ABSTRACT
The Indonesian term adat means ‘custom’ or ‘tradition’, and carries connotations of sedate order and consensus. Yet in the last few years it has suddenly become associated with activism, protest, and violent conflict. Since the resignation of President Suharto in 1998 after almost a third of a century of authoritarian rule, communities and ethnic groups across Indonesia have publicly, vocally, and sometimes violently, demanded the right to implement elements of adat or hukum adat (customary law) in their home territories. In the name of adat, Balinese villagers have rejected ‘megatourism’ development projects and, in an atmosphere of mounting xenophobia, revived customary regulations forbidding the sale of land to outsiders and denying residence in the village to anyone not participating in its Hindu religious life. In the name of adat, a cultural and political awakening among the long-marginalized Dayaks of West Kalimantan has spawned a self-empowerment movement and led to mass violence against migrants to the province. In the name of adat, small-scale farmers in Sulawesi and Flores have challenged the legitimacy of national park boundaries, while local elites have hijacked the growing potency of adat for personal gain. In the name of adat, long-dormant sultanates, from Sumatra to the Moluccas, have suddenly been revived. In the name of adat, Jakarta-based and regional activists have combined forces to form Indonesia’s first national indigenous peoples’ lobby: AMAN or Aliansi Masyarakat Adat Nusantara – literally, the ‘Archipelagic Alliance of Adat Communities’. ‘If the state will not acknowledge us’, declared AMAN provocatively at its first general congress in 1999, ‘then we will not acknowledge the state’.
