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Property, Politics, and Conflict: Ambon and Minangkabau Compared

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 April 2024

Franz von Benda-Beckmann  and
Keebet von Benda-Beckmann
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Abstract

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This essay focuses on factors internal to the organization of social life in two regions of Indonesia to explain differences in patterns of dispute management that occur despite similarities in forums, substantive property categories, and types of disputes—primarily over inheritance and property rights in land. In Minangkabau, where disputes are usually phrased in terms of inherited property, are concerned with the status of land, and are more likely to expand into major political battles, rice land is intensively farmed and is held by matrilineal clans that are also political units. In Ambon, disputes are usually phrased in terms of self-acquired property, are concerned with the status of trees, and are less political; people combine fishing and gathering with harvesting sago palms, distinguish rights to land from rights to trees, lack stable descent groups, and share the land with recent migrants. Although increasing monetization in Minangkabau is making property relationships more complex, while increasing sedentarization in Ambon is simplifying property relationships, both regions are moving toward a concept of property rights akin to the Western concept of ownership.

Type
Part III: Land & the Natural Environment
Information
Law & Society Review , Volume 28 , Issue 3: Special Issue: Law & Society in Southeast Asia , 1994 , pp. 589 - 607
Copyright
Copyright © 1997 by The Law and Society Association.

Footnotes

An earlier version of this essay was presented at the Eighth European Colloquium on Indonesian and Malaysian Studies, Kungalv, Sweden, June 1991.

References

1 For an ethnography of conflict and disputes in Minangkabau see Tanner 1969, 1972; F. von Benda-Beckmann 1979; K. von Benda-Beckmann 1984. For an ethnography on Ambon see Benda-Beckmann & Benda-Beckmann 1988; 1989; F. von Benda-Beckmann 1990a, 1990b; F. von Benda-Beckmann & Taale 1992. We carried out fieldwork in Canduang Koto Laweh, Minangkabau, in 1974–75 and in the village of Hila, Ambon, in 1985–86. Additional fieldwork in Hila was done by Tanja Taale and Arie Brouwer in 1987–88. The research was carried out under the auspices of Lembaga Ilmu Pengetahuan Indonesia (LIPI)—the Indonesian Academy of Science.

2 We are well aware that, generally speaking, differences in the level of containment of disputes within a village have to be explained both by village-external and village-internal factors and their interdependencies. Political and economic developments, for example, affect the rate of disputes significantly (see Slaats 1988). Moreover, what is considered internal today was often in the past shaped by external factors, notably the specific incorporation of villages in the colonial and present state apparatus (see Benda-Beckmann & Benda-Beckmann 1988). The reason that we concentrate on internal factors is not due to an underestimation of the general importance of external factors (Nader & Todd 1978; F. von Benda-Beckmann 1981, 1985:190; Collier 1976; K. von Benda-Beckmann 1981; Slaats 1988.) We feel justified in focusing on village-internal factors because the most important external factors that might explain differences in disputing behavior and containment of disputes within the village are very similar in the regions that we are dealing with, whereas the regions differ considerably in agro-ecology and political organization.

3 Most contemporary references to ulayat land refer to the area with that status when the village was established. It was the land surrounding the village core (see F. von Benda-Beckmann 1979:144).

4 There is considerable variety in sociopolitical organization in Minangkabau villages. For more references see Josseling de Jong 1951; F. von Benda-Beckmann 1979; K. von Benda-Beckmann 1984. Our description is based on the organization of Danduang Koto Laweh and surroundings.

5 For a more detailed account see F. von Benda-Beckmann 1979. Until 1975 a Dewan Perwakilan Rakyat Nagari was supposed to advise the village head. The latest reform, following the 1979 local government law, no longer even pretends to be based on adat but attempts to unify local governments throughout Indonesia on the basis of the desa model. The Nagari Canduang has thus been divided into 11 desa.

6 A dusun, which may cover many hectares, may contain more than one plantation. We use the translation “plantation.”

7 For more information on the agro-ecosystem see Brouwer 1990; Taale 1991.

8 The succinct description of the complexity of Ambonese property rights by Holleman in 1923 has lost none of its aptness:

The legal situation in the pusaka lands is chaotic and precarious. The chaos automatically emerges from the principles that small nuclei of pusaka retain their distinct character and do not merge with larger pusaka complexes; that, further, the rights of each individual inheritor are retained by his descendants; and, finally, that affines also acquire claims to pusaka because the rights of a married daughter are retained by her children. The chaos increases if one considers that the concern is not so much with dusun [as a whole] as with plantations and groups of trees in and on the dusun, which grow in all directions and form a colorful mix of several generations, families, and individuals. (Pp. 96, 97; trans, by authors).

9 See also Holleman 1923:110; and on Christian villages see Kriekhof 1991.

10 Historically, the sociopolitical organization and its development have been much more complex. The successors of traditional political, ritual, and property leaders still hold the titles but are now strongly associated with the Muslim organization, though their influence has not entirely disappeared. For details see Fraassen 1972; Manusama 1977; Rumphius 1910; Holleman 1923; Hoevell 1875.

11 Originally the Ambonese lived in the hills in patrilineal clans or in clusters of clans. In the beginning of the 17th century, they were forced by the Dutch East India Company to move down to the coast. Resettlement did not happen all at once, and some clans or soa moved down earlier than others, taking the best parts of the coastal land and claiming to be the founders of the new setdements. The colonial administration honored their claims by granting the leaders the title of raja or orang kaya, head of the village. Villages differ considerably from each other in their settlement histories. See Rumphius 1910; Manusama 1977; Knaap 1987; Benda-Beckmann & Benda-Beckmann 1989.

12 This is, by the way, contrary to stereotype; Ambonese subdistrict officials and lawyers claim that dispute rates are higher in Muslim villages owing to the absence of dati registration. Thus, dispute behavior in Christian villages resembles that in Minangkabau villages. For other striking similarities between Christian Ambon and Minangkabau see F. von Benda-Beckmann 1986; Benda-Beckmann & Benda-Beckmann 1988; Benda-Beckmann & Benda-Beckmann 1989.

13 On Minangkabau see F. von Benda-Beckmann 1979; Benda-Beckmann & Benda-Beckmann 1985. On Ambon see F. von Benda-Beckmann 1990b.