Legal reform cannot be left to just anyone. It requires actors with specific capacities and qualities capable of implementing legal reform in a focused, systematic, effective, and efficient manner to maintain and/or restore units of popular sovereignty. These actors must be bound by a concrete and clear mandate from those who grant it—that is, the people themselves, organized within communities.
Relevance to HuMa
In its preamble, HuMa was established to help realize a just social order through a system of natural resource management that places people as both the primary actors and focal points. This is manifested in the role of *Pendamping Hukum Rakyat* (PHR), or People’s Legal Advocates. PHRs are “individuals who work within social movements to empower people’s legal resources and/or advocate for legal reform toward social and ecological justice.” Simply put, a PHR is an advocate for the people’s law, where “law” here includes not only state law but also local and customary laws. The term People’s Legal Advocate reflects a commitment to the people.
There are five fundamental characteristics a PHR must possess: 1.) Emphasizing the rights of indigenous and local communities to land and natural resources as the primary focus of PHR activities; 2.) Affirming the need for autonomous spaces for exercising these rights as a necessary condition; 3.) Advocating for the existence of local laws as a sufficient condition for implementing the rights of indigenous and local communities over land and resources; 4.) Centering indigenous and local communities as the targets and subjects of PHR efforts; and 5.) Utilizing rights-based and participatory approaches and methods.
To fulfill their roles, PHRs must have various core competencies, including the ability to conduct social and legal analysis using tools like legal pluralism, critical legal studies, human rights values, and humanitarian principles, as well as practical skills to restore law to the people.
Mobilization Strategy
In addition to the PHR school as a platform for creating legal reform actors, the approach that needs strengthening includes empowerment work that involves critical education and organizing, as well as reinforcing customary/people’s/local laws through natural resource law reform. In other words, connecting the work of PHR with the work of natural resource law reform.
If mobilization is carried out with thorough studies and national-level advocacy, the social movement of PHR can be established. Based on the defined core competencies, PHRs are expected to operate within their smallest units, such as communities, people’s organizations, tribes, hamlets, and villages, moving toward a larger movement. These units will gradually connect with other similar units to expand the movement and reclaim legal reform in Indonesia.
