Seeking the State: Appropriating Bureaucratic Symbolism and Wealth in the Margins of Southeast Asia

Herriman, Nicholas; Winarnita, Monika

doi:10.1002/ocea.5122

Cited by 5 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 36 publications

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“…At the same time, people may choose to be at the forest margins (or the periphery) to avoid State control such as the administration of taxes or land control (Scott, 2009). When States claimed rights and control over the forest, people in remote forested areas continued practicing traditional ways of forest and land use (Arnold, 2001), while at the same time incorporating and adapting with the overall political and economic system of the State (Scott, 2009;Herriman and Winarnita, 2016). Today, people in these areas are also the main target for the latest drive of formal state structured social forestry development.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Social Forestry - why and for whom? A comparison of policies in Vietnam and Indonesia

Moeliono¹,

Pham²,

Bong

et al. 2017

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Abstract:Community forestry or social forestry (henceforth referred collectively as SF) programs have become new modes of forest management empowering local managers and hence, allowing integration of diverse local practices and support of local livelihoods. Implementation of these initiatives, however, face multiple challenges. State-prescribed community programs, for example, will remain isolated efforts if changes in the overall economic and social governance frameworks, including the devolution of rights to local users is lacking. Financial sustainability of these measures remains often uncertain and equity issues inherent to groups and communities formed for SF, can be exacerbated. In this article, we pose the question: Whose interests do SF policies serve? The effectiveness of SF would depend on the motivations and aims for a decentralization of forest governance to the community. In order to understand the underlying motivations behind the governments' push for SF, we examine national policies in Vietnam and Indonesia, changes in their policies over time and the shift in discourses influencing how SF has evolved. Vietnam and Indonesia are at different sides of the spectrum in democratic ambitions and forest abundance, and present an intriguing comparison in the recent regional push towards SF in Southeast Asia. We discuss the different interpretations of SF in these two countries and how SF programs are implemented. Our results show that governments, influenced by global discourse, are attempting to regulate SF through formal definitions and regulations. Communities on the other hand, might resist by adopting, adapting or rejecting formal schemes. In this tension, SF, adopted to serve the interest of local people, in practice has not fulfilled its promise.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Social Forestry - why and for whom? A comparison of policies in Vietnam and Indonesia

Moeliono¹,

Pham²,

Bong

et al. 2017

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“…Overall, these interactions produce “regulation.” In this view, the state is just one regulatory actor which is limited in its reach, and indeed citizens evade formal regulation in the informal economy (Rothenberg et al, 2016), or by making creative use of the unregulated pockets of the internet (Lindquist, 2021). This also reflects the complex entanglement of state‐society relations that emerges from “disparate and sometimes contradictory encounters” (Herriman & Winarnita, 2016).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Influencing the influencers: Regulating the morality of online conduct in Indonesia

2022

Self Cite

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Indonesia boasts a lively influencer scene. These influencers promote various products and messages, including political messages, to their followers for commercial gain, and have been particularly active during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. Influencers in Indonesia are potentially subject to state regulation, particularly via the controversial Electronic Transactions and Information Law (ITE Law) which criminalizes digital communications that "breach morality," defame the good name of another, or spread misleading information resulting in consumer losses. In addition, influencers face a risk of community-led regulation, via an online backlash, should they transgress perceived moral boundaries. In this article, we present and analyze a series of case studies where influencer behavior has attracted regulatory responses. These cases illustrate the interactions among regulatory actors and also where and how the lines for acceptable influencer moral standards of behavior are being drawn.

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“…The pattern I have traced converges with a burgeoning wider recent ethnographic literature on Pacific and other settings, showing how local kin networks proactively produce state forms and embrace state institutions in excess of focused state intervention ( e.g . Buitron 2020, Herriman and Winarnita 2016, Oppermann 2015, Schwoerer 2018, Street 2012, Tammisto 2016, to mention just a few contributions). In the Korowai case, their special sensitivity to inequality, and their methods of working with its constant presence in social life, have powerfully driven their entry into large‐scale structures of domination.…”

Section: Conclusion: State Formation From Outside the Statementioning

confidence: 99%

Self‐Lowering as Power and Trap: Wawa, ‘White’, and Peripheral Embrace of State Formation in Indonesian Papua

Stasch

2021

Oceania

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Building on Ferguson's account of 'declarations of dependence' and prior Melanesianist work on 'humiliation', I examine how enthusiasm for state-formation among Korowai of Papua has been shaped by their understandings of self-lowering as a politically complex way of influencing kin and equalizing relations. I begin with media firestorms in Australia and urban Papua about the need to save two vulnerable boys. Korowai understandings of these episodes, unknown to faraway media publics, illustrate their idea that self-lowering toward a hoped favorable benefactor is a desirable way of exercising a degree of relational control in a wider situation of being dominated. Building on the Australia-linked Wawa affair, I look further at why sending boys to school in towns is a main strategy by which Korowai try to ameliorate their felt inferiority to city people. Transactions between schoolboys and senior relatives are politically complex, in ways that suggest the schooling strategy is an application of old egalitarian kinship techniques to new geopolitical inequalities. Finally, I look at Korowai responses to the new environment of large money flows into the countryside under government policies of redistricting and community-driven development. Strong Korowai interest in benefactor relations with 'Regency' leaders, and the new embrace of divisions between 'heads' and 'community' within villages, also exemplify a strategy of seeking out a more livable relation of inequality to ease a less livable one.

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Seeking the State: Appropriating Bureaucratic Symbolism and Wealth in the Margins of Southeast Asia

Cited by 5 publications

References 36 publications

Social Forestry - why and for whom? A comparison of policies in Vietnam and Indonesia

Social Forestry - why and for whom? A comparison of policies in Vietnam and Indonesia

Influencing the influencers: Regulating the morality of online conduct in Indonesia

Self‐Lowering as Power and Trap: Wawa, ‘White’, and Peripheral Embrace of State Formation in Indonesian Papua

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