Reclaiming the Land: Conflict and Resistance in Contemporary Peasant Social Movement

Abstract

This study aims to analyze the dynamics of contemporary peasant social movements, especially related to conflict and resistance in reclaiming the land. The end of the New Order era in the late 1990s in Indonesia provided space for peasants to reclaim the land for their cultivated land. Reclaiming is an effort to act of resistance, carried out by oppressed people to regain their rights such as land, water, and other natural resources, as well as other means of production fairly, to create universal prosperity for the people. This study uses a qualitative method, which was carried out by exploring and understanding the meaning of research problems by collecting data that reflects the views of participants regarding the research problem being studied. Data collection techniques were carried out through literature study, observation, and in-depth interviews with peasant and social movement members and leaders in the three research villages in West Java. The results show that reclaiming is successful when there is a political opportunity and mobilization of political network resources during conflicts and peasant resistance. In addition, the importance of the political network of urban activists and university students is used in resisting the policy regime made by the power holders.