Breaking the cycle of violence in Indonesia

Annabel McGoldrick, Reporting the World, London, annabelmcg@aol.com and Aya Muchtar, Contributor, Jakarta, aya@cbn.net.id

Since the fall of President Soeharto's New Order government four years ago, many areas of Indonesia have been disfigured by brutal fighting and bloodshed. A recent study by the Ministry of Defense said no fewer 15 provinces were vulnerable to religious and ethnic conflicts. What is more difficult is to take the next step and ask the crucial questions -- what makes them vulnerable and what could be done to protect them?

Thousands of capable people across the country are actively seeking ways to improve the prospects for their communities. Knowledge is power, and to empower peace actors, from grassroots to government, it is important to know about the dynamics of conflict and how they can trap people in repeating patterns of behavior.

This is where an influential concept from the UK could prove useful in Indonesia. The "cycle of violence" describes a syndrome whereby trauma breeds trauma and fear breeds revenge and retaliation. Above all, it offers clues for more effective conflict prevention by directing our attention to where a variety of different interventions can help the situation by breaking this cycle.

The classic cycle of violence, which ensures that conflict follows conflict, has roughly seven stages. They are all too familiar to anyone who has paid serious attention to the Israeli- Palestinian conflict, or violence in central Africa. The agonizing death of Yugoslavia has been another showcase for this highly recognizable pattern, and it's now flowing in many of Indonesia's provinces.

This is how the cycle of violence works in the human psyche.

Perhaps you were there, or someone you know witnessed, say, the riots in Kalimantan, or house-burnings in Poso; did you lose a member of your family, a friend perhaps?

The first human reaction to such horror is to feel shocked and frightened, disbelief that such an atrocity has taken place. As people begin to come to terms with what has happened they then feel pain, sometimes agonizing pain that dear loved ones have gone. Then the grieving process begins.

Sometimes this takes many years -- Mari Fitzduff, professor of conflict studies at the University of Ulster Northern Ireland, recently explained at a conference in London how the constant trickle of tragedies in the province prevented people from grieving until the let-up in the violence of recent years.

As people come to terms with their grief and loss they then feel angry -- why did this have to happen, why did they have to die? Anger hardens to bitterness. Bitterness is anger plus memory.

Crucially, bitterness stays in the system, as an emotion constantly demanding that "something must be done" -- something equal to, or worse than, what was done to me. So it fuels the call for revenge.

The cycle of violence explored here is conceptualized by Scilla Elworthy, director of the British NGO, the Oxford Research Group. Dr Elworthy says that the cycle can only be dismantled within the individual human mind and heart.

According to Dr Elworthy, "Intervention is needed at the point before anger hardens into bitterness, revenge and retaliation."

"To be effective it must address the physical, the political and the psychological security of people trapped in violence".

"One without the other is insufficiently strong to break the cycle. In every case, the people involved in situations of violence must be supported in the development of their own resources for transformation."

In Indonesia there have been a number of interventions for physical, political and psychological security which are primarily concerned with conflict resolution or mitigation initiatives. This is different from, and complimentary to, the profoundly important role of relief, development and human-rights agencies.

o Intervention for physical security

Peacekeeping: Where people have murdered, brutalized or tortured each other, the first necessity is to keep them physically separated. This is often a role of the UN, where it is distinguished from peacebuilding and peacemaking -- working to overcome trauma, restore confidence and encourage reconciliation.

In Indonesia, the mobile brigade and the Indonesian Military (TNI) are often dispatched to a conflict zone, in the aftermath of violence, to put up road blocks and forestall any further attacks. But the record of these organizations is mixed.

Their own lack of resources, training and awareness, particularly when it comes to respect for human rights, has often limited their effectiveness. The International Crisis Group, a Brussels-based think-tank, recently added its voice to those criticizing the TNI as counter-productive, its officers accused of ordering their men to provoke or maintain conflicts in order to profit from them.

Protection: When civilians are threatened, driven from their homes, or under attack they can be protected in a number of ways. In Aceh protection is provided by Peace Brigades International (PBI). Trained volunteers accompany local NGO staff in Aceh to go about their daily tasks, providing a witness to any threats of violence and intimidation.

Tentena, the mainly Christian town on the shores of Lake Poso, has been caught up in the intercommunal clashes of recent years. The Sintuwo Maroso Youth Convoy (Amsimar) is a group of mainly university graduates providing protection to the 30 or so Muslims who've stayed in their homes rather becoming refugees. They've stood guard over the local mosque as well as the market place.

Weapons collection: When a province is awash with weapons after violent clashes, effective schemes are needed to collect and destroy the weapons. This job has been undertaken in recent years by the police and TNI, but there has been some criticism of these schemes being ineffective, even counter-productive.

The Malino Agreements for both Ambon and Poso contained weapon collections schemes but residents feared that only a token number of weapons were handed over.

However in July 2002 in Tobelo, North Maluku an army weapon- sweeping operation proved a trigger for another round of violence as it was considered unequal by the Muslim community. Thus intervention aimed at physical security is unlikely to work unless interventions to provide political and psychological security are being carried out at the same time.

One of the most creative schemes put into practice was in El Salvador in 1995. This was launched by a group of businessmen whose trucks were being hijacked by heavily armed gangs.

The gangs were formed with guns left over from 12 years of civil war, in response to a major source of insecurity -- not having enough to eat. So for every gun surrendered, the businessmen offered food vouchers worth US$100. By the end of the second weekend vouchers worth $103,000 had been issued. The President helped, and in three years over 10,000 weapons were handed in.

The writers recently led a training program in peace journalism for the British Council in Jakarta.