Title: Pig-feast democracy | Direct local elections and the making of a plural political order in West Papua
Domain: philosophy

Question: How the convergence of pig feasts and electoral politics constitutes a new institutional framework and a condition of plural political order in Indonesia-occupied West Papua?

Background: 1.Pig feasts reemerged in 2013 in West Papua as a distinctive means of Papuan political ordering. | 2.West Papua was granted special autonomy status by the Indonesian government in 2001 in response to longstanding Papuan demands for greater political self-determination. | 3.Three pillars of West Papua’s governance: (1) the Papuan People’s Assembly (Majelis Rakyat Papua, hereafter MRP), (2) the Papuan People Representative Board (Dewan Perwakilan Rakyat Papua, hereafter Parliament), and (3) the governor and vice governor. | 4.The autonomy policy in West Papua makes the electionsto be the only democratic platform that the central government recognizes. |

Definitions: 1.pig feast: A ceremonial event in which pigs are slaughtered, cooked, and shared among a community to mark important social, cultural, or political occasions. Common in many Indigenous societies, especially in Melanesia and Papua, pig feasts function as systems of reciprocity, alliance-building, status display, and social cohesion, often reinforcing kinship and political relationships.2.plural political order: The multiple modes of understanding and organizing power that coexist under one social field. it entails different claims about the meaning, values, and procedures of democratic politics, even though they both rely on the notion of popular sovereignty. 3.Democracy: A system of government in which power is vested in the people, who exercise that power directly or through elected representatives. It is characterized by "free and fair elections", "majority rule with respect for minority rights", "the rule of law", and "protection of civil liberties" .4.direct local elections: A form of democratic electoral process in which residents of a specific locality (such as a district, municipality, or province) vote directly to elect their local government officials—such as mayors, governors, or regional legislators—rather than having them appointed by higher levels of government or indirectly chosen by elected representatives.

Methodology: 1.Conducting fieldwork in the Central Highlands as well as in the coastal cities of Nabire (Central Papua Province) and Jayapura (Papua Province) to gather empirical data.2.Adopting the theoretical perspective of plural political orders, and moving beyond the analysis of existing institutional forms, with a focus on the possibility of constructing new institutional frameworks both within and beyond electoral politics, to explore the theoretical and empirical significance of democracy. | |

Answer: 1.The historical overview and political context of West Papua's plural political order | Indonesian central government devised a new policy forthe region, granting special autonomy status to West Papuain 2001. | The elections are the only democratic platform that the central gov-ernment recognizes: First, the special autonomy on West Papua excluded armed groups and civil society groups, so it lacks political legitimacy among much of Papuan society. Second, the specialautonomy laws do not establish local political parties. Third, the special autonomy status does not entail recognition of Papuans'fundamental rights, such as freedom of speech and assembly,or their rights to self-determination. | Special autonomy and direct local elections has shifted the locus of political strength from thecoast to the Central Highlands, where 60 percent of Indigenous Papuans live. The highland politicians are well situated to reap the benefits of thedemocratic system, thanks to their demographic and organizational advantages. | Lukas Enembe rose as one of the most emblematic models ofthe new type of Papuan leadership. The most decisive factor in his rise lies in his skillin accumulating resources and mobilizing a new ideology of Papuan power through, among other ways, pig feasts. | 2.The birth of new pig feasts | Several characteristics of the old pig feasts persist, yet their transformationis marked most explicitly by several phenomena. First, as in other Melanesian societies, the traditional pig feasts, withtheir associated sacred character, are not held as often or atthe same scale. Second, the decline of pig feasts is followed by therise of bakar batu or barapen, which translated by the author as a "new pigfeast." A clear distinction is made between the two, especiallyregarding their sacred character and location within the sphere of ceremonial exchange. | 3.Pig feasts during the elections | The resurgence of pig feasts as a distinctive Papuan mode of political ordering began in 2013, when Lukas Enembe and Klemen Tinal ran with the support of a coalition of five political parties. | The regulatory framework creates a significant barrier for independent candidates and forces all candidates to run with political parties' machines instead. Because the special autonomy law has yet to pass a provision for local political parties, Papuan candidates are forced to approach national or Jakarta-based political parties and request their support. | Papuan candidates deal with this system in two ways. First, money politics. Second, during the gubernatorial elections, the candidates organize pig feasts for their voters, especially the Papuan ones. The decision to contribute pigs or cash to certain candidates is determined, for instance, by "whether the candidates or their families havehelped paying bride wealth, fines, or compensations in thepast, or whether they helped mediate a conﬂict, that sort ofthings." | The campaign teams of candidate will undertake an expansive ceremonial cycle that takes place within and beyond one's related partners, and that determines one's victory. And this achievement is usually shown in the second phase of the cycle, which takes public form as the feast itself. | The organization of pig feasts is an indicator whether the candidate can mobilize constituents to his or her favor. | Conclusion: Electoral politics has become a privileged site for the reemergence of pig feasts. Conversely, through their role in electoral politics, pig feasts in West Papua have become a politically charged site of competitive exchange. Highlanders have also treated elections as a war and that pig feasts help build alliances, especially amongthe Indigenous groups. | 4.Electoral democracy in a plural political order | In the West Papuan case, both electoral politics and pig feasts operate as a procedure to mobilize power—although with different degrees of institutionalization and formalization. | Two kinds of political order: Scholars of politics have theorized political order as a stateof being. It is a quality of stability and lack of violence in a community's political life. One strand argues "order is afunction of state capacity and their formal institutions" . The nonstatist approach to order, on the other hand, considers community capacity and informal institutions in maintaining order. | The conception of plural political order contends that various forms of political institutionalization and values can coexist, and that liberal democracy is not the pinnacle ofpolitical order. | Political order in West Papua is a kind of plural political order. It reflects different bases of democratic politics. On the one hand, electoral politics reflects the moral and political claim of the modern nation-state and its postauthoritarian ideology. On the other hand, the pig feasts function as anonstate form of political ordering, one that draws its authority from the notion of tradition. Both are an experiment in exercising political authorities enabled by the democratic transition. | | Conclusion: Pigfeasts are used to incorporate foreign elements, either moneyor the electoral system, into the indigenous cycle of ceremonial exchange. As a political form, pig feasts and other Papuan traditions have becomean important political order that competes for legitimacy in thefractured landscape of state-citizen relations in the region.

Checklist: 1. Does the answer discuss the special autonomy status of West Papua? | 2. Does the answer discuss the emergence of new pig feasts in West Papua? | 3. Does the answer include content about the operation of pig feasts during elections in West Papua? | 4. Does the answer include content about the plural political order in West Papua? | 5. Does the answer discuss West Papua’s electoral politics and pig feasts within the framework of the plural political order?