Author: amozhor

Figure 1. Tranquility in Takengon, Aceh.

There is a prevailing notion that violence is always a bad thing. Even when resistance to the state is justified, resistance should ideally be non-violent. However, political theorists are divided as to whether violence is ever justified, and if so, the conditions under which violence can be justified. For example, violence is typically understood to be justified under the condition of self-defense. However, what is included in the “self” of “self-defense” is typically up for debate: “the self” could be extended to include one’s family, community, political community, or others who are defenseless against tyranny. Moreover, there are often worse things than dying. Nevertheless, the non-violent bias motivates much empirical research on civil conflict.

One way the non-violent bias motivates empirical research is in the following research question: why do some people choose violent resistance as opposed to non-violent resistance? This was indeed my own research question going to Aceh, Indonesia. I asked: why did some Acehnese, given similar grievances, choose to become combatants, whereas others chose to become activists? The implicit normative assumption in this question was: why did some Acehnese choose “more moral” forms of resistance than others? The answer to this question of violent vs non-violent pathways, detailed in my previous blogpost, seemed rather banal: Acehnese who had access to GAM networks (Gerakan Aceh Mederka, the Free Aceh Movement) were more likely to join GAM; Acehnese who had access to student activist groups were more likely to become student activists. Many student activists, despite their adoption of non-violent tactics, were also likely to support GAM’s resort to armed resistance as necessary, and sometimes, even coordinating actions with GAM. One activist even described GAM combatants as like “heroes” (pelawan). For several activists, there was very little in their response that suggested a moral commitment to non-violence. This does not mean that the Acehnese I interviewed did not have some idea of what kinds of resistance was “moral,” but their idea of “moral resistance” did not hinge on whether one used violence or not.

So how can we understand moral resistance in Aceh? For many respondents I interviewed, there was a clear distinction between combatants who used violence as an act of revenge – an end in itself – and combatants who used violence instrumentally towards the protection of other Acehnese. I call the former “practices of revenge” and the latter “practices of pity.” No doubt many combatants used violence to seek out revenge, but many also used violence because they pitied victims of the conflict. Likewise, many Acehnese turned to activism because of the pity they felt towards victims of the conflict, but many were also looking for revenge through their activism. So what made resistance “moral” was not just the use of violence or non-violence, but how violence or non-violent activism was practiced – for revenge or for pity. Let me explain what this looks like, starting with combatants, then activists.

	Combatant	Activist
Revenge	Violence as a weapon to punish and end in itself	Demands for accountability as a way to punish
Pity	Violence as a tool for helping Acehnese	Humanitarian efforts that help Acehnese

Table 1. A Typology of Moral Practices of Resistance

In the case of violent practice of revenge, some combatants were clearly motivated by the desire for revenge – taking pleasure in killing as many Indonesian soldiers as possible. They were angry, even if they hadn’t themselves directly experienced any abuses by the Indonesian military. Notably, combatants looking for revenge were not interested in the preservation of life, especially civilian life. One ex-combatant I interviewed told me about how he missed his home village and was angry that there were seven military posts around his village, and then boasted how he had entered his village with his rifle anyways, which ended up with him getting shot at in the village. While he escaped unhurt, he had put his village at risk. Likewise, another ex-combatant I interviewed described how his unit had captured a local town for 14 hours – an important symbolic victory for his unit. The intention was not to hold territory, but to show their ability to drive out the Indonesian military from the town. When I interviewed civilians at the battle, many were terrified of being caught in the crossfire. Moreover, fourteen hours later, on Eid, the Indonesian military recaptured the town and subjected the civilians to intense security checks in case there might be GAM combatants hiding among them. These combatant practices of revenge prioritized winning battles or achieving symbolic victories over civilian life.

On the other hand, violent practices of pity look rather different. It may seem counter-intuitive that combatants may be interested in the preservation of life. Nevertheless, violence is not infrequently used instrumentally to minimize human costs. For one, such combatants emphasize the importance of keeping the fighting away from villages – which sometimes meant that they would forgo being able to go home. Another example, one ex-combatant explained how the most important role as a senior commander was to discipline his soldiers – including executing two of his men for raping a villager. Another ex-combatant explained to me that since the objective of guerrilla warfare is to demonstrate their presence to the Indonesian military, they would either choose non-human targets or shoot to injure, not to kill. In contrast to practices of revenge, the disposition of these combatants was always calmer, less angry, and more concerned about the suffering of others.

Figure 2. I would ask respondents what the definition of “peace” meant to them.

If there can be both moral and immoral uses of violence, there certainly can be both moral and immoral uses of non-violent activism. During my interviews, it was stark to me how different combatants could be from each other, and how different activists could be from each other. I found a similar pattern among activists – some were also motivated by revenge or anger and wanted nothing but to hold Jakarta accountable for past human rights abuses in Aceh. For example, one human rights activist explained how many activists would be so focused on extracting testimonies from victims in the pursuit of justice without realizing how the very act of sharing a testimony may cause victims to relive their trauma. Other activists were more practical and focused on what was best for victims. In Aceh, the term “humanitarian activists” was bestowed on those who were engaged in providing relief to internally displaced populations while also staying out of politics.

So, what counts as moral resistance need not necessarily be non-violent; and what counts as immoral resistance need not necessarily be violent. One can use violence and non-violence in moral and immoral ways. Just because the conflict is over does not mean that Aceh has attained lasting “peace.” Our lack of understanding of what motivates individuals to practice politics an all-or-nothing (revenge) as opposed to an open-ended dialogue undermines our ability to find solutions to both violence and non-violent forms of conflict. Understanding Aceh’s prospects for peace – not just the absence of violence, but the ability to negotiate and settle differences – requires an understanding of the (emotional) motivations (such as revenge or pity) how Acehnese practice violence or non-violent activism.

By Amoz JY Hor, Sigur Center Summer 2019 Field Research Grant Fellow. Amoz is a Political Science Ph.D. student at George Washington University. He researches on the emotional practices of violence and humanitarianism in Indonesia.

The causes of civil conflict requires understanding why people would join an armed rebel group in the first place. I explore this in the case of Aceh, where an armed separatist group, GAM (Gerakan Aceh Mederka), waged war against the Indonesian state for 30 years until Aceh was granted special autonomy status in 2005. How was GAM able to recruit Acehnese to join its cause? If GAM were not successful, GAM would simply not survive as an organization. This is especially the case for GAM, a separatist organization that depended on its popular legitimacy for resources, recruits, and civilian support to function. Part of GAM’s success was its ability to naturalize the idea that Acehnese is a distinct nation that deserves independence from Indonesia. Yet, not everyone who supported Acehnese independence decided to join GAM. While some picked up arms to resist the Indonesian state, others chose to use non-violence methods as activists. Why did some Acehnese choose to become combatants, yet others become activists?

There are several prevailing theories as to why some people might join a rebel group, or not. These theories do not work well in the case of Aceh. In this blog post, I provide some evidence that suggest that existing theories do not work. Instead, my fieldwork suggests a much simpler explanation: Acehnese chose to become activists or combatants based on the networks they had access to and the skill sets they could offer.

Figure 1. 90 Interviews were conducted over local coffee and snacks

The first common theory is that: joining an armed group is a natural response to relative depravation or because they had experienced abuses by the state. This might seem intuitive: if one is poor enough or has suffered enough, the opportunity cost of risking one’s life in armed conflict is relatively low. One may also seek out violence in order to reclaim a sense of agency. However, many ex-combatants I interviewed were from well-to-do families, educated, and had never experienced violence personally. At the same time, I also had interviewed Acehnese who were poor, lived in highly unequal areas, and who had experienced violence firsthand, and still chose to become activists rather than pick up weapons. Something else must be going on.

A second common political science argument is that: people are persuaded to join a rebel group when political entrepreneurs are able to use propaganda to blame people’s seemingly trivial and petty grievances on the state. Since everyone has petty grievances, we should expect that those who participate in violence to be those who were exposed to propaganda that directed their grievances towards an enemy. In Aceh, it was true that support for Acehnese independence was higher in areas where GAM’s networks were stronger. However, on its own, this theory cannot explain why is it that some pro-independence Acehnese chose to become combatants, whereas other pro-independence Acehnese chose to become activists.

Figure 2. Perks of fieldwork in Aceh: the aroma of pandan/coconut of this snack (butai/buleukat silei in Acehnese) was ARRESTING.

So why would some Acehnese choose to become combatants rather than activists? First, contrary to the way political scientists (and myself) have understood the question of rebel recruitment, many of the respondents I interviewed did not think that the decision to become a combatant or activist were mutually exclusive choices. Many activists supported GAM, and some even wanted to become combatants, describing them as heroes (pelawan). Some activists eventually became combatants, and some combatants eventually became activists (though this change was considerably rarer if one was already black-marked by the Indonesian state). Many interviewees explained to me that violent resistance and non-violent activism were two paths to the same goal. Violence and non-violence were complements, not substitutes. For example, several respondents explained to me how both student activists and GAM combatants would work together to mobilize Acehnese to demonstrate and demand a referendum on Acehnese independence. This not only involved explaining the importance (mensosialisasikan) of the referendum to villages across Aceh, but also included cooperation on smuggling in weapons past military checkpoints into Banda Aceh, where the demonstrations occurred. Some activists also boasted how their campaign against the British sale of Scorpion tanks to Indonesia succeeded because they were able to show they were being used not for external defense, but internally against the people of Aceh. They told me that this was how they supported GAM’s military efforts. Some activists also told me that their activism was only effective because there was an armed struggle to begin with.

So if becoming a combatant and activist were complementary to the cause of Acehnese independence, why did different Acehnese choose different paths? In my estimation, the single two biggest factors that explains why some people chose to become activists and others chose to become combatants were the networks one has access to, and the skills one had.

First, on skills. As mentioned, several activists indeed told me that they were inspired to join GAM. They described to me secret coordination meetings they had with the chief commander, Abdullah Syafi’i, who told them that, given their status as university students (mahasiswa), they would better serve the dream of independence through their activism rather than as combatants. GAM understood that an essential aspect of their struggle was to gain international recognition that Aceh was a sovereign people that had suffered under abuses of the Indonesian state, and the student activism leant GAM’s efforts legitimacy. Because of this, university students were more likely to become activists. Here, education or the status of being educated was a useful skillset for activism. By contrast, it is popularly understood that GAM recruited less educated Acehnese. I was frequently told that this is because GAM would find it difficult ordering university students like soldiers. Nevertheless, even though GAM’s members were disproportionately less educated on average, many of GAM’s high-ranking combatants and early members were significantly over-educated. There were also important roles for educated GAM members. One GAM member described his role as a spokesperson – who provided GAM statements to the press, many of which sounded like the statements put out by student activists, but under the name of GAM. Not all activists were university students either, especially those who were not based in Banda Aceh, but working directly with affected and displaced communities. So skills (or education) can go some way in explaining why some Acehnese joined GAM and others became activists, but there is still some variation left to be explained.

Figure 3. Nira espresso: espresso with water from the branch a species of coconut, ijuk. Incredibly refreshing.

From my interviews, what explains the variation between joining GAM as opposed to joining a student activist group are the net–works one had access to. If one was based in a village along the Northeast coast (GAM strongholds), it would be difficult to access the student activist networks based in the city. But one could easily access or may even have been actively recruited by GAM networks. Likewise, if one was a university student in Banda Aceh, one would naturally have been exposed to or recruited by the student activist networks in the universities. As a stronghold of the Indonesian military, it would also mean that one would have less access to GAM networks. Thus, some ex-combatants told me that they might have joined an activist group had they had the opportunity. Likewise, activists hence would tell me that while they had wanted to join GAM, many simply did not have the opportunity, at least initially. Instead, they were recruited by student activist groups. In fact, many student activists did not start out campaigning independence. Rather, they were part of an Indonesian-wide student network who were rallying to oppose Suharto, Indonesia’s strongman president for 31 years. Almost all these student activists told me that in the years following after Suharto’s fall, the full extent of human rights abuses in Aceh came to light. This prompted many of them to read up on Aceh’s history (typically written by Hassan di Tiro, GAM’s founder), and conclude that independence was the only way to right these wrongs and prevent further abuses. Many of them only considered joining GAM after this point. Some did. But it was typically easier to continue with activism given their education levels, experience doing activism, and networks with other activists.

What are we to learn from this? For scholars of civil conflict, it is important to not think of rebel recruitment primarily as a decision about the use of violence vs non-violence. Many activists who employed non-violent methods understood their actions to be inline with and supportive of combatants who used violence, and many combatants thought likewise of activists. Many activists and combatants understood themselves as Acehnese freedom fighters and part of the same team. These vocational choices were complements, not substitutes.

For aid, human rights, and peace-keeping practitioners, I hope the lesson is not to be suspicious of local activists just because they may be supportive of violent resistance, or that the best way to ameliorate civil conflict is to make it more difficult for potential combatants to network. The Indonesian state attempted this by setting up road blocks all around Aceh (called sweeping operations). This may have been somewhat effective, but occurred at the expense of the civilian population. Such an approach prioritizes the reduction of violence at all costs (zoe), but ends up securitizing civilian life to point that life becomes meaningless as well (bios).

In my next blogpost, I suggest that questions concerning violence vs non-violence is based on a normative bias that requires unpacking.

By Amoz JY Hor, Sigur Center Summer 2019 Field Research Grant Fellow. Amoz is a Political Science Ph.D. student at George Washington University. He researches on the emotional practices of violence and humanitarianism in Indonesia.

After the 2004 tsunami, aid workers from all over the world flew into Aceh. In the aid world, “Aceh” is still associated with the tsunami, beneficiaries of the world’s largest humanitarian response in human history. This narrative not only reduces Acehnese to victims, it also overlooks the role of many Achenese in humanitarian efforts that began even before the tsunami. Aceh’s culture of humanitarianism thus evolved very differently from the rest of the international aid industry – one with important lessons on localization and humanity.

 

This humanitarianism was on full display when over a thousand Rohingya refugees arrived on Aceh’s shores in 2015, after 7 months of being ping-ponged between different Southeast Asian countries, each refusing them permission to disembark.

 

 

(Source)

 

Although the Indonesian coast guard were under orders to not let the refugee boats land, the Acehnese fishermen deliberately helped the refugees evade them to get to land. When asked why, the fishermen explain that this is their customary law, adat nelayan Aceh, or the custom of the Acehnese fisherman. Namely, when at sea, if they encounter anything that is in need of help, they are under obligation to offer assistance. This is mandatory for injured animals, what more fellow human beings.

 

Hence, contrary to the narratives in Malaysia and Indonesia, the fishermen are adamant that they did not simply offer help to the Rohingya because they were fellow Muslim brothers. As one of my interviewees put it:

 

“If we [Acehnese] only help these Rohingya because we come from the same religion, what makes us different from the Buddhists that are trying to throw out these Muslims from their own land?”

Aceh’s humanitarian response to the refugees did not stop at the initial rescue. They were given medical treatment, housed, fed, given language lessons, livelihood training, and even access to the local schooling system.

One of the most important things about the refugee camps in Aceh is the way they treat the refugees with dignity. While most refugee camps are renowned for confining refugee to the camps (like prison cells), I was pleasantly surprised when the Rohingya children brought me out of the camp to this adjacent swimming pool which they could freely use.

This has not been costless for the Acehnese community, who have their own history of conflict and disaster. In part, it is because the Acehnese know what it is like to be a victim of disaster or conflict, that they understand the importance of treating refugees not as objects to be managed efficiently or securely, but as fellow human beings. Moreover, given the large internally displaced population during Aceh’s conflict years, there is no shortage of Acehnese who have had years of experience organizing camps, aid distribution, and engaging with victims of conflict.

 

But it is not just their experience as victims that informs the Acehnese of how to do humanitarianism. The Acehnese insist that it is their custom to honour their guests, adat pemulia jamee (literally, custom of honouring the guest).

Contrary to the hyper-professionalized international humanitarian industry, everyday acts of Acehnese hospitality like these regularly disrupted my hyper-modern, efficiency-oriented, cold-hearted-optimizing sensibilities. It makes me think that the professionalization of humanitarianism (such as the SPHERE standards) often appears so obviously attractive because it promises tangible, visible, physical benefits, while masking what it takes away – the practical, intangible, human parts of everyday living. That doesn’t make professionalization inherently evil. However, hyper-professionalized projects, designed in the absence of relationships with the very people one wishes to help, become deeply suspect.

As one veteran humanitarian (pictured) put it:

“The NGO world is a world where trial and error is always involved. You never have the peak of knowledge in this work. What’s best practice today may not be best practice in the next ten years. Best practices are always relative. Failure is always relative, and we are always learning.

For example, when the (Acehnese) fishermen rescued the Rohingya – that wasn’t the international standard. In fact, they were taking the risk to rescue them because it was illegal. They did it because of their local custom. That suggests that their local custom was better than the international standards. So why stick with the international standards when there is something better? If this best practice is better than the one before, why not change it?

The problem with professionalism is that it kills the inspiration to learn. How do you know something is done correctly if you’ve never failed? You should do first, and learn. Of course, don’t close your eyes when you do it. Keep your eyes open, be watchful, and you can gain new knowledge.”

 

 

Amoz JY Hor is a PhD student in Political Science at the George Washington University. His research explores how emotions affect the way the subaltern is understood in practices of humanitarianism.

 

What’s in a cup of coffee?

In the modern (read: neoliberal) world, coffee is a part of everyday life, the morning drink one picks up on the way to work. Coffee, or kopi in Indonesian, takes on a very different significance in Aceh. If in the modern world, coffee is an individualized drink that gives one the energy boost for the solitary work in the office, kopi is an inherently social drink in Aceh.

One of the things that I quickly learned coming to Aceh is that everything happens at the warkop (or warung kopi, literally coffee shop). It is Aceh’s community and social space par excellence, but many also use it as their “second office” (which is where most people get their wifi), classrooms, meeting rooms, consultation space etc.

Politicians, too, each will have their own “base camp” coffee shop, where their constituents can approach them freely. We even saw civil servants collecting the signature of a more senior civil servant in the coffee shop. Because the coffee shop is where everyone goes to, it is where all sorts of networks are formed.

For many Acehnese, the coffee shop is always contrasted to formal spaces. While the latter are felt to be rigid an uneasy (baku), the coffee shop is a place where rank and status disappear.

It is thus unsurprising that the coffee shop is an important site of contemporary politics in Aceh. Historically, coffee shops were important sites for the exchange of political ideas in Europe as well – it was the staging area before the actual revolutions. Perhaps in the modern world, the rental cost of land is so high that it is difficult, if not impossible, to see the coffee shop as anything other than a business. In Aceh however, the coffee shop remains an affordable site of political community and political action.

This was not always the case however. Aceh’s civil war peaked in 2001-2004 when it was put under martial law. Curfews were imposed, and there were frequent spot checks on the roads. These practices, called “sweeping,’ isolated Acehnese from each other – which was part of the Indonesian’s military strategy of breaking up the separatist movement (Gerakan Aceh Merdeka). Ironically, it was between the years 1996-2004 that Aceh’s student activists’ networks would begin to form. A group that sided neither with the armed separatists nor the Indonesian military, this group rallied around the opposition to human rights violations from either side. They collected reports on human rights abuses and reported them to their networks around the world, hoping to use international pressure to restrain the Indonesian military; they also actively gave “political education” to the separatist combatants on non-violent struggle. Many of them also provided humanitarian relief to internally displaced people from the conflict.

Where did these networks form? From the conversations we had with former activists in coffee shops, it seems that many of these networks began in Banda Aceh’s universities – where Acehnese from all over the province would go to (menrantau) get their degree. In the 1980s and 1990s, Aceh’s civil war had been largely fought under the radar, what the Acehnese refer to as DOM (Daerah Operasi Militer). The activists recall that nobody knew that there was fighting, or the extent of the conflict. They had been told that the Indonesian military were fighting drug smugglers or terrorists.

By around 1996 however, university students in Banda Aceh got to have a better sense when they compared their experiences. By 2001, it was harder and harder to meet openly under marital law. Yet, university students found ways to meet, including in the meunasah (a small scale neighborhood mosque for the village).

These meetings didn’t merely involve planning mobilization, but entailed discussions of Karl Marx’s Das Kapital and Paolo Freire’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed, as one activist who majored in engineering recalled. It seems that what brought the student activist networks together was not merely shared grievances – either personal losses or a sense that the Acehnese nation was being violated. What made the movement unique was how they channeled their energy towards devouring “banned books” to make sense of what was happening, and what ought to be done. Unsurprisingly, many of these university students would take it on themselves to descend from the intellectual safe space in Banda Aceh back to the villages.

Today, these political networks can operate much more openly.

Moreover, the preferred site of struggle is no longer with guns, but through democratic politics. Rather, the preferred site of political discussion is the coffee shop – where the likes of Marx, Friere, Gramsci or other revolutionaries are openly talked about – where political visions are born and networks made.

Or, for that matter, over durians, the “King of Fruits:”

Below, a durian seller helps us open the durians:

So what politics / philosophy is in a cup of coffee?

A lot, if we learn to pay attention.

Amoz JY Hor (center) is PhD student in Political Science at the George Washington University. His research explores how emotions affect the way the subaltern is understood in practices of humanitarianism.

There is little doubt about the resplendent natural beauty Aceh has to offer. For one, its beaches are absolutely serene:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

These beaches are on an island off of Banda Aceh called Sabang or Pulau Weh. I didn’t have an water-proof camera to show pictures of the incredible colours of marine life one could witness underwater.

It was also fun that we got around on “mario carts:”

 

 

From the beaches down below, Aceh has magnificent mountains above as well. Another popular location is the coffee growing region of Takengon:

 

 

 

 

 

Gayonese coffee is internationally renown, and grown right here:

 

 

Moving south, here’s a shot of a beach in Meulaboh:

Even Banda Aceh, the capital, has terrific sights:

 

 

 

As a claustrophobic city kid who grew up in Singapore, even the sight of expansive open green space (with a volcano in the backdrop) absolutely takes my breath away.

In my most recent trip, I heard that Singapore was often used by separatists’ propaganda as a posterboy of what Aceh could look like if only it got independence. While Singapore can often be attractive as a model of catch-up development in Asia, I wonder what gets lost in the pursuit of “development” – nature, but also heritage and spirit – themes that Singaporeans are all too familiar with.

Ironically, even as Acehnese are looking to Singapore for a model of development, Singaporeans are looking to retrieve something that which has been lost through their experience of development, that which has been endearingly called “the kampung spirit,” or the spirit of community (associated with the village).

For many Acehnese, the site of the community is in the WarKop (Warung Kopi, or Coffee Shop). I will take up this theme in my next blog post.

 Amoz JY Hor is PhD student in Political Science at the George Washington University. His research explores how emotions affect the way the subaltern is understood in practices of humanitarianism.