Over 12 million people live in Sulawesi, and over half of them live in the province of South Sulawesi. Ethnic groups include the Bugis, the Makasarese and the Mandarese in the southern coastal areas, the Minahasans in the north and the Toraja in the highlands. Around 80% practice Islam, the remainder (17%) are Christians and there is a small percentage of traditional religions. The majority of Christians are located in the north, as well as in the district of Poso in Central Sulawesi. The Muslim population dominates the central, southeastern, and southern provinces.
These peoples usually live together in harmony, but the political upheavals accompanying Suharto’s resignation sparked a religious conflict in Central Sulawesi between Christian and Muslim communities. It is estimated that more than 300 people had died by 2000, and tens of thousands were displaced before an uneasy peace agreement was reached at the end of 2001.
Social violence as a manifestation of social conflict has been paralysing Indonesia in the past ten years. The violence was triggered by the financial crisis beginning in mid-1997, which reached a peak in early 1998 with riots and looting in several parts of Indonesia provoked by shortages and price hikes of basic goods.
Following the fall of Suharto’s New Order regime, identity-based violence erupted throughout the Indonesian archipelago including Central Sulawesi. Many commentators have attributed the increased violence to weakened state institutions which allowed latent conflicts to explode from apparently minor incidents. There have been few comprehensive attempts at characterizing the processes by which identity-based violence arises and escalates or at examining these conflicts from a bottom-up perspective.
At this moment conflict status in Central Sulawesi is at a medium level (measured by the death rate due to conflicts). In 2000, religious violence in the nearby Moluccan Islands spread to the remote Poso region of Central Sulawesi. The northern part of this province is largely Christian, but elsewhere Muslims are in majority. The killings between the previously peaceful communities may have been sparked by business rivalry.
In 2002, both communities made moves towards peace when they agreed to hand over their weapons. However some fighting has continued, mostly in the Poso area.
References:
BPS-Statistic Indonesia et al., “Indonesia Human Development Report 2004: The Economics of Democracy: financing Human Development in Indonesia”, Jakarta: BPS-Statistic Indonesia, Bappenas and UNDP Indonesia, 2004
JICA, “Poverty Profile Executive Summary Republic of Indonesia”, Japan Bank for International Cooperation, February 2001
Tadjoeddin, Mohammad Zulfan; “ Social Violence in the Context of Transition: The case of Indonesia 1990-2001: working paper: 02/01- E”, Jakarta: UNSFIR, April 2002
UNDP, “Indonesia Progress Report on the Millenium Development Goals”, online: http://www.undp.or.id/pubs/imdg2004/ , 2005
World Bank, “Indonesia Country Brief”, Jakarta: World Bank, August 8, 2003
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