The Chinese resistance to land rights discrimination in Indonesia

Abstract

Ethnic Chinese is the largest ethnic minority in Indonesia. However, ethnic Chinese is not entirely accepted by Indonesian society. For instance, ethnic Chinese experienced discrimination through the 1975 instruction, which prohibited land ownership in the only special region of Indonesia, namely Yogyakarta. This article aims to trace the ethnic Chinese response to the 1975 Instruction. By employing the historical method with a multidimensional social sciences approach. This research shows that historically ethnic Chinese who have experienced discrimination in land ownership rights in Yogyakarta since 1975 only started to carry out resistance in 1998. Resistance began to emerge and grew with increasing escalation due to factors in the political culture conditions that occurred in Indonesia generally and Yogyakarta especially. The resistance carried out divided into individuals and groups. However, both are categorized as open resistance. In the end, the Indonesian government needs to take serious steps to address the issue of racial discrimination in land rights before it escalates into conflict.