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Purpose of this website

Social Sciences for the Study of Conflict in Indonesia is a cooperative research program linking the Pusat Penelitian Kemasyarakatan dan Kebudayaan (PMB), part of the Lembaga Ilmu Pengetahuan Indonesia (LIPI), and the Laboratoire Asie du Sud-Est et Monde Austronésien (LASEMA), part of the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS). The program commenced on 1 September 2001. This website is designed to facilitate research and communication among program participants, as well as to serve as a tool for the wider community of researchers, academics, policy makers, and members of civil society.

At the outset, the research activities of the program are focused more on the conflicts in Kalimantan and Aceh, and the general question of migration and conflict; nevertheless, as there is much interest in other regions and related topics of equal importance for understanding conflict, this website will progressively incorporate wider themes. Please feel free to send us items and suggestions for improving or enriching this site.

Although communal conflicts are sometimes regarded as religious conflicts or ethnic conflicts, rarely are such labels sufficiently explanatory. Other issues—including economic or social exclusion, unequal access to valued resources, competition between civilian and military elites, or a myriad of factors which may be subsumed under the rubric of globalization—may play an important and even dominant role in the genesis and persistence of conflict.  communalconflict.com seeks to understand conflict and its causes, manifestations, and wider repercussions in all their historical, social and cultural complexity. communalconflict.com explores possible avenues of conflict mitigation and resolution, particularly those which take this complexity into account.

Social Sciences for the Study of Conflict in Indonesia is linked up with other networks dealing with similar questions, including The Economics of Civil Wars, Crime and Violence, a project of the World Bank, and the Indonesian Conflict Studies Network, supported by the Nordic Institute of Asian Studies (NIAS, Copenhagen). The program is made possible by funding from the CNRS (détachment for Dr. Hélène Bouvier-Smith), and from the French Embassy in Jakarta. Their support is gratefully acknowledged.