<![CDATA[Studies on the recognition of customary law communities (masyarakat hukum adat) in Indonesia generally highlight inconsistencies in national regulation and the general role of regional governments, but have not examined problems specific to newly established autonomous regions, namely provinces born within a Special Autonomy regime that must build a recognition framework from scratch. This article analyses the harmonisation of authority among the central government, South Papua Province, and regencies in recognising and protecting customary law communities, and formulates a harmonisation model. Using a normative legal method with statutory, conceptual, and case approaches, primary and secondary legal materials were analysed through systematic interpretation, legal preference principles, and a vertical-horizontal harmonisation matrix, supplemented by government documents and media reports as contextual data up to October 2026. The analysis identifies three core problems: (1) a transitional vacuum, as Law No. 14 of 2022 does not confirm the validity of the parent province’s regulations, while Papua Provincial Regulation No. 5 of 2022 was enacted only after South Papua was established; (2) sectoral fragmentation across six recognition regimes with different instruments and actors; and (3) asynchronous authority, whereby central decisions on space and permits move faster than regency-level recognition. The article proposes a Layered Authority Harmonisation Model for New Autonomous Regions consisting of five dimensions: regulatory synchronisation, clarity of authority, procedural alignment, participatory coordination, and a recognition-first sequencing principle. Its contribution lies in conceptualising harmonisation as a matter of time and institutional transition, not merely normative consistency.]]>
