Contestation ou négociation à Jakarta ? Deux quartiers face aux projets urbains de la métropole

Abstract

As a metropolis and the capital city of Republic of Indonesia, Jakarta fits into the neoliberal context, producing competition between spaces and cities. These kinds of urban production and urban management do not reduce inequalities inside the urban area. Moreover, it contributes to strain land access. We can question the governance modes in that metropolitan context. This paper compares two areas and its stakeholders in different phases of the urban project. The aim is to describe the negotiation and the contestation according to several factors: the legal status of people and of the land, the size of the community involved, the principles of urban development. At local scale, the top down production of the city is less relevant. Urban governance practices highlight new power relations and negotiation. The emergence of informal governments is linked to contested land uses. Also, some daily quiet encroachments cohabit with official planning practices: it contributes to the production of inequalities and vulnerability inside the city. In Budidharma (North Jakarta), a household’s group helped by a NGO can negotiate with the owner (a developer company) and the local government to avoid their eviction. In Bintara (Bekasi), some residents resisted hardily against a residential high standing compound project because of unclear land use. They may be forced to leave this area very quickly. These two case studies question uses of ordinary citizen and of urban planners between individualization of social relations and collective mobilization.

Keywords

• contestation
• Jakarta
• land use conflict
• negotiation
• power relations
• informal