Being seen like the state: Emulations of legal culture in customary labor and land tenure arrangements in East Kalimantan, Indonesia

Abstract

ABSTRACT In this article, I analyze emulations of state legal culture in local labor and land tenure arrangements among Bugis migrants in East Kalimantan, Indonesia, to challenge the assumptions of a World Bank report on nonstate justice in Indonesia. I focus, in particular, on how and why nonstate actors emulate aspects of the governmentality of the state to construct a new realm of participation in the region and the state as well as of rights and citizenship. In contrast to conclusions reached by the World Bank, I find that this tendency may increase rather than reduce legal pluralism and does not guarantee that those involved acknowledge the state's ideal of the rule of law.