Uma Politics, An ethnography of democratization in West Sumba, Indonesia, 1986-2006

Judul	:	Uma Politics, An ethnography of democratization in West Sumba, Indonesia, 1986-2006
Penulis	:	Jacqueline A. C. Vel
Penerbit	:	KITLV Press Leiden
Bahasa	:	Inggris
Tahun Cetak	:	2008
Halaman	:	277
ISBN	:	978-906-718-324-6
Sumber	:	http://www.oapen.org
Download	:	Di Sini

In Indonesia, on 21 May 1998 President Suharto stepped down from office, marking the start of a new period in Indonesian history in which the country would be transformed quickly into a democracy. Studies that describe the political history of this period show a sequence of the most salient features of what was first called ‘a transition to democracy’. The first studies centred on the financial crisis in 1998 and Reformasi (Budiman, Hatley and Kingsbury 1999) and concentrated on the end of the New Order and hopes for the future.

The reorganization of the regime caused uncertainty regarding not only who would be in charge nationally, but also in each region or district. Governors and district heads, unsure of support from the centre and local forces, used their new freedoms of speech and organization to voice their interests and grievances. Moreover, the economic crisis had impoverished many families and had forced the state to restrict the number of civil servants, resulting in intensified job competition and changes in the rules governing that competition.

The first three years after the demise of the New Order sadly became a period of widespread violence in Indonesia. Many instances of ‘small town wars’ (Van Klinken 2007) were described by researchers who had engaged in long-term studies of particular areas and now witnessed peaceful coexistence transform into inter-group violence. One general conclusion of these collected studies is that local elite had a large role in producing the violence and mobilized mass support by emphasizing religion and ethnicity. This type of political violence occurred in West Sumba’s capital town Waikabubak in November 1998. There, Christians fought each other when ethnic sentiments were manipulated during a district power struggle.

Violence not only destroyed lives and homes, but also initial optimism about democratization. Scholars dropped the term transition and focused on the actual practices of local politics in different regions. In 2000, the political discourse focused on a new development: decentralization, as it was called from a central perspective, or regional autonomy, the current term employed in Indonesian districts. The devolution of decision-making power in many domains of governance and the creation of autonomous district budgets brought a radical change for politicians and bureaucrats at the district level. Studies about the initial reactions in these districts were published in several volumes. These cases reveal an array of opportunities for local leaders, including the creation of new districts, a process that occurred in West Sumba.