NASIONALISME ETNIK DI KALIMANTAN BARAT

Abstract

Nowadays ethnical celebration triggered by the uncontrollable identity politics,
is happening in Indonesia. In West Kalimantan, for instance, a struggle for the
identity politics has succeeded in forming new governments in district levels.
The new district governments are always based on the dominant ethnic groups
in the area. The political impact of the identity politics can whip up the ethnical
spirit by giving hegemony to ethnic monitory in the area. This paper argues that
this phenomenon could become “ethnic nationalism”. Theoretically, identity
politics is a struggle of a group or marginal people (periphery) politically,
socially as well as culturally and economically. Various ethnic conflicts in
West Kalimantan relate to the identity politics and the resistance towards
the hegemony of the ruling ethnic elite. The paper concludes that the ethnic
conflicts in West Kalimantan are the forms of effort of an ethnic group to
show their existence. These people have been threatened, or for a long
time they have been marginalized systematically, so that their spirit to fght
against hegemony rise. Identity politics appearing in the forms of cultural
institution such as ethnic customary council could be explained as the ethnic
systematic efforts to strengthen their identity, which eventually could become
a prospective “ethnic nationalism”.
Key words : Politics, identity, conflicts, nationalism, ethnic, hegemony.