Unsettling Ground: Rethinking Land Tenure Security in Indonesia’s Legally Plural Setting

Tuslian, Widya Naseva

The Indonesian Journal of Socio-Legal Studies

This study investigates the way in which legal pluralism within state law affects perceptions of property rights and land governance in Indonesia. Taking a case of prolonged conflict over land status under a Land Use Permit, or colloquially known as the “Surat Ijo” (re: green card) by the inhabitants of Surabaya, the country’s second-largest city, this research reveals how overlapping and often contradictory legal frameworks within the state system can undermine efforts to unify land administration. This phenomenon, referred to as legal pluralism within state law, captures the contradiction in the state legal framework that has hindered the effectiveness of land unification, and thus affected people’s overall sense of land tenure security. Furthermore, this study demonstrates that people’s notions of citizenship, legal consciousness, and everyday engagement with the law shape their understanding of land ownership and legitimate possession. These factors, in turn, influence how people assert, and mobilize claims to land within a complex legal and political environment.