Emergent land and contested claims

The implementation of a number of large development projects in the Segara Anakan Lagoon on the south coast of Java and its watershed since the 1970s provided something of a historical record that allowed for the exploration of changes in the discourses, policy environment and actors involved. This material was examined and coupled with empirical

findings aimed at understanding current dynamics of how land is contested. Supporting this was the lagoon’s position as a “natural laboratory” for academic work.⁷

As mentioned, the research was a continuation of an earlier project focused on both the lagoon and its watershed. In the earlier stage of the project, reports and other documents were collected which covered the period 1975 to 2006. These dealt with the main loan-funded projects in the lagoon and its catchment area. During the previous and current stage documents were collected from government offices in Central and West Java, non-state actors and internet sources.

Using MaxQDA to organize information and help in identifying links and patterns, documents were then reviewed to: i) identify the main actors involved in planning and implementation;

ii) establish the justifications for the interventions; iii) determine how the projects may have impacted or been impacted by the Segara Anakan Lagoon; iv) explore how resource tenure issues were discussed and addressed in these projects.

A preliminary visit was made to the district capital, Cilacap, in September 2013. Subsequent field work was conducted in the lagoon in two main phases, in November 2013, and in December 2014 - January 2015, with an additional short visit in May 2014. Primary data was collected through a combination of semi-structured interviews, open ended discussions and observation. Interviews were conducted with lagoon-dependent people from the four villages in the area of interest, government representatives at the district, sub-district and village levels, the state forest corporation (Perhutani), the state oil company (Pertamina), non-governmental organizations, and academics.

7In 1985 Turner, describing the process which reversed the planned reclamation of the lagoon, mentions the lagoon’s appropriateness as a natural laboratory as one of the reasons that it should not be reclaimed. He notes the lagoon’s proximity to major education centers. Whether by design or not, this vision of the lagoon seems to have played out in practice. The list of bachelor, master and doctoral theses and dissertations focusing on the lagoon from institutions such as Universitas Gadjah Mada, Universitas Jenderal Soedirman, and Universitas Diponegoro, among others, is long.

In some cases respondents were visited several times in order to request additional clarification on issues that arose following the initial interview. This was particularly the case with district level agencies – the Cilacap office of the National Land Agency, the Department of Marine Affairs and Fisheries and Segara Anakan Management, the Planning Board (BAPPEDA, Badan Perencanaan Pembangunan Daerah), the land office of the local government – who were visited during both field research phases, and some individuals in the village of Ujung Alang (the village that was the focus of the first field phase) who had in-depth knowledge of the historical development of land usage on the north shore of Nusa Kambangan island.

Prior to each field phase interview guidelines were prepared. In the first phase field work was conducted in the village of Ujung Alang, and the guidelines focused on questions such as: change in land use and land cover, approaches to land and mangrove management, and sedimentation (see interview guidelines, Annex 1). In the second phase, after the first phase information had been analysed and outstanding issues identified, the interview guidelines were revised (see Annex 2). In the second phase the geographic coverage was broadened to include other villages that comprised emergent land, and the interview guidelines did not focus as much on sedimentation, but integrated questions about relationships with state agencies.

Questions were designed to start off as open ended as possible before focusing down on more detail. A laminated copy of a 2012 satellite image of the lagoon was used in some interviews to facilitate discussion of spatial issues. Respondents were able to draw on the map to clarify their points. For the most part interviews were not recorded – at the early stages of the process several respondents expressed discomfort with the idea of recording.

Given this experience and the fact that the interviews touched on sensitive issues of land rights, in only a few subsequent cases were respondents asked whether they agreed to being recorded.

I typically conducted interviews at the village level together with an Indonesian student. This was in part to put the respondents at ease, but was also helpful in situations where people used a combination of Javanese and Indonesian to answer questions, as was occasionally the case in the Segara Anakan Lagoon. I speak Indonesian, but not Javanese. At the district level I mainly conducted the interviews alone.

Following interviews, notes from the discussion were reviewed and discussed (when an assistant was involved) to make sure they were complete. This also provided the opportunity to identify new ideas or information that had emerged, items that needed to be followed-up, and additional people to meet. From here a strategy for the next interviews was developed. As such, the iterative nature of the research was fostered. Reviewing and discussing following the meetings also allowed for an-going process of trying to understand the key arguments of different actors.