ABSTRACT
It was inevitable that with the erosion of central control following the fall of Suharto local voices would reassert themselves. The New Order’s crash development programmes had after all paid little heed to local sensibilities and left a powerful residue of grievance and resentment in many communities. ‘Localism’ is in this sense a backlash against a heavily centralized system of politics and resource exploitation. It has been manifest variously as a drive for independence from Indonesia, autonomy within Indonesia, and greater representation for local ethnic groups (putera daerah) in regional governments. In some parts of Indonesia, mostly outside of Java, we have also seen groups asserting the right to regulate themselves and the natural resources in their area, according to a variety of customary practices and values known collectively as ‘adat’. It is this last trend, often referred to as ‘adat revivalism’, that this book is concerned with.
