ABSTRACT
One of the impacts of globalisation is the increase of movement of people which leads to the rise of transnational marriages, in this case between Indonesian citizens and foreign nationals. Indonesian laws, which are mostly developed from a patriarchal perspective, have generally disadvantaged women, who become ‘invisible’ in respect to their rights as Indonesian citizens. This situation has improved, but discriminative laws against Indonesian women who are married to foreigners still exist. This paper examines the discrimination against Indonesian women married to foreigners, in their application for land ownership rights. Women have different rights, and they are not ‘equal before the law’ in Indonesia because of their transnational marital status. These women stand to lose their land ownership rights unless a notarised prenuptial agreement has been established prior to their marriage. With the focus on women as the subjects, this research adopts multicultural feminism and feminist legal theory perspectives, and applies qualitative methods which include in-depth interviews and participant observation. As a researcher and an Indonesian woman who is married to a foreigner, the author is also involved in the community and is experiencing the direct implication of the cause. By presenting the insights and experiences of Indonesian women as part of the women’s movement, this research may contribute to changing the existing discriminative laws in Indonesia, and bring the laws in line with changes caused by the rapid mobility of people as part of the globalisation.
