Political and Legal Transformations of an Indonesian Polity
The Nagari from Colonisation to Decentralisation

This book explores the relationships between matrilineal, Islamic and state law, and investigates the dynamics of legal pluralism, governance and property relationships.

Franz von Benda-Beckmann (Author), Keebet von Benda-Beckmann (Author)

9781107038592, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 15 August 2013

528 pages, 18 b/w illus. 3 maps
22.9 x 14.5 x 2.8 cm, 0.87 kg

Political and Legal Transformations of an Indonesian Polity is a long-term study of the historical transformations of the Minangkabau polity of nagari, property relations and the ever-changing dynamic relationships between Minangkabau matrilineal adat law, Islamic law and state law. While the focus is on the period since the fall of President Suharto in 1998, the book charts a long history of political and legal transformations before and after Indonesia's independence, in which the continuities are as notable as the changes. It also throws light on the transnational processes through which legal and political ideas spread and acquire new meanings. The multi-temporal historical approach adopted is also relevant to the more general discussions of the relationship between anthropology and history, the creation of customary law, identity construction, and the anthropology of colonialism.

1. Towards an anthropological understanding of political and legal change
2. The pre-colonial nagari
3. Minangkabau under colonial government
4. Japanese occupation, independence and postcolonial transformation until 1983
5. Centralised government at its zenith
6. Reformasi: constitutional reforms and regional autonomy
7. Creating new nagari structures
8. The return to the nagari: smooth transitions
9. Uneasy transformations
10. Governing the village
11. New dynamics in property rights
12. Never ending disputes
13. Property law reconstituted - uncertainty perpetuated
14. Old issues revisited: adat, Islam and Minangkabau identity politics
15. Decentralisation, the transformation of the nagari and the dynamics of legal pluralism: some conclusions.

Subject Areas: Law [L], Social & cultural anthropology, ethnography [JHMC], Sociology & anthropology [JH], Black & Asian studies [JFSL3]