Fixing the Route of Citizenship Transformation for Indigenous Communities and Reinforcing the Existence of the Nation-State

Noer Fauzi Rachman**)

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The realization of the Indonesian independence proclamation commitment, that “matters concerning the transfer of power and others are carried out carefully and as quickly as possible,” has taken a long and winding road, especially when it comes to the process described by Clifford Geertz (1963) as the transformation of primordial sentiments from “old societies” in the context of the existence of a “new state.” The new state has a great project to build national integration, including through the development of national consciousness among the population as a whole. As illustrated by Wignjosoebroto (2002:500),

“… the existence of a nation-state – as a state built and upheld by its people – will not be determined by the presence or absence of ethnic identities in it, but will be greatly determined by the presence of individuals who still want to integrate there with the citizenship identity they have chosen, regardless of their ancestral origins.”

In reality, as seen in Indonesia’s experience under the New Order regime, the government’s way of governing how national consciousness is held by the population with primordial identities is done through coercion and social engineering, including through development projects by the government and giant companies working with concessions of land, mining, plantations, forestry obtained from the central government. What occurs is a process of transplantation, not transformation, of national imperatives imposed on the primordial sentiments of local communities. Ironically, the transplantation process results in chronic citizenship problems, such as the lack of a comfortable route for the “old societies” to integrate into the Indonesian nation-state.

The Guided Democracy and New Order regimes inherited ways in which the government governed the population by emphasizing their social obligations rather than fulfilling the civil, political, and socio-economic rights of the citizens (Rajawali Foundation: 2010, 2011). Bureaucrats in the Reform era continue to act as rulers and act arbitrarily, exacerbating citizenship issues for rural populations, including those referred to in the 1945 Constitution as “customary law communities” (hereinafter referred to as indigenous communities).

Indigenous communities have specific characteristics as rural populations living in a particular area for generations with a unique cultural system and customary rules that bind social relationships among various social groups within. In addition to how indigenous communities identify themselves (self-identification), they are also bound by how other parties, especially the State and all its apparatus, treat them.

These indigenous communities are one of the direct groups of people who have become victims and suffer due to the granting of mining, forestry, and plantation concessions that have been ongoing since the New Order regime came to power in 1967. The granting of these concessions, which include some or all of the land, natural resources, and areas managed by indigenous communities, is perceived by the indigenous communities as a deprivation of some conditions necessary for their survival. When indigenous communities reject this deprivation, direct or indirect agrarian conflicts arise. In this case, agrarian conflict can be understood as disputes over a piece of land, territory, and natural resources between indigenous communities and other local communities, with large land-owning bodies, especially those engaged in production, extraction, and conservation businesses, and the conflicting parties strive to eliminate each other’s claims directly or indirectly. The main source of agrarian conflict is the decisions of public officials to include land, natural resources, and areas managed by communities in concessions granted to these giant companies. In this context, indigenous communities are needed as burdened populations, treated as objects, and not treated as citizens with all the rights fulfilled by the State.

The demand of indigenous communities to obtain recognition of their existence and traditional rights attached to them, as clearly articulated by the previous AMAN motto “if the State does not recognize us, we do not recognize the State,” and the new AMAN motto “If the State is not with us, we still sovereign over our land and waters”, according to the author, needs to be deeply understood and taken seriously. AMAN’s demands and struggles for the State to recognize the existence of indigenous communities along with securing basic rights for the continuity of the existence of these communities are a call for officials and state bodies to fulfill their constitutional obligations: “to protect all Indonesian citizens and the entire Indonesian bloodline and to advance the welfare of the people” for the purpose of “realizing social justice for all the people of Indonesia.”

It is not difficult to understand that the struggle carried out by AMAN is a struggle to achieve social justice. The author’s main arguments, first, besides advocating for social justice, AMAN also advocates for the rights of citizenship of indigenous communities within the Indonesian nation-state; Second, the struggle for social justice and citizenship is primarily shaped by how the central government bodies of the Republic of Indonesia