Political and Legal Transformations of an Indonesian Polity is a long-term study of the historical transformations of the Minangkabau polity of nagari, property relations and the ever-changing dynamic relationships between Minangkabau matrilineal adat law, Islamic law and state law. While the focus is on the period since the fall of President Suharto in 1998, the book charts a long history of political and legal transformations before and after Indonesia's independence, in which the continuities are as notable as the changes. It also throws light on the transnational processes through which legal and political ideas spread and acquire new meanings. The multi-temporal historical approach adopted is also relevant to the more general discussions of the relationship between anthropology and history, the creation of customary law, identity construction, and the anthropology of colonialism.
• Demonstrates that the revitalisation of customary law is more than a yearning for a lost past, and helps readers understand that the revitalisation of customary law can assist with regaining illegally expropriated land • Singles out property issues as a vital element in decentralisation and sheds light on the material basis of decentralisation policies and the politics of common property regimes • Analyses the processes of identification entailed in the decentralisation policies in order to show that identification politics do not focus on either Islam or adat but on the relationships between normative orders
Contents
1. Towards an anthropological understanding of political and legal change; 2. The pre-colonial nagari; 3. Minangkabau under colonial government; 4. Japanese occupation, independence and postcolonial transformation until 1983; 5. Centralised government at its zenith; 6. Reformasi: constitutional reforms and regional autonomy; 7. Creating new nagari structures; 8. The return to the nagari: smooth transitions; 9. Uneasy transformations; 10. Governing the village; 11. New dynamics in property rights; 12. Never ending disputes; 13. Property law reconstituted – uncertainty perpetuated; 14. Old issues revisited: adat, Islam and Minangkabau identity politics; 15. Decentralisation, the transformation of the nagari and the dynamics of legal pluralism: some conclusions.
Printer friendly version