11:30 AM - 11:45 AM
[HGG02-09] Rethinking "community-based" resource management: Mobile, transient and muliti-sited lives in Southeast Asia
Keywords:community, mobility, resource management, Southeast Asia
In various development projects in Southeast Asia, the term "community-based" is frequently used. However, as many researchers point out, there are limitations to capturing local societies with such stereotypical and normative concepts. One of the major challenges in the concept of "community" in development projects is that it perceives geographical space as fixed, and imagines culturally tight-knit, sedentary societies as ideal. This overlooks fluid lifestyles and multi-sited livelihoods. This presentation focuses on sparsely populated forest frontiers in Southeast Asia, especially in Borneo and Sumatra, where societies that move across wide areas and communities with frequently changing members are common. In these places, communities that maintained a certain population size in one generation may completely disappear in the next. A key factor in advancing development projects in Southeast Asia will be how to incorporate people who base their lives within a certain geographical range but are not bound by it.
This presentation critically examines the concept of "community" based on settlement, views the lifestyles in the forest frontiers of Southeast Asia from a "transient" perspective, and attempts to reconstruct the existing concept of "community". "Transient" here implies a lifestyle not necessarily tied to a specific place. In Borneo and Sumatra, such transient ways of life have been passed down through generations and are still evident in various aspects today. A prime example is the rapidly expanding oil palm plantations since the 1980s in these islands and smallholders who started cultivating oil palm in swidden fields and unused lands in response.
Oil palm is a perennial crop, requiring regular harvesting twice a month for about 20 years after four years of planting. Therefore, smallholders might seem to lead a life centered around their farmland (management). However, oil palm is resistant to pests and requires regular weeding and fertilization but not protection from animals eating the fruits (though theft by people is possible), so the time spent on farmland management is minimal. Additionally, smallholders often hire laborers when the area exceeds a certain size, taking on a management role in plantation management, making it possible for individuals or households to manage large areas. It's also common for them to work in cities during weekdays and manage their land on weekends. Thus, the "living sphere" of smallholders does not always coincide with the oil palm production site. Oil palm, with these plant characteristics, can be considered a crop well-suited for people who prefer a transient lifestyle. This paper analyzes the livelihoods of these oil palm smallholders from a "transient" perspective, attempting to reconstruct the concept of "community" in development projects.
This presentation critically examines the concept of "community" based on settlement, views the lifestyles in the forest frontiers of Southeast Asia from a "transient" perspective, and attempts to reconstruct the existing concept of "community". "Transient" here implies a lifestyle not necessarily tied to a specific place. In Borneo and Sumatra, such transient ways of life have been passed down through generations and are still evident in various aspects today. A prime example is the rapidly expanding oil palm plantations since the 1980s in these islands and smallholders who started cultivating oil palm in swidden fields and unused lands in response.
Oil palm is a perennial crop, requiring regular harvesting twice a month for about 20 years after four years of planting. Therefore, smallholders might seem to lead a life centered around their farmland (management). However, oil palm is resistant to pests and requires regular weeding and fertilization but not protection from animals eating the fruits (though theft by people is possible), so the time spent on farmland management is minimal. Additionally, smallholders often hire laborers when the area exceeds a certain size, taking on a management role in plantation management, making it possible for individuals or households to manage large areas. It's also common for them to work in cities during weekdays and manage their land on weekends. Thus, the "living sphere" of smallholders does not always coincide with the oil palm production site. Oil palm, with these plant characteristics, can be considered a crop well-suited for people who prefer a transient lifestyle. This paper analyzes the livelihoods of these oil palm smallholders from a "transient" perspective, attempting to reconstruct the concept of "community" in development projects.