Autonomy, Local Voices and Conflict Resolution: Lessons from East Timor

Abstract

The civil society in East Timor – today The Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste – developed knowledge and views about different constitutional structures during some critical years before the country’s independence in 2002. “Autonomy” proved to be an effective generic concept for this purpose in dialogues and seminars, organised inside and outside East Timor, on the issue of the territory’s future international status. While a certain political autonomy structure, alongside with independence, were the two options in the 1999 UN-led referendum on East Timor’s final status, the concept of “autonomy” was used as a point of reference for the analysis of principally different structural options for small territories – from typical independence, via forms of limited independence and associated state arrangements, to autonomy and levels of integration. Naturally, existing autonomy arrangments are studied when relevant in peace processes, but the concept of “autonomy”, with its need for local adaptation and recognition of difference, brings also compromise and therefore creativity into a process of political wrangling. In addition, an autonomy perspective in peace processes raises the issue of human rights protection on national level – can it protect on the level of an autonomy? The autonomy concept provides, finally, a framework for its own legitimacy, in relation to human rights and other measures in defense of human dignity. To identify a potential autonomy, thus, means assessing the characteristics of difference in such a framework, a process that local voices in East Timor needed to pursue.