deeply engage with land struggles in various places (a) to understand causes of land grabbing and its associated state repression and deceits, and the condition under which those are enabled; (b) to find an acceptable frame for their future activism. 

When a group of activist from Jakarta and Bandung under the leadership of Bonnie Setiawan from Yayasan Studi Masyarakat had conducted a study on national agrarian politics and a series of regional workshops in various provincial cities in Indonesia archipelago (Medan, Lampung, Palembang, Bandung, Yogyakarta, Denpasar, Mataram, Samarinda, Pontianak, Palu, Jayapura) local activists had enthusiastically responded the call with setting up a local team deliver a scooping study on land grabbing issue in their region. Later in Bandung on December 22, 1985, those local teams along with those who made studies on national agrarian politics presented their report in an agrarian seminar convened to the first congress of the KPA.[14]

Resistance against land grabbing in local level was reframed by KPA into struggle for agrarian reform in multi-scales of action. Parallel with YLBHI’s notion on reklaiming (to reclaim lands that previously were grabbed by force)[15], KPA introduced “direct land occupation” as a necessity step to set up a condition for agrarian reform as national agrarian policy. KPA’s expert, Gunawan Wiradi (1997, 2001), called it “land reform by leverage” (in opposition to “land reform by the grace”), an idea that was inspired by Powelson and Stock (1987).[16] Then, KPA had prolifically sprouted a new generation of “agrarian activist” started through a series of agrarian courses, trainings and workshops for field activists and published a set of practical manuasl how to organize rural poor peasants for agrarian reform (Fauzi et al 1997, Fauzi and Juliantara 2000, Fauzi and Zakaria 2001, Faryadi et al 2001, Pelokilla and Zakaria 2001). On the other hand, in the national level, KPA had launched a campaign for agrarian reform policy through exposing the pervasiveness of land grabbing cases, included through using the following opened-eye figure of land grabbing cases (See table #2).[17]

        

        From KPA's Agrarian Conflict Data-base, entry due to Dec 30, 2001
 

Toward Sundanese Peasant Union (SPP)

The notion of “land reform by leverage” found its subject in Sundanese Peasant Union (SPP). Tracing the formation of SPP should start from Sagara case in Southern Garut district, West Java. The case is the first and successful local land struggle in West Java upland against State Forest Corporation (SFC), the biggest state landlord in Java. Their struggle walked through hilly and rocky terrain during the authoritarian regime of Soeharto With a support from some higher officials within the National Land Agency (NLA), they succeeded to kick out the SFC claim over 1,100 hectares of land, and got land certificates for almost half of it in 1997. Their successful struggle is not only because of the efficacy of that nexus, but also by a role played by Soedjarwo Soemihardjo, the Deputy Head of NLA who coordinated a team to settle the Sagara land dispute case composed from NLA and MoF officers. After doing ground check and paper works the team able to convince the Minister of Forestry to exclude the land from forest zone. The Minister agreed, and released an official decision. Based on that, the Head of NLA treated the land as state-land and released a decision to redistribute the land to the villagers.[18]

Soedjarwo Soeromihardjo proudly told me that the Sagara case is one of unforgettable events within his service as civil servant. In his autobiography that was published after my interview with him, he wrote:  

“On 2006, some years after the case was resolved, I met and made conversation with Agustiana, General Secretary of SPP who share a story on 1,100 hectares of land that located in four villages (Sagara, Karya Mukti, Maroko dan Simpang in Cibalong, Garut.district) and became paddy fields (sawah) and rubber garden. The rubber that they produced able to be one of finalists in a competition in provincial level. Then it was dubbed as “the exemplary people rubber”. They were able to build a 12 km village road. Their income exponentially increased 300% (1992 to 1995). They started with 12 brick-houses, and now they have 1,694 brick-houses (Soeromihardjo, 2007:125).

 

The Sagara case is partially responsible for the new way student activists in Garut city learned how to conduct deep organizing, support land occupation, and mobilize dispossessed people for protest land reform through their link with rural local leaders. The activists then realized that their strategic nexus with local leaders became an anchor to reorganize dispossessed peasants for the future agrarian movement in the West Java upland area (Agustiana 1995, Lukmanurdin 2002).[19] The activists set up a youth and student organization in Garut (Forum Pemuda, Pelajar dan Mahasiswa Garut (FPPMG). One of his leader, Agustiana, then led the formation of two similar organizations in two other cities, Tasikmalaya and Ciamis, respectively Forum Pemuda dan Mahasiwa untuk Rakyat (FPMR), and Forum Rakyat dan Mahasiswa Ciamis (Farmaci). These three student organizations, and their particular connections to rural local leaders were responsible to diffuse land occupation, and mobilize dispossessed communities to make protest actions to government, as new tactics for land struggle in Garut, Tasikmalaya and Ciamis districts. They were part of larger pro-democracy student and NGO activism (Pro-Demo) against authoritarian policies and practices of the Soeharto regime (See Aspinal 2005:116-144).[20]

Because of his leading role in various protest actions, one of their leaders, Agustiana was frequently accused as so-called provokator (person who provoke people to do protest actions) or aktor intelektual (intellectual leader who design a protest action) or pembangkang (political dissident). Those kinds of accusation certainly are a maneuver to hiding substantial cause of the protest, and prevent them to take responsibility for the cause.  He was sentenced to eight years in prison for subversion over his alleged role the Tasikmalaya racial riot of 16 December 1996. The riot was triggered by allegations of police brutality over Islamic religious teachers. The mass protest against the police rocked other targets, and became a riot against Chinese businesses and Christian churches. Agustiana refused to be accused as “subversive intellectual actors” behind the riot. He was a scapegoat (See: Tim ISAI, 1998). 

The fall of the authoritarian regime started when Soeharto declared his resignation on May 21^st, 1998 in response to the financial and economic crises, the loss of legitimacy and political supports from military and civilian politicians, massif student demonstrations and riots in Jakarta and beyond. Habibie, Soeharto’s Vice President, became new president and had made drastic changes in favor to political democratization, including giving presidential amnesty for all political prisoners. Because of that amnesty, Agustiana was released from the jail on July 25^th, 1998, a month after the fall of Soeharto. 

The beginning of Reformasi era was an opening moment for building the Sundanese Peasant Union (SPP) backboned by the nexus of rural local leadership and urban activists. Agustiana who closely  observing the West Java Peasant Union (SPJB) had directed his fellow activists to have and lead his own peasant organization. Agustiana conceived rural groups under the SPJB were positioned as target groups of two non-governmental organizations in Bandung City, namely Bandung Legal Aid Foundation (LBH-Bandung) and Institute of Rural Education and Development (LPPP), and this positioning had constrained the SPJB to be developed become mass based organization and leadership. Instead, he pushed some activist leaders to be part of the SPP leadership. 

            SPP was declared in Garut, a small town, on January 24^th, 2000. Tens urban activists and around a thousand angry villagers from land grabbing cases in upland villages, in Garut, Tasikmalaya, and Ciamis districts, started to forge a new trajectory for their land struggle after they did bravely land occupation and other form of resistance against long domination of the SFC and private and state owned plantations. Peasant groups within the SPP are not a homogenous unit. The trajectory of each SPP chapter is unique.[21] In Sarimukti Village, Garut district, the emergence of the nexus between local leaders and urban activists was preceded by a case of village head corruption in 1998. As a part of social safety net mechanism, central government distributed free rice for poor people (program raskin), but the village head of Sarimukti illegally sold it outside the village. A local leader told this story to a student activist group (FPPMG) in Garut city. They decided to help villagers to make a protest-report to District Attorney office. The report led to an official investigation, and then the village head was criminalized for the corruption case. Because of that the villagers overthrow his position, and new interim village head was appointed by village council. A student activist followed up this successful action by some visits and discussions with local leaders. They started to realize that majority of the villagers are landless agricultural laborers who work for some individual landlords on daily basis. For five hours work a man get 8,000 rupiah (around a dollar), and a women get 6,000 rupiah (around 75 cent). Part of them cultivated forest-lands that under the control of the SFC. In each harvest time they paid tribute to SFC officers. The local leaders uncover the history of the way the SFC took over the forest-lands from villagers since 1980ies. The students brought his finding to the student group (FPPMG), and their leader, Agustiana, who just released from the jail because of Presidential amnesty (see previous story) started to set up a collective of local leaders to launch a boycott paying tribute, and to organize land occupation over the whole forest lands in the village. The SFC unexpectedly didn’t do any repressive action, and according my interview with the SFC officer, the SFC had tolerated them to use the land for agricultural purpose because of “economic crises”. 

Cikaso case, which covers 708 hectares of ex-private plantation land and five villages (Cigayam, Cikaso, Banjaranyar, Pasawahan and Kalijaya villages), erupted in 1997 when the SFC took over the plantation land that previously under the control of a private company, PT Raya Sugarindo Inti (RSI). When the SFC started to plant the whole area with teak, a group of twelve local leaders called Panitia Permohonan Tanah Cikaso (hereafter: Panitia) realized that the transfer of the land from the RSI to the SFC was legally problematic. A district parliament member from ruling political party informed the Panitia that there is no adequate legal basis for the SFC to control the land because the right to use (hak guna usaha) that the RSI got from government was expired, and as a consequence of it, the legal status of the land is unused land (tanah terantar). The Panitia made a request to Ciamis District Government to officially recommend the National Land Agency, which has an authority to decide the legal status of the land, to treat the land as a target of land redistribution. Members of the Panitia also made frequent discussions on possible ways to access the land with a group of student activist based in Ciamis city, Forum Aspirasi Rakyat dan Mahasiswa Ciamis (FARMACI). The Panitia was split after their chairperson declared his disagreement to follow what the activists suggested, to directly occupy the land. In mid 2000, majority of the Panitia members quit, set up the SPP chapter, and launched massive land occupation over 708 hectares. They used the moment after President Abdurrahman Wahid —known for his sympathies for NGO activism— made a public statement in the end May 2000 that dear to the hearts of many farmers. He said that it was not appropriate that the people were being accused of seizing land, because, “in fact, the plantations have stolen the land of the people. Taking land is not just talk” He then said, “some forty percent of plantation land should be shared with cultivators who need it. Moreover, people could even hold shares in the plantation itself,” and, “if all this time the nation has become rich from controlling and managing land and natural resources, than for the future, the people should enjoy the same benefits,” and even further, “if we are rich, we should be rich together and if we are fated to be poor, we should also be poor together.”[22] In 2001, the local SPPs in the five villages identified 1,432 villagers cultivated 708 ha ex-plantation land. Majority of them changed their class position from plantation workers to smallholders. Each members control around 0.5 hectare. In 2002 part of them started to move from their old settlement, build new community and settlement in their occupied lands, included to an SPP training center. 

Sindangasih case in Cikatomas, Tasikmalaya district is also different. The case was triggered by a confrontation between a group of villagers and plantation guards over access to a grassed land in 1999. The plantation claimed the land as part of their concession, but on the other hand the villagers confronted the claim and continuously used the land as a grassing area for herding their goats, lambs, buffalo and cows. The tension was broken into a confrontation after some plantation guards quarreled with a villager who herded his buffalos in that area. The guards seized him and his buffalos, and bring him to a plantation worker settlement (emplasemen) near the grassing area. He was released after sunset, and he told his family and neighbors about the ways the guards treated him, included some hits he got.  A day after a group of angry villagers took revenge. They went came to the plantation worker settlement to meet the guard.  This event brought local leaders meeting together, and discussing not only the case, but also competing claims between villagers and the plantation over the grassing land and other lands within the village. Aside from a plan to handle the case, they decided to send six leaders to meet some Cimanggu village leaders, which already joined the SPP since the beginning of 1999, to learn their way occupying plantation land that previously controlled by the same state-owned plantation. Aside sharing their story, the SPP local leaders in Cikupa village brought them to a student and youth activist group in Tasikmalaya city (FPMR) that in turn helped them to set up an SPP chapter in Sindangasih village. This connection led their struggle to a direct confrontation to the plantation through land occupation. Since 2000 the local SPP in Sindangasih village has succeeded to organize 800 families, included ex-plantation workers, to cut cocoa and rubber trees, occupied and cultivated 460 hectares land, changed its land use from plantation type to agricultural and agroforestry plots. 

After SPP was declared in Garut, subsequently in February 2000, several of the students and other youth activists and their organizations from Garut, and then also from Tasikmalaya and Ciamis districts, joined with rural local leaders from each of the districts to announce the formation of SPP, with Agustiana as Secretary General. The activists also built Yapemas (literally Foundation for Community Development), an NGO that would expand make to do support and strengthen the SPP. They developed a unique organizational structure that clearly exposes the relationship between activists and rural leaders (see: figure 1).

The local organizational structure is shaped by land occupation. In every area with a local chapter of SPP, a local leadership group was formed.  Each group had a head, a secretary, a treasurer, public relations, and a security guard. Many of these local SPP leaders, almost all of them are men, have had experience working and living in the city, some as salesmen in wholesale markets in Bandung and Jakarta.  Their urban connections are not far in the past, but are very recent and seem to have reduced their feelings of out-sized respect and submissiveness in the presence of land controllers, who increase their power through social relations.  More than that, in the city, especially in the traditional street markets, struggle through competition and bargaining are parts of everyday life.  These men became very aware of their influence and gained experiences, facing down official power-holders such as bureaucrats in the market and with police, and also with unofficial power-holders such as thugs or preman.  They developed their abilities to deal with these various powerful figures in very contentious places, i.e. the markets, with the police, the state officials, etc.  

With SPP, they used these abilities to develop their new leadership qualities, taking care of their membership, mobilizing and leading them in occupations, demonstrations, and confrontations with landed elites and their guards, including developing arguments to dispute control over land.  In addition, some of the local leaders of SPP expanded their leadership roles by getting formal positions, such as being elected to village councils and village heads, chosen directly by villagers.

Since 2000, SPP with twenty-six chapters in Garut districts, twenty-four chapters in Ciamis districts and six chapters in Tasikmalaya districts (the list is removed from the article, NFR) started become the most active, if not the biggest, rural movement organization in Java, that overtly challenge the government to carry out land reform on lands controlled by private and state-owned plantations and State Forest Company. 

 

In each land occupation case is never once and for all. The ways the occupants maintain their access and control to occupied lands and keep previous landlords away constantly are always in opposition to the ways the previous landlords to evict land occupiers.   It turned to produce what Sidney Tarrow, a prominent social movement scholar, call “cycle of contention” which is "a phase of heightened conflict across the social system: with a rapid diffusion of collective action from more mobilized to less mobilized sectors; a rapid pace of innovation in the forms of contention; the creation of new or transformed collective action frames; a combination of organized and unorganized participate; and sequences of intensified information flow and interaction between challengers and authorities. Such widespread contention produces externalities that give challengers at least a temporary advantage and allows them to overcome the weaknesses in their resource base. It demands that states devise broad strategies of response that are either repressive or facilitative, or a combination of the two" (Tarrow 1998:142). 

 

Linking Local Land Struggle with National Campaign for Agrarian Reform

In order to clarify my stand point in explaining the ways the SPP changes its social practice in relation to changing political spaces in multiple and interconnected sites of struggle, I need to start with Doreen Massey critique to Michel de Certeau characterization of tactic and strategy. De Certeau (1984) makes a key distinction between the ‘tactic’ that is more reliant on time, the actual moment, than is the concept of strategy. “De Certeau argued that a ‘tactic’ was a small lived practice, set in time, without any control over the context or space of practice in which it was taking place… ‘Strategy’ is more systematic … because instead of just a single moment, or a single practice, there is a more widespread and focused control over the space of the actions. Time is no longer the centerpiece; space is, as tactics accumulate into larger strategies (or immediate ‘opportunities’ in de Certeau’s language)”.  De Certeau formulates strategic practice as “the calculus of force-relationships which becomes possible when a subject of will and power … can be isolated from an “environment.” A strategy assumes a place that can be circumscribed as ‘proper’ (propre) and thus serve as the basis for generating relations with an exterior distinct from it” (De Certeau 1984:xix). On the other hand, tactics are “a calculus which can not count on a spatial or institutional localization … the place of tactic belong to the other. A tactic insinuates itself into the other’s place, fragmentarily, without taking it over in its entirety, without being able to keep it at a distance. It has at its disposal no base where it can capitalize on its advantages, prepares its expansions, and secure independence with respect to circumstances (De Certeau 1984:xix). So, de Certeau links "strategies" with institutions and structures of power, while "tactics" as “rushes” and “maneuvers” are utilized by individuals to create space for themselves in environments defined by strategies. 

Based on an understanding that de Certeau “equates strategy, the proper, the system of power, with space; while tactic – street politics of resistance – are equated with the temporal”, and “to retain ‘the structure’ as his conceptual starting point, and then recruit guerillas to attack it”, Massey (2000) criticizes the de Certeau binary partition, and argues that his oppositional characterization of the spatial and the temporal is “a wholly misconceived imaginary” and “made it difficult to think space actively and politically (p. 282-283). The spatial and the temporal should to be thought together, as necessary to each other (see Massey 2005 for an explication of this argument; for a new concise summary see Massey 2006). This relational view certainly seems “to open up the potential for the forefronting of the spatial (that is, the spatial configuration of power-imbued social relations) as an active force in the formulation and operation of dominance/resistance.” (Massey 2000:283). As a consequence of this view, the space of domination and the space of resistance are not treated in separation, but in relation one to another. “For if relationship are practice (they are processes, they are dynamic) so the spaces of domination/resistance which are active space of action, continually being made” (Massey 2000:284).

I find Massey critique is convincing as my departure. I have been also convinced by Henry Lefebvre idea that spatial struggles can only be understood if we fully conceive social space is “simultaneously both a field of action(offering its extension to the deployment of projects and practical intentions) and a basis of action (a set of places whence energies derive and whither energies are directed)” (Lefebvre [1974] 1991:191). Both Massey and Lefebvre theorizations enable me to argue that the SPP changes its social practices  over time in order to shape spaces that allow them to grow, and the SPP bases their actions on those spaces that are socially created. Aside from that, my thick connection with the SPP enables me to produce those arguments, especially it became visible on the following three moments: (a) the moment when the SPP had utilized the President Abdurahman Wahid speech that delegitimizes state and private owned plantation lands; (b) the formation of the 2001 People Consultative Assembly Decree on Agrarian Reform and Natural Resource Management, and (c) the changing local politics due to decentralization policy. The SPP overarching aim is to get legal recognition over their land occupation.  Their early strategy to link their local land struggle with national campaign for agrarian reform through the Konsorsium Pembaruan Agraria (KPA) is driven by this motive.

Abdurahman Wahid and Megawati Sukarnoputri was elected respectively as the President and Vice President of the Republik of Indonesia after Bacharuddin Jusuf Habibie’s accountability report, which was a report of what he had achieved during his presidency 1998-1999, was refused by the 1999 People Consultative Assembly meeting (Sidang Umum MPR).[23] Abdurahman Wahid was the chairman of Nadhatul Ulama, the biggest Islamic moderate organization in Indonesia, and Megawati Sukarnoputri, the daughter of Sukarno, is the leader of an oppositional political party (PDIP, Partai Demokrasi Indonesia Perjuangan)  during the last years of Suharto regime. Their leadership provided a tremendous leverage for various civil society campaigns. Some pro-agrarian reform leaders, included the KPA and the SPP leaders, separately made meetings with the President to convince him to implement land reform and make a radical change in managing land dispute affairs.[24]  The event after these meetings was surprising. President Abdurahman Wahid made a public statement dear to the hearts of many land-hungry farmers, in which he said that it was not appropriate that the people were being accused of seizing land, because, “in fact, the plantations have stolen the people’s land.” He then said, “some 40% of plantation land should be distributed to cultivators who need it.  Moreover, people could even hold shares in the plantation itself.”[25]  The statement is part of his opening speech for National Conference on Natural Resources (Konferensi Nasional Sumber Daya Alam), a conference initiated by some national NGOs in Jakarta, 23 May 2000.  This public statement was largely covered by newspapers, had tremendous impact on the flourishing land occupations over plantation and other state lands. The SPP activists made a special briefing for local leaders, and the local leader brought a bunch copy of newspaper clipping containing the statement to be spread in the SPP members in their villages. 

In my conversation with a local leader in Sindangasih case in Cikatomas, Tasikmalaya District, he shared his story on his plethora of emotion when he met and shacked hand with President Abdurahman Wahid. “If it is not because the SPP, I couldn’t meet with President Gus Dur (common nickname for President Abdurrachman Wahid)”. The local leaders in Sindangasih used the President public statement as one of arguments that justify their land occupation over the state owned plantation as an “halal” (lawful) action. The local leaders in Sindangasih, which most of them are also local Islamic religious leaders, made a special discussion about “halal” (lawful) or “haram” (unlawful)[26] to do the land occupation.  And, they decided the land occupation action is halal because they are taking the lands that were previously stolen by force from them. My first impression when I visited Sindangasih case and closely observed the ways local leaders have thought villagers about the importance of their land struggle, is that they have practiced a kind of “Islamic liberation theology”, which are dialectically shaped also by their situated struggle. The SPP and their local leadership were originally different entities, but in turn they are mutually constitutive.[27]

The President public statement had tremendous impact on the legitimization of the farmers’ reoccupation of plantation lands. The Director General of the Department of Forestry and Plantations estimated that as of September 2000, some 118,830 hectares of national estate land had been seized, along with 48,051 hectares of private estate lands (quoted in Koeswahyono 2001).

Another example that allows me to think about the changing practices of the SPP leaders is the ways the implementation of decentralization policy is reworked. Law No. 22/1999 on Regional Government^[28] states that a district-parliament is more powerful than a district-government. The consequence of this is a very real possibility of power struggles between the district-parliament and the district-government.[29] The SPP leader, Agustiana, approached the chairperson of Garut District Parliament (DPRD) to propose a join-workshop between the District-parliament and Consortium for Agrarian Reform (KPA). In August 2000 district-parliament chairpersons agreed to implement a joint training-workshop with KPA in addressing (a) a specific need of district-parliament members to understand the Law, which is complicated and contains new principles, rules and direction; and (b) to find ways to deal with discrepancies between district-parliament’s authorities defined in the new Law and the capacity of district-parliament’s members to perform, especially in the context of potential tensions and power struggles between district-parliaments with district-governments.[30]

In the training workshop sessions, many district-parliament members were quite angry about what they perceived to be the central government’s problem, such as land disputes, which they had “inherited” as a result of the decentralization law. They felt that Garut district had enjoyed none of the benefits of the government’s programs and policies, but were left “holding the bag” when the system ceased functioning. Another primary agenda of the training program was to address public discontent with the village government system or Desa which was perceived to be authoritarian and oriented toward the national bureaucracy. 

Two months after the parliamentary training program was completed, the district-parliament of Garut formed two special commissions, responsible for Land Conflict Resolution and Village Government Reform, respectively. The Village Government Reform Commission began its work first, studying and discussing a packet of draft district-regulation that had been prepared by the district-government. The Special Commission joined together with KPA and SPP to conduct a follow-up workshop to revise and improve the draft regulation. Two fundamental changes that were introduced into the language of the new regulation, as mandated by law No 22/1999, were (1) that the village or Desa is an autonomous entity, not structurally linked to the state government hierarchy; and (2) the formation of the village council, or Badan Perwakilan Desa whose members are to be elected. These changes were very much in keeping with the campaign undertaken by YAPEMAS and KPA to foster democratic institutions at the grass-roots level. Soon after the draft regulation was passed into law, many SPP local leaders submitted their nominations to run for village council members. In the ensuing elections, SPP members were able to win a majority of seats in some 30 of the nearly 300 Desa in Kabupaten Garut. This alone was not enough to counter the inherent conservatism of village government in the region.  In fact, conflict soon developed between some of the bureaucracy-oriented village heads and the village council, which led to stagnation and gridlock in many villages. These conflicts will probably reach a climax when the current village heads term expires, and new elections will be held. Only once these conflicts are resolved, will it become possible to alter the outlook and behavior of village government in the Garut region. 

The Special Commission on Land Dispute Resolution developed its operational framework at a workshop on Land Dispute Resolution held in November 2000. The process began with identification and investigation of outstanding cases, followed by an analysis of the factors that caused the conflicts in the first place, and that prevented their successful resolution. They encountered three basic types of conflict: (i) Conflicts between local farmers and State Forestry Company (Perum Perhutani); (ii) Conflicts between farmers and commercial plantation firms (both private and state owned); and (iii) Conflicts between citizens and the National Land Board, mostly cases of manipulation and graft.  The commission members were motivated by the awareness that if left unchecked, these conflicts would continue to erode the government’s legitimacy in the eyes of local communities. They were, however, also acutely aware of their limitations, particularly in the era of regional autonomy, given that the most powerful stakeholders in these conflicts – most prominently Ministry of Forestry and National Land Agency– were national government agencies. Under law, regional governments have no authority over contracts that have been granted by national government agencies, until the contract period expires. The role of district-parliament and government were further weakened when the government issued Presidential Decree No. 10 of 2001, perceived by many local politicians as being a retraction of district governments’ autonomy in managing land rights. The new decree basically annulled district governments’ authority as set out in Paragraph 7 of the 1999 Law No. 22 on Regional Government.  In spite of the fact that the Special Commission on Land Dispute Resolution cannot produce any specific district policies, their political role to register people claims over plantation and forest land and to assist local people to access those claimed lands are a significant achievement to empower SPP’s movement. They have became one of SPP’s important allies in the district-parliament. 

The third and last example that allows me to think about the ways the SPP changes its practice in order to shape spaces that allow them to grow is their engagement with the People Consultative Assembly Decrees No. IX/2001 on Agrarian Reform and Natural Resource Management (hereafter: TAP MPR No. IX/2001). This TAP MPR No. IX/2001 is phenomenal.[31] For the first time, after more than two decades of activism, agrarian reform entered to an official stage through this decree since 2001. According to the Decree agrarian reform is defined as “a continuous process relating to the reorganization of control, ownership, use and exploitation of agrarian resources that is carried out in order to achieve legal certainty and protection as well as justice and prosperity for all Indonesian people.”  It is unfortunate that the Decree did not mention about the Basic Agrarian Law 1960 which until now has provided the legal basis for the implementation of land reform, and makes a bold separation without any substantial integration between policy directions on agrarian reform[32], and policy directions on natural resource management[33]. This allows the ceaseless debate, and tension, between pro- and contra- the Decree within agrarian reform activists. The debate centers on whether this decree will be beneficial or dangerous for the agrarian reform movement. The KPA believe that the Decree can be used as a tool to extend the effects of the agrarian movement and push the government to implement agrarian reform. At the same time, the Indonesian Federation of Peasant Unions (FSPI) view the decree as dangerous, a potential entryway for a neo-liberal agenda, with potentially negative implications in abrogating the Basic Agrarian Law of 1960 — the only existing law which have strong agrarian justice principles and spirits.[34]

Before the TAP MPR No. IX/2001 was released the KPA and the FSPI had jointed hand. But after that, these two agrarian movement organizations have taken different ways. Looking at the moment that made them walking different pathways allows me to think that signification and positionality matters. The FSPI as the only member of the Via Campesina in Indonesia fully adopt and amplify Via Campesina’s global frame “struggle against neoliberalism and imperialism” and “agrarian reform for food sovereignty”. Their critiques to the Decree is situated by the ways they employ that frame, and by their positioning to do “global campaign for agrarian reform” though local and national cases.

SPP, which is the biggest member of the FSPI, had taken different position. SPP is rooted in local struggle, and since the SPP declaration in 2000, the SPP leaders had deeply engaged in discussing how to promote agrarian reform agenda to MPR.   They involved with KPA’s effort in strategizing campaign and approaching political leaders from different political parties. KPA in turn submitted a proposal to the MPR ad hoc committee that have an authority to set up agendas and preparing concept papers for the MPR meeting.[35] The ad hoc committee decided to discuss the proposal in the 2000 MPR Assembly Meeting (Sidang Umum MPR RI), but then in the 2000 the committee put the proposal down based on an argument that the existing laws and regulations is adequate enough to deal with land and agrarian issues, and KPA proposal was conceived unrealistic. In early 2001, KPA strategically responded this with initiating an expert group (KSPA, Kelompok Studi Pembaruan Agraria) composed by NGO activists and prominent agrarian scholars, included some professors from Bogor Agricultural University and Gajah Mada University.  

Under the leadership of Maria Soemarjono, an agrarian law professor from Gajah Mada University, KSPA approached the Ad Hoc Committee, and in turn submitted a concept paper “Fundamental Principles for Agrarian Reform” in their internal workshop 26 April 2001.[36] Then the ad hoc committee also officially invited members of KSPA to give some talks and present papers to their workshop 14-16 September 2001 in a luxurious hotel in Bandung city. When the workshop was started, The KSPA members, included some NGO activists, were surprised that the ad hoc committee also has a plan to make a separate Decree on Natural Resource Management. This led some NGO activist made a protest because they feel it was a fait a compli, and both draft was substantially overlapped. In the mid of this tension, the SPP leaders mobilized some 10,000 peasants, from Garut, Tasikmalaya, and Ciamis Districts, to support the KSPA proposal for the MPR decree on agrarian reform and plan to come into the ad hoc committee meeting place. But they were blocked by a police line at Cicalengka, a small city some 30 km from Bandung.  Negotiations then took place at two locations, on the road to Cicalengka—between the leaders of SPP with the police; and in Bandung between NGO activists who were participants and resource people in the workshop, and the legislators participating there.  Subsequently, it was decided that the leaders of the ad hoc committee would go out to where the peasants were in Cicalengka, rather than having a huge group of protesters go into Bandung.  When they got to Cicalengka, the committee chair from the MPR, Rambe Kamaruzzaman, in front of the masses promised to resign if the decree was not passed.  SPP’s active influence on the People’s Consultative Assembly Decree did not stop there.  When the People’s Consultative Assembly had its annual meeting on 7 November 2001, a group from SPP mobilized about a thousand people to demonstrate in Jakarta, joint with around a hundred of local leaders and activists from National Indigenous Peoples’ Association (AMAN, Aliansi Masyarakat Adat Nusantara)[37] and to give voice to the need for the People’s Consultative Assembly to pass the decree on agrarian reform.^[38]  Through these actions, SPP showed itself to be in support of the new People’s Consultative Assembly Decree No. IX/2001 on Agrarian Reform and Natural Resource Management.

The issuance of the Decree No. IX/2001 had strategic meaning for SPP. Meanwhile KPA, working with a number of NGOs in the NGO Working Group for Agrarian Reform and Natural Resource Management (Pokja PAPSDA), had busily campaigned to push national government to follow up the Decree, local SPP leaders had used the decree to justify their land occupations. At that time, at the local level the decree has became a powerful tool to fight against their opponents – such as plantation and/or forest managers – and to negotiate with the local bureaucracy and the police. Everywhere that there were land dispute cases, the SPP leaders show them the Decree in order to disempower their opponent’s claim over the occupied lands through calling that the national policy over disputed lands will be on their side. 

 

Conclusion

After providing background on the emergence of the SPP and their situated practices in relation to the changing political spaces, I argue, the SPP gives us following lessons: (a) to exemplify the ways the peasant/agrarian movement organization has been built through a nexus of the two different types of intellectuals (rural local leader and urban activists) and dispossessed peasants who have occupied lands that was previously controlled by the SFC and private/state owned plantation. This nexus “is provided by an organic cohesion in which feeling-passion become understanding and thence knowledge (not mechanically but in a way that is alive)” use Gramsci (1971:418); and (b) to revive contentious agrarian politics in the multiple and interrelated site of struggle through their scalar collective actions. The backbone of the SPP as an agrarian movement organization is rural local leaders and urban activists. What the organized rural villagers did in local level is a disruptive and confrontational challenge against the SFC and private/state owned plantation though land occupation in various places in West Java. Because of the role of rural local leaders and urban activists, especially through their network with other movement actors, these land occupation actions are amplified to other sites of contestation and negotiations.[39]

The ways the SPP leaders to seize and in turn shape political spaces in order to allow them to grow are sophisticated. The SPP leaders are not “transnational activists” as defined by Sydney Tarrow,[40] those who are analyzed by Edelman (2008) relying on Via Campesina’s leaders.[41] They are well informed about the transnational agrarian movement discourse on anti-neoliberalism, anti-imperialism, pro agrarian reform and food sovereignty. Some of them have engaged in transnational fora. But, different with the FSPI leaders they are refused to be an amplifier of those discourses. Their strategic practices are oriented to change national and local political spaces that in turn allow their members to continue land occupation, to securely access occupied lands, and to make SPP stronger. In this sense, they are committed to have been making mass politics and place-based struggle, which is material as well as symbolic. 

 

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*) Noer Fauzi is is a PhD candidate in the Department of Environmental Science, Policy and Management (ESPM) at the University of California, Berkeley. He was co-founder and the Head of the Executive Board of Consortium for Agrarian Reform (KPA, Konsorsium Pembaruan Agraria) for two term (1995-1998 and 1999-2002). KPA is a national wide non-governmental organization (NGO) network in Indonesia, which campaigns for agrarian reform policy and strengthening people organizations.

**) The author thanks Nancy Peluso, Kate O’Neil, Louise Fortmann, Gillian Hart, Michael Watts, and my fellow “Land Lab” students in Society and Environment Division, Department of ESPM, at the UC Berkeley. This paper is a product of my dissertation research.

[1] By the term “rural local leaders” or “local leaders” I refer to leaders of peasant communities who lives in villages and have the function to lead their land struggles.

[2] By the term “urban educated activists” or “activists” I refer to students activist as well as non-governmental (NGO) activists who have been involved in various aspect of organizing peasant communities and of campaign for agrarian reform and other agendas. 

[3] Different with traditional intellectual such as students, teachers, philosophers, priests, and other functionaries who had work directly based on their particular position, organic intellectuals are embedded within every social grouping. Gramsci explains that “(E)very social group coming into existence on the original terrain of an essential function in the world of economic production, creates together with itself, organically, one or more strata of intellectuals which give it homogeneity and an awareness of its own function not only in the economic but also in the social and political fields” (1971:5).

[4] Turner and Caouette (2009a, 2009b) suggest that in order to grasp adequately contemporary rural resistance in Southeast Asia we need using a multi-scalar approach in order to capture the diversity of forms of contemporary rural struggle; we must respect multiple, complex and diversified form of collective actions; and we must recognize the centrality of agency in analyzing those struggle.

[5] In line with the current interpretation of primitive accumulation as on-going processes (Angelis 2001, Perelman 2000), Farid argues, “I do not wish to suggest that capitalism in Indonesia began in 1965. One should understand primitive accumulation as something which, besides forming the starting point of capitalism, returns again and again, as the basis or basic precondition which is necessary for further phases of capital accumulation. It recurs particularly in a time of crisis when it becomes an obstacle to the reproduction of the system.” (2005a:9-10)

[6] KPA (1995) published a position paper to portrait various form of brutal repression and deceitful manipulation in land grabbing cases. The brutal repression includes to conduct systematic intimidation, terror, and torture against villagers, bulldozing village settlement and agricultural plots, isolating land dispute area and villagers from others, arresting farmer leaders, using land dispute areas as military training ground, etc. The deceitful manipulation include to declare the fakeness of people’s land title and other documentations, to label the people who demand their rights as communist, subversive, anti-development, etc., to manipulate villagers’ signatures, to unilaterally determine the value of compensation, to hinder farmer’s report on criminal actions of their opponents, etc.

[7] Such as LBH Bandung, LBH Nusantara, and Lembaga Pendidikan dan Pengembangan Pedesaan (LPPP) and Komite Pembelaan Mahasiswa untuk Rakyat Indonesia (KPMURI).

[8] Because of sarcastic caricatures of the President of Republic Indonesia and the First Lady in the poster-calendar the national police and the attorney general declared that the artist committed to criminal subversive act for his contempt for president. To prevent further repression, the artist cum activist went to underground. The unintended consequence of this government action was the increasing public attention to authoritarian practices of government, police, and military apparatus in land dispute cases. 

[9] This is parallel to “go-down campaign” (turun ke bawah) where forty-six Indonesia Communist Party’s cadres cum researchers went to West Java villages to doing “participatory research” on agrarian conditions and peasant movements in the mid of 1960ies (Aidit 1964, Mortimer 1972, White 2005).

[10] Tarrow defines ‘rooted cosmopolitans’ as “individuals and groups who mobilize domestic and international resources and opportunities to advance claims on behalf of external actors, against external opponents, or in favor of goals they hold in common with transnational allies” (2005, 29).

[11] For Gramsci, ‘common sense’ comprises the "diffuse, uncoordinated features of a general form of thought common to a particular period and a particular popular environment" (Gramsci 1971:330n). He emphasizes the nature of ‘common sense‘ as "a chaotic aggregate of disparate conceptions, and one can find there anything one likes" (Gramsci 1971:422). It is "an ambiguous, contradictory and multiform concept" and "crudely neophobe and conservative" (Gramsci 1971:423).

[12] After the Indonesia President, Soeharto, set up the National Human Right Commission (hereafter the Commission) in 1991 to accommodate domestic and international pressures over gross human right violations, the Commission became another destination of the land protesters. According its yearly reports, the Commission handled 101 land cases in 1994,168 in 1995 and 327 in 1996, 351 in 1997, and 339 in 1998. The land cases became the top issue in those all years (the other issues are labor, government official misconduct, housing, religion, and miscellaneous issues). (Komnasham 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999). A human right NGO codify 891 land expropriation cases in twenty-seven months since July 1994 until September 1996 from twenty-eight national and local newspapers (Yapusham 1997).

[13] Social movement literatures employ Goofman (1974) notion on framing to conceptualize various signifying works or meaning constructions (Gamson et al 1982, Snow et al 1986, Snow & Benford 1988), that is, “they frame, or assign meaning to interpret relevant events and conditions in ways that are intended to mobilize potential adherents and constituents, to garner bystander support, and to demobilize antagonists’’ (Snow and Benford 1988: 198). The resultant products of this framing activity within the social movement arena are referred to as ‘‘collective action frames.’’ (Snow 2004:384). This denotes “

[14] Two years after the first congress, KPA working together with the Publishing Unit of Economic Department of University of Indonesia, published this study in a book titled “Reformasi Agraria: Perubahan Politik, Sengketa, dan Agenda Pembaruan Agraria di Indonesia” See, Bachriadi et al (1997). 

[15] The YLBHI calls it reclaiming (reclaiming), which emphasizes rights to take back the grabbed lands (Wijardjo and Perdana 2001).

[16] Wiradi writes, “Almost all agrarian reforms has been carried out under government benevolence, so that as soon as the government’s awareness (of its importance) changes, then all the positive things created by agrarian reform are erased. Indeed, there is one government that has carried out agrarian reform fairly and sincerely for the sake of many people. However, as soon as that government changes, the new power elites can change directions and reverse the situation. This can be true even when reform is born through a revolution, as was the case in Mexico, for example. That political benevolence is what Powelson and Stock have called “reform by-grace.” Such reform is not “sustainable” because it depends on what Yushiro Hayami calls “the political market.” Thus, what is needed is a reform that is based on people empowerment. Or what Powelson and Stock call, “land reform by leverage.” Thus in any “political market” when the peasants/little people are not in a strong bargaining position, the results of previous reform will not be so easy to reverse.” (Wiradi 1997:41)

[17] This mandate was inspired by Christodoulou’s idea that “(a)grarian reform is the offspring of agrarian conflict” (Christodoulou 1990:112). 

[18] See: Keputusan Menteri Negara Agraria/Kepala Badan Pertanahan Nasional No. 35-VI-1997.

[19] Based on deep interviews with local elders Lukmanurdin (2002) provides an excellent account focusing on the long trajectory of struggle and repression since colonial time, and changing challenges they faced over time. He also laid out the centrality of what I call place-based tactical repertoires such as doing land occupation, cultivating agricultural/agroforestry plots, and the ways those were connected to other tactics such as making protest action and statement/petition and sending delegation to government offices that were run in cooperation with student and NGO activists in cities.

[20] They were part of rural community organizer network anchored by Indonesia Partnership for the Development of Human Resources in Rural Areas (InDHRRA-Bina Desa), human right activist network anchored by the Center of Human Right Information and Education (Pusat Informasi dan Pendidikan Hak Asasi Manusia), independent labor union network anchored by the Indonesian Labor Welfare Union (Serikat Buruh Sejahtera Indonesia),  gender and rural development network anchored by Kalyanamitra Women, and last but not least, a newly declared political party, Partai Uni Demokrasi Indonesia.

[21] In 2004 I had a privilege to guide a team of seven SPP activists to produce a guidebook for SPP local leaders, later published as Supriadi et al (2005) Gerakan Rakyat untuk Pembaruan Agraria, Gerak Langkah Serikat Petani Pasundan (literally “People Movement for Agrarian Reform, Footsteps of Sudanese Peasant Union”). I helped them in designing methods and steps of inquiry and writing to produce the book, assisting and supervising them to follow the steps, and editing what they wrote. An essential step that we decided to follow was to produce grounded stories on the ways local leader and their communities paved ways into the SPP through deep interviews to local leaders and focused group discussions with local leaders. The most puzzling question that I urged them to ask was under what circumstances the local leaders made connection to student activists that led them into the SPP. We had unpublished thirty-one stories out of sixty SPP’s working areas in Garut, Tasikmalaya and Ciamis districts, simply based on accessibility where each member of the team responsible to do inquiry and writing stories (Fauzi 2004).

[22] Speech of the President of the Republic of Indonesia at the National Conference on Natural Resources (Konferensi Nasional Sumber Daya Alam), organized by national NGOs in Jakarta, 23 May 2000. See Kompas and Republika headlines, 24 May 2003. 

[23] Habibie was sworn in as President right after Suharto resignation on 21 May 1998 because of political discontent, financial crises and the loss of elite support. As a transitional period, Habibie’s one and a half years are filled by various important and also controversial steps, among others, conducting a referendum in East Timor case which led to East Timorese Independence, conducting free election for parliament members (national, province and district) with forty-eight political parties, increasing significantly agricultural credits from 344,3 million rupiah (1997/1998) to 4 billion rupiah (1998/1999). Because his accountability report was rejected, he withdrew his nomination for presidential election. See van Dijk (2001).

[24] Two notable meeting held in April 20000 are (a) Four NGO leaders (Hendro Sangkoyo, Dani Munggoro, Chalid Muhammad and Noer Fauzi) met President Abdurahman Wahid in the presidential palace to inform about the chronic agrarian/natural resource management issues. The President requested them to make a briefing paper to his cabinet on immediate task to solve agrarian and natural resource issues; (b) Agustiana, some activist and SPP local leaders met Presiden Abdurahman Wahid to specifically request the President make a legislation that legalize their occupied lands. The President requested them to propose a draft for Presidential Decision on Agrarian Reform.

[25] See for example: Kompas and Republika headlines, May 24, 2003 (in Bahasa Indonesia).

[26] “Halal” is an Arabic/Islamic teaching term, which means lawful or permitted. Sometimes it is translated as acceptable or not forbidden. The opposite of “halal” is “haram”, which means unlawful or prohibited. Sometimes it is translated as unacceptable or forbidden.

[27] After some scholars, included me, spent two days and a night in 2003 to learn about their land struggle, we had discussed about the central role of these local leaders, their unique connection to urban activists, and their deep organizing works. The Sindangasih case makes those factors are visible in relation to our curiosity to understand the durability of social movement. See Afiff et al (2005) for a full report on this visit and its context. 

[28] Law No. 22/1999 on regional government replacing law No. 9/1974 on regional government and law No. 9/1979 on village government. One of the most important aspects of the previous system of government was the extension of government control to the village level, embodied in Law No. 5 of 1979 on Village Government. Under Law No. 22 of 1999 on Regional Government, villages now have the right to remove themselves from the state structure to become more autonomous and democratic units, For a larger account on the village autonomy and democratization under decentralization policy in Indonesia, see: Antlov (2004).

[29] According to Lay (2000), this possibility stems from (a) the inclusion of new members who are not from the same socio-economic groups as entrenched local government leaders – and who might not share the same views, use the same language and symbols – i.e., individuals who are not the traditional “partners” of the local bureaucratic elite. Disagreement was almost unheard of under the previous system, when the legislative and executive members of regional government all derived from (or who quickly integrated into) the same ruling “clique.” Currently, there is a multiplicity of voices and viewpoints represented in the parliament that will inevitably lead to a measure of disagreement and conflict; (b) Many of the new generation of politicians hail from the NGO and student movements, who experienced discrimination and suppression during the New Order period. A measure of residual enmity from that era still pertains; (c) Many of the new politicians represent social groups who were marginalized or victimized during the past three decades, and their attitude toward more entrenched political actors is often influenced by bitter experience; As well (d), the new generation of politician tends to view their elite counter-parts in the bureaucracy as thieves and rogues, who cannot be trusted; Meanwhile, (e) most of the bureaucrats and officials from the executive branch are far more experienced at the “rules of the game” and political maneuverings than their counterparts in the legislature, and can be contemptuous of what they view as inexperienced upstarts.

[30] KPA believes that democratizing decentralization involves redefining the roles and performance of district-parliamentary bodies. KPA’s approach to this is through capacity development of local parliament members, carried out in conjunction with grass-roots community organizing. The strategy set out by Zakaria et.al. (2001:126-127) comprises the following steps: (i) collaboration with district-parliamentarians to accurately assess constraints, opportunities, resources, and capabilities. This is intended to produce an awareness of capacity-building needs, and a willingness to take necessary steps to address these needs. The process stresses engendering a willingness (and an ability) to analyze and support the wishes of local communities; while (ii) increasing local communities’ access to parliamentary members and processes, so that the parliamentary body becomes more responsive to the needs and desires of its constituents. Forging strong ties between local communities and their legislators is a key component of this strategy. For critical analysis on the relationship between decentralization and democracy, see: Hadiz (2004).

[31] Rosser et al uses the policy making process of this TAP MPR to argue that “the post-Suharto era has opened up limited opportunities for poor and disadvantaged groups to participate more in and exert greater influence over the policy-making process at the national level” (2005:55). 

[32] Six policy directions on agrarian reform were mandated to the President of Republic of Indonesia, together with the National Parliament (DPR), i.e.: 

a.      To review on legislation relating to agrarian policy to synchronize inter-sector policy.

b.     To rearrange control, ownership, use and exploitation of land (land reform) to deliver justice by prioritizing land ownership by the people, both in rural and urban areas.

c.      To conduct data collection on land through inventory and registration of land control, ownership, use and exploitation in a comprehensive and systematic process in the framework of land reform implementation.

d.     To settle conflicts relating to agrarian resources arising to this time while at the same time anticipating potential conflict in the future.

e.      Strengthen institutions and their authority to conduct agrarian reform and to settle disputes relating to agrarian resources.

f.      Ensure the availability of funding for agrarian reform program and for the resolution of conflicts relating to agrarian resources.

[33] In separate part the Decree also mandated six policy directions on natural resource management to the President of Republic of Indonesia, together with the National Parliament (DPR), i.e. 

a.      To review regulations relating to management of natural resources to synchronize the intersector policy.

b.     To optimize natural resource use through the identification and inventory of quality and quantity and potential for national development.

c.      To expand access of information to society about natural resource potential in their regions and encourage the establishment of social responsibility to use environmental friendly technology including traditional technology.

d.     To pay attention to the types and characteristics of various natural resources and implement efforts to add value to these natural resources.

e.      To settle conflicts on natural resource use and anticipate potential conflict in the future.

f.      To develop a strategy to use natural resources based on optimal use by paying attention to regional and national interests and conditions. 

[34] This debate unfolded in Kompas, Indonesia’s largest national newspaper. See Idham Samudera Bey, "Lonceng Kematian UUPA 1960 Berdentang Kembali - Menyoal TAP MPR No IX/MPR/2001," Kompas, 10 January 2002; Dianto Bachriadi, "Lonceng Kematian atau Tembakan Tanda Start? Kontroversi seputar Ketetapan MPR RI No. IX/MPR/2001 - Komentar untuk Idham Samudra Bey", Kompas, 11 January 2002; Idham Samudra Bey, “UUPA 1960 Lebih Baik Dibandingkan RUU Pengelolaan Sumber Daya Alam” Kompas, 10 May 2003.

[35] KPA proposes eleven agenda for People Assembly Decree on Agrarian Reform: (1) to correct old agrarian laws and produce new law responsive to people demands; (2) to review the concept of State’s Right to Control over all Land (Hak Menguasai dari Negara) which opens possibility for the ruling regime to abuse their authority; (3) to correct legal and institutional sectoralism related to land and natural resources; (4) to revise the concept of homogenization of resource tenure (land, forest, coastal and other resources); (5) to strictly apply ceiling (particular upper limit) over total land controlled by private company enterprise and a group of company; (6) to improve tenancy security for agricultural laborer, and poor peasants; (7) to recover political, sovereignty and identity rights of rural people to freely have their independent organizations, to treat fairly all rural organization, and to respects the diversity of people organizational culture; (8) to resolve all agrarian dispute and conflict caused by the previous government regime; (9) to restructuring agricultural production; (10) to set up independent agrarian court; and (11) to set up a special government institution to implement agrarian reform agendas. (“Usulan Ketetapan Majelis Permusyawaratan Rakyat Republik Indonesia tentang Pelaksanaan Pembaruan Agraria (Reforma Agraria)”, dalam KPA (2000) Usulan Ketetapan MPR Republik Indonesia tentang Pembaruan Agraria (Reforma Agraria), Pp.. 6-9.

[36] This paper is “Pokok-pokok Pikiran Pembaruan Agraria” (Fundamentals of Agrarian Reform) which was a main source for article 2 and 5 of the MPR Decree No. IX/2001 on Agrarian Reform and Natural Resource Management. Later, the paper was published in Sumarjono (2008:69-77).

[37] AMAN (officially translated as Indigenous Peoples Alliance of the Archipelago) was formally established in 1999 at a national meting in Jakarta. Their social origin generally related to the politic of forest resource extraction and territorialization, and repression during the authoritarian regime. Their social bases is mostly peasant and traditional local leaders in Outer Java-Islands (Sumatera, Kalimantan, Sulawersi, Molucas, Bali, West and East Nusa Tenggara, and Papua). They started with a strong demand to be recognized as masyarakat adat  (literally customary based people, the term they use for Indigenous Peoples). Their famous motto is: If the State do not recognize us, We will not recognize the State. See.  Li (200,2001,2004).

[38] For detail reportage, see  http://www.tempo.co.id/harian/fokus/76/2,1,15,id.html, in Bahasa Indonesia. Last downloaded on 09/23/2009.

[39] Peluso et al recently argues that “the trajectories and strategies of ‘new’ agrarian movements need to be understood in relation to those of environmental movements and the positioning and power relations of both set of movements within shifting political economic conjunctures” (2008:377).

[40] ‘Transnational activists’ according to Tarrow, are “people and groups who are rooted in specific national contexts, but who engage in contentious political activities that involve them in transnational networks of contracts and conflicts” (2005, 29).

[41] The best introduction on Via Campesina is Desmarais (2002, 2007, 2008).