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Journal of Contemporary Asia

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Social Media and the Successful Anti-Mining Campaign in Bangka, Indonesia

Kristina Großmann

To cite this article: Kristina Großmann (2018) Social Media and the Successful Anti- Mining Campaign in Bangka, Indonesia, Journal of Contemporary Asia, 48:5, 835-854, DOI: 10.1080/00472336.2018.1432675

To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/00472336.2018.1432675

Published online: 06 Feb 2018.

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Social Media and the Successful Anti-Mining Campaign in Bangka, Indonesia Kristina Großmann

Faculty of Arts and Humanities, University of Passau, Passau, Germany

ABSTRACT This article elaborates on the functionalities of Facebook and WhatsApp, and the possibilities and limitations of their usage in the anti-mining campaign in Bangka, Indonesia, with special focus on the participation and offline–online intertwining of communi- cation processes. The research reported in this article contributes to a deeper understanding of the relationship between social media and political protest in the context of discriminatory natural resource extraction in Indonesia. In 2017, the alliance against the mining activities of the Chinese company PT Mikgro Metal Perdana in Bangka, which consisted of villagers, activists, tourism operators and divers, succeeded in ousting PT MMP from Bangka. Social media enhanced mobilisation, communication, knowledge trans- fer, transparency, and solidarity in this anti-mining campaign. Through WhatsApp, the rapid transmission of information and communication was facilitated when urgent action was needed. The Facebook group Save Bangka Island not only provided gen- eral information but also enhanced solidarity, cohesion and the creation of an “imagined community.” However, it is also found that social media sites are stratified spaces where villagers – the primary affected group – are excluded because of their lack of Internet access.

ARTICLE HISTORY Published online 07 February 2018

KEYWORDS Social media; Facebook; WhatsApp; Indonesia; social movement; mining

In February 2017, the Supreme Court of Jakarta revoked the production permit of the Chinese owned mining company PT Mikgro Metal Perdana (PT MMP) to extract iron ore in Bangka. This court decision marked an important success in the struggle of an anti-mining alliance against the company’s activities on the small island located in the northeastern tip of the province North Sulawesi. One aspect of the successful opposi- tion was the online campaign called Save Bangka Island, which started in 2011, and the use of commercial social media such as Facebook and WhatsApp.

Bangka, only 48 square kilometres and inhabited by roughly 3,000 people, was developed to become an exclusive diving site owing to its high marine biodiversity and paradise-like beaches.1 The small island is recognised as deserving environmental protection, as it is part of the huge Coral Triangle stretching over Indonesia, Malaysia, Papua New Guinea, the Philippines, Solomon Islands and Timor-Leste and is located close to the Bunaken National Park.2 However, in 2008, the then regent (bupati) of

CONTACT Kristina Großmann [email protected] Faculty of Arts and Humanities, University of Passau, Dr. Hans-Kapfinger-Str. 14 b, Passau 94032, Germany.

JOURNAL OF CONTEMPORARY ASIA 2018, VOL. 48, NO. 5, 835–854 https://doi.org/10.1080/00472336.2018.1432675

© 2018 Journal of Contemporary Asia

North Minahasa, Sompie Singal, issued a permit (izin eksplorasi) allowing PT MMP to explore for iron ore on the island. The permit covered 1,300 hectares, which is almost one-third of the island, and the mining company was soon conducting exploratory drilling. In 2011, villagers, activists, tourism operators and divers increasingly organised their resistance by bringing their complaints to the national parliament and initiating online and offline campaigns. In 2012, residents of Bangka and tourism operators sued the former bupati and the mining company to stop the mining activities under Law 27/ 2007, which forbids mining on islands that are less than 2,000 square kilometres. In the following years, several court cases were filed, and the success of the anti-mining alliance culminated in the decision by the Supreme Court in 2017 that officially declared the mining activities illegal.

The online campaign was a critical component in this anti-mining victory. A key person responsible for the design and implementation of the online campaign was Eku Wand. A professor of media design and multimedia at the Braunschweig University of Art in Germany, he is a media designer, social media professional and scuba diver, who visited Indonesia regularly and returned to live in Jakarta in 2014. Having known Bangka as a diving site since 2007, he confronted the mining problems in Bangka in 2011. In October the same year, supported by tourism operators, he began to devise and implement the online anti-mining campaign known as #Save Bangka Island. With his background as social media professional and scuba diver, he established the online campaign to stop PT MMP and to save the environment and people’s livelihood. His view was that he wanted to implement an “all-encompassing example” in the field of social media marketing (Interview, Eku Wand, Jakarta, March 8, 2016). The social media campaign, according to Eku Wand, should aim at mobilising, sharing knowledge and developing solidarity amongst the members of the anti-mining alliance by enhan- cing transparency and addressing the information and knowledge deficit in Indonesia with special focus on the Bangka case. Furthermore, he wants to build trust and teamwork amongst the members of the alliance. For him, social media should also act as an intermediary between the involved actors and create a space where users establish their own rules and as a counterweight to political and social restrictions. But, also aware of the limitations of social media, he states that the role of social media, being a mirror of society and politics, is dependent on the engagement and capacities of the involved people and on the will of the political regime. Eku Wand’s idealism and his professional challenge materialised in a time-consuming orchestration and maintenance of diverse social media sites such as Facebook, Twitter, and Google+.

Online protest, like Eku Wand’s engagement, links to debates about the intertwine- ment of social media and political participation. Numerous scholarly discussions refer in a binary way to the question of whether people can strengthen their political participation and citizen rights through social media. Soon after the development of the internet in the 1960s, digital technology and cyberspace were described as a space beyond the control of governments (Drissel 2006). In this vein, Shirky (2008, 2011), Castells (2009, 2012) and Jenkins (2008) tend to ascribe social media an important role in enhancing a participatory culture and user empowerment. Fuchs (2008, 2010, 2011) and van Dijck (2009), however, oppose such simplistic views. They assert that com- mercial social media serves corporate interests and that participation is dependent on the financial strength and social class of the user. Morozov (2011, 179) goes further in a

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dystopian approach and perceives online activism as banal and ineffective, using the term “slacktivism.” By using this pejorative compound word of “slacker” and “activism” he argues that people easily form Facebook groups for speaking out against something because the effort required is low, which also prevents them from organising. In the wake of the political revolts in North Africa and the Middle East in 2010, debates on political participation and social media took on new dimensions and dynamics, mostly without moving away from dichotomous descriptions. These revolts are often depicted as prototypes of technological revolutions. An oversimplified celebration of so-called Facebook revolutions stresses the importance of social media in bringing down political systems. Castells (2012) claims that in the Egyptian protest movement, social media had an outstanding role for mobilisation. Howard and Hussain (2011, 2013) ascribe digital media a major role in the uprisings in several Middle Eastern and North African countries, especially in providing a new infrastructure for social movements. However, in the Egyptian case, surveys of Egyptian protesters’ use patterns of media showed a more diverse picture. Wilson and Dunn (2011) state that personal interaction was the most important source of protest-related information, followed by television, phone calls, and SMS, with Facebook being the least important.

More recent studies on social media and political protest are aimed at overcoming binary descriptions by taking seriously the potential usefulness of digital media in campaigns without applying technological determinism (see Martin 2014; Della Porta and Mattoni 2015). Furthermore, they aim at providing insights into the complexity of political protest and social media (see Dencik and Leistert 2015; Gerbaudo 2012). In providing a more nuanced picture, they elaborate on the contexts of and relationship between political protest and social media, on opportunities and restrictions, and on how the intertwinement between offline and online can be grasped, a path that indicates the direction of my arguments in this article. This article seeks to work against the oversimplified celebration of Facebook revolutions and the illusionary perception that hierarchies are dissolved in social media. Research on political participation and social media in Southeast Asia exists.3 However, it is relatively under-represented in compar- ison to literatures referring to the US, Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa (see Martin 2014). This article seeks to add to the discussion on Southeast Asia.

Taking Eku Wand’s aims as a starting point, this article delves into the role and potential of Facebook and WhatsApp in regard to mobilisation, co-ordination and co- operation, development of solidarity, enhancement of transparency and the relationship between offline and online in the frame of the anti-mining campaign in Bangka. A special focus is the social stratification of members of the multinational anti-mining alliance according to their networks, aims, communication structures and community formation. Special attention is given to the access, control and power within communication pro- cesses. In addition, the functionalities, possibilities and limitations of Facebook and WhatsApp will be taken into consideration. This research contributes to a deeper under- standing of the intertwining of technology/social media and political transformations/ protest in the context of discriminatory and non-transparent natural resource extraction in Indonesia. The data collected for this article were accessed during fieldwork in March and April 2016. The author lived in Bangka and conducted participant observation, focus group discussions and semi-structured and narrative interviews with 23 villagers (19 opposing and four supporting the mining activities) and six resort owners on topics

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such as the company’s activities, the anti-mining campaign and networks and participa- tion of members of the alliance. In addition, semi-structured and narrative interviews were conducted with members of three civil society organisations in Manado and Jakarta regarding the anti-mining campaign in general and networks, and the participation of members of the alliance. Semi-structured interviews were also conducted with eight members of the Facebook group Save Bangka Island. A network analysis of the involved actors in the anti-mining alliance that focused on communication channels provided insights into the structure of the network, the position of members, and the relationships amongst individual actors (Borgatti, Everett, and Johnson 2013).4 In addition, since 2015, the author has been a member of the Facebook group Save Bangka Island, which in October 2016 had 7,728 members, and several WhatsApp groups. This permitted content and network analyses on postings and comments in the Facebook group Save Bangka Island from March 22 to July 1, 2016. Triangulation using data obtained through quali- tative and quantitative methods and from offline and online activities enabled an analysis of the participation of actors and their use of social media, power structures, and com- munity formation within the network.

Social Media and Political Protest in Indonesia

In Indonesia, the use of the internet by political protesters started with the anti-Suharto movement in 1998, where the establishment of email news groups enhanced commu- nication amongst protesters and served as a source of information then beyond government control (Luwarso 2004). During the preparation of the referendum in East Timor in 1999, local groups could disseminate information via the internet to the international community despite censorship by the occupying army (Hill and Sen 2005). The Islamic group Lashkar Jihad used the internet for self-representation, information dissemination, and recruitment (Lim 2003). During the conflict in the Moluccas, websites and mailing lists served as a tool for community building, repre- sentation of conflict parties and recruitment (Bräuchler 2003, 2007, 2013). Research has increased in recent years, focusing on diverse media such as newspapers, television, radio and cinema, and covering topics such as democratisation and media (Sen and Hill 2011), democratisation and the internet (Hill and Sen 2005), the press and politics (Romano 2003) and media and conflict (Bräuchler 2013). In her research on websites and mailing lists as tools for community building, Bräuchler (2013) refers to Anderson’s (1983) concept of imagined communities. She argues that “Internet communities are also often composed of conglomerates of users spread widely across the globe. As with national consciousness, in these cases a feeling of community and identity is conveyed and imagined in cyberspace via the media.” Collective identities in the internet “are bound to common goals, values and ideas, a certain symbolism, existing notions of friends and enemies, a common history, events in certain offline contexts, etc.” (Bräuchler 2013, 28).

Facebook and Protests

In Indonesia, only 31% of the population uses social media, what is relatively low in contrast to other Southeast Asian countries.5 But as Indonesia’s population is more than

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260 million, the number of social media users is high. In fact, Indonesia has the highest number of social media users in the region. Moreover, the number of people using social media increased rapidly at about 10% per year between 2014 and 2016 (We Are Social 2016).

Facebook is currently the most popular social media site in Indonesia (eMarketer 2016). In 2015 about 30% of the population were active on Facebook (We Are Social 2015a). In addition, the number of users who access their Facebook account via mobile phones is relatively high, with Indonesians being the third largest mobile phone Facebook audience in the world, after the US and India (eMarketer 2015). Generally, the rate of use of mobile phones for private and professional communication is high, with mobile access being 125% of the population, meaning that some people typically use several SIM cards, slightly more than the average in Southeast Asia (We Are Social 2015b).6

Although instances in which social media, predominantly Facebook, played a vital role in political protest and political campaigning in Indonesia have gained attention in recent years, relatively few academic publications exist on the topic. Nyarwi and Popa (2014) and Johansson (2016a) focused on the use of social media in election campaigns of party candidates and explained the increase in social media use with the low costs and the high impact of reaching people for the promotion of the candidates. Furthermore, social media provides the possibility of advertising political party candidates who stand outside the Jakarta political establishment, as the election of President Joko Widodo in 2014 showed (Chen and Priamarizki 2014; Johanssen 2016b; Nyarwi and Popa 2014). Johansson (2016b, 35–36) considers that social media has gained growing importance in Indonesia’s electoral processes because of the “complementary and to some extent even substitutive role social media has alongside traditional media.” Social media thus serves as an alternative channel for the distribution of oppositional information and the promotion of political agendas outside the mainstream. Lim (2013) and Hamideh (2015) have elaborated on the role of Facebook in the successful anti-corruption movement in 2009 (known as the Gecko v. Crocodile case, Komisi Pemberantasan Korupsi [KPK], or Support Bibit- Chandra) and the Coins for Prita Mulyasari case, also in 2009. Lim (2013) states that simple narratives, actions with low risk, and congruence with meta-narratives made the cases successful. She argues that, with most people accessing Facebook via mobile phones, the narratives that go viral “are of a light package, they tap into headline appetites and they embrace a trailer version” (Lim 2013, 644). Hamideh (2015, 101; 103) points out that in the above-mentioned cases, the diffusion of the movements’ message into the public sphere and the supportive stance of politicians were main factors for success.

Looking beyond Indonesia, analyses of the protests and social media in the Middle Eastern and North African upheavals of the early 2010s also provide insights for drawing a nuanced picture of the contexts and relationship between political protest and social media. Tufekci and Wilson (2012, 374–377) stressed in their research on Egypt’s Tahrir Square protests that besides the use of social media, the organisation of event logistics, the likelihood of the protester’s success and the spread of visual content from participants were important. Moreover, political activists used and augmented social network sites that existed before the uprising for political information and

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mobilisation; those networks were more likely to participate in politics online and offline (Salem 2015; Sayed 2011).

Social Media and the Bangka Campaign

This article now turns to the juridical background, anti-mining alliances and offline and online campaigns in Bangka. It then delves more deeply into the opportunities and restrictions of Facebook and WhatsApp in the anti-mining campaign, predominantly focusing on communication processes, participation and transparency, as well as on community formation.

Juridical Struggle

The litigation between residents, tour operators and activists against PT MMP and politicians took several years and ended up with the success of the anti-mining alliance, in contrast to many other cases in Indonesia where villagers are unable to assert their rights against companies. The juridical process was characterised by state authorities withholding information, as the copies of the initial mining permits were only handed out to villagers several years after the issuance and court orders were also retained for months. Furthermore, the company repeatedly landed drilling equipment on the island, backed by provincial police units and local militia, despite court orders having already annulled permits.7 Villagers reported that the company also threatened resisting villa- gers and bribed five of the plaintiffs during litigation.

In 2012, residents of the island and tourism operators sued the former regent and PT MMP at the Manado Administrative Court. On August 30, 2012, the court rejected the lawsuit and the plaintiffs appealed at the High Administrative Court of Makassar, South Sulawesi. On March 1, 2013, the judges accepted all points of the applicants. The former bupati and the mining company then appealed before the Supreme Court, which dismissed the appeal on September 24, 2013. On July 31, 2013, ignoring the High Administrative Court’s verdict, the former bupati issued a decree (surat keputusan) on the environmental feasibility of iron ore mining, which included the construction of a smelter, a steel plant and a pier for Bangka island. In September 2013, to intensify the protest against the mining company that again tried to force the unloading of drilling equipment, an online petition on change.org was launched. In November 2013, three Bangka plaintiffs, backed by local and national civil society organisations, intensified lobbying in Jakarta at 18 ministries and national agencies to enforce the Supreme Court’s decision. In early 2014, the company again landed equipment and constructed infrastructure on the island. The online and offline protests showed some success in 2014. In June 2014, the central government ordered the suspension of the mining activities. Despite the court decisions and governmental interventions, on July 18, 2014, the then Minister of Energy and Minerals Jero Wacik issued the operation permit to PT MMP. On September 3, 2014, Wacik was suspended from office and the Anti- Corruption Commission (KPK) investigated him on various corruption allegations in several diverse cases (Tribune News, August 31, 2015). On October 2, 2014, the original Bangka plaintiffs filed a lawsuit against Wacik for violating the Supreme Court ruling. By the end of 2015, the company had removed heavy machinery from the island but, in

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March 2016, once more landed material and equipment, seemingly ignored by Governor Olly Dondokambey and the authorities. In April 2016, representatives of the KPK arrived in Manado and Bangka and investigated corruption by the governor. At the end of the month, most of the company’s equipment was removed from Bangka. Finally, in February 2017, all permits issued to PT MMP were annulled by the Supreme Court.

Impact on the Villagers

Initially most villagers welcomed PT MMP’s plans for mining because in information events before the drilling the company promised good wages, high compensation for land and improvements to the island’s infrastructure. However, after illegal expropria- tion of land, the destruction of forests, fields and houses without compensation, irregular wages and violence against opponents, an increasing number of villagers began to oppose PT MMP. The company’s exploratory drilling and the construction of roads and premises had resulted in negative consequences on the livelihood of the villagers and dive resort owners, who complained about sedimentary deposits on corals, reduced fish stocks, the destruction of agricultural land and trees as well as polluted drinking water.

Moreover, inhabitants of the village which is in immediate proximity to the com- pany’s main premises were divided over the mining activities. As a consequence, in 2013, the original village separated into two smaller villages: Kahuku (about 130 families) and Ehe (about 150 families). The relationship between the inhabitants of the two villages has been tense, as residents in Ehe largely support the mining activities and work for the company, whereas in Kahuku, the residents are mostly opponents of the mining activities. Therefore, most inhabitants of Kahuku and some residents of the other two villages – Lihunu and Libas – support the anti-mining campaign.

Anti-Mining Campaign

The anti-mining campaign shares features of a social movement, such as collective action that is motivated by political, economic and cultural goals, operating outside state branches but aiming to act upon it, being temporal and relational – as it is a network that exceeds a single organisation – having shared beliefs, and solidarity (Della Porta and Diani 1999; Della Porta and Mattoni 2015). The anti-mining campaign is multi-layered, as it has members on the local, national and international levels; com- prises several strategies; and includes diverse online and offline activities.

Members of the Campaign

At the beginning, the campaign was small, with only a handful of members and organisations joining successively, sometimes after being invited several times. The Manado-based activists Jull Takaliuang, director of Yayasan Suara Nurani Minaesa (Voice of the Heart of Minahasa) and Didi Koleangan, director of Aliansi Masyarakat Menolak Limbah Tambang (Alliance Against Mining Waste) were key actors in the alliance. Owing to their engagement in previous anti-mining campaigns in North

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Sulawesi, both were experienced organisers who were well-connected to local and national activists. Liga Mahasiswa Nasional untuk Demokrasi Sulut (National League of Students for Democracy for North Sulawesi) and Tunas Hijau (Green Sprout) also provided local-level support.

Of the six diving resorts on Bangka, some have existed for many years. The resorts have three to 20 bungalows and are managed and directly run by the owners. They provide work opportunities for villagers and usually buy fish and agricultural products from them. The operators of the resorts opposed mining activities as a threat to their businesses and the natural resources they relied on and became important actors in the anti-mining alliance. Tourism operators on Bangka and the resorts on the mainland established the Bangka Conservation Fund (BCF) and the Manado North Sulawesi Watersport Association, which are the main platforms for information sharing, strategy planning and funding of anti-mining activities. The members of the BCF ask every tourist who stays in their resort to donate $7.60 for the anti-mining campaign and some members of the BCF manage the funds of the donation platform betterplace.org.

Villagers in Bangka who oppose the company’s activities act as plaintiffs, lobby at the regency, provincial and national levels, and are engaged in holding the company’s activities on the island by blocking the jetty and supply roads to inland premises.

The international supporting organisations such as Greenpeace Indonesia and World Wide Fund For Nature, strengthen the campaign through their good reputation and provide networks for spreading the campaign, but joined only in 2013. National organisations such as the KPK, which joined in 2014, and Jaringan Advokasi Tambang (Mining Advocacy Network), which joined in 2012, predominantly helped in preparing and financing lobbying visits by villagers and Manado-based activists to Jakarta and in exerting pressure on politicians and judges. Other supporting organisa- tions at the national level were Wahana Lingkungan Hidup Indonesia (Friends of the Earth Indonesia) and the Komisi Nasional Hak Asasi Manusia, Komnas (National Human Rights Commission). Some key actors of the anti-mining alliance had known each other since before the anti-mining campaign started as they were involved in protests against mining activities preceding the Bangka case.

Aims of the Anti-Mining Alliance

The main aim of the anti-mining alliance is to stop the activities of PT MMP in Bangka and to enforce a judicial decision prohibiting mining on the island. Therefore, the general strategy is to enhance pressure on key actors in politics, the legal system, and the company. For gaining the support of politicians and judges, lobbying at the regency, provincial and national levels is a main activity of the involved activists. In addition, they must carefully prepare for court sessions by instructing the witnesses and lawyers so that they can argue convincingly. Other means to augment pressure are public protest, physical resistance against the company’s activities and online and offline reports on the Bangka case in Indonesian local and national newspapers, international dive magazines and on television. Additional activities include the composition of a Wikipedia article about Bangka island, with a special focus on the anti-mining cam- paign, and fundraising by, for example, providing an information booth at the boat fair in Dusseldorf, Germany, with a raffle yielding several thousand dollars (Interview,

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resort owner, Kahuku, March 16, 2016). An important element of the protest against mining activities has been the online campaign, which is detailed in the following section.

The Online Campaign

The online campaign, which started in 2011, was supported by diverse actors, one of them being the well-known Indonesian singer Kaka Slank, who joined the campaign in September 2013. He composed an anti-mining song and travelled with his band to North Sulawesi to perform in Manado and Bangka, lobbying against the mining activities on the island. This campaigning tour was documented and disseminated in social media and pictures of the tour are used as profile pictures in several social media. The visit by the group, including famous musicians from Jakarta, strengthened the solidarity amongst the alliance, stressed the importance of villagers’ criticism, legiti- mised their concerns, and motivated individuals in their protest.

The online campaign has comprised several elements, such as online petitions at change.org, thepetitionsite.com, rainforest-rescue.org and avaaz.org. However, in Indonesia, online petitions have not been very successful, usually with hundreds to several thousand signatures. In contrast, in Germany, signatures were usually ten times higher (see Table 1).

The YouTube videos of the campaign involving Kaka Slank were published with moderate resonance, with some 20,000 views over three years. A donation platform on betterplace.org was established in 2011 and about $15,000 was collected from 164 donors by October 2016. The donations were mostly used for the travel expenses in lobbying visits to Jakarta by Manado-based activists, for the court cases, and to support villagers. Information on the campaign was published in diverse blogs. A Google+ account was also established, with a moderate following of 172 (on October 10, 2016). The Facebook group Save Bangka Island is the most vibrant social network site in the online campaign, having 7,728 members (on October 10, 2016) and approximately 20 new members each week. In addition, several WhatsApp groups were established among members of the anti-mining alliance, such as one general group for all involved villagers, resort owners, activists, journalists and other interested persons, and one group amongst the members of the BCF.8 The Facebook and WhatsApp networks are embedded in existing personal and online networks.

Table 1. Online petitions in Indonesia and Germany Total no. of signatures (per week or day) Period and year online Platform

Indonesia 3,769 (157/week) 6 months, October 2011 thepetitionsite.com 22,012 (423/week) 12 months, October 2013 change.org 2,619 (218/week) 3 months, September 2015 change.org 259 (32/week) 2 months, October 2014 change.org

Germany 32, 695 (4,087/week) 2 months, December 2014 rainforest-rescue.org 672 (224/day) 3 days, December 2012 avaaz.org

Source: Author calculations from listed platforms.

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Communication, Participation and Transparency

Vibrant discussions in academia circle around the question of whether the internet and social network sites have the potential to enhance communication, to further the access to information, and to strengthen participation in deliberative processes. Manuel Castells (2009) argues with his visionary model of the network society and his elabora- tions on power and communication in multimedia networks that hierarchies tend to be undermined. However, Paolo Gerbaudo (2012) counters that in contemporary move- ments, leaders make use of social media for choreographing protest; therefore, hier- archies and power structures are maintained rather than dissolved. In the following, a nuanced picture of the relationship between political protest and social media in the context of Bangka is constructed with attention to the dissemination of information to enhance transparency, participation in different online and offline communication channels, and means to overcome exclusions.

Transparency, Access, and Communication Channels

The Facebook group Save Bangka Island provides general and up-to-date information about the Bangka case. It includes, in the Files section, court decisions, letters from courts and ministries, press releases and summaries from members. In the Discussion section, current information and background knowledge on the Bangka case and related topics are posted and discussed. This section also includes links to newspaper articles, pictures, reports and comments on the maritime world, the company’s activ- ities and lobby meetings, as well as on activities of activists from other parts of Indonesia. As mentioned earlier, the disclosure of information by the company, courts and political institutions with respect to the mining activities in Bangka is poor. Therefore, the Facebook group enhances transparency by providing documents and articles to those who have access to it, reinforcing Johansson’s (2016b, 25, 36) argument that social media serves as an alternative channel for the dissemination of oppositional information.

Social media transgress time boundaries as they offer a platform for the immediate transmission of information and communication. Therefore, mobile phones with access to the internet were important tools for members of the anti-mining cam- paign, as they could disseminate information about current activities and develop- ments immediately via social media. In March 2016, PT MMP landed material without providing information about their activities to villagers and activists, who feared the company would expand. One resort owner took pictures of the unloading and sent them via WhatsApp and email to the other members of the anti-mining alliance. Manado-based activists then sent the information and the images instantly via WhatsApp to the bupati and journalists. Eku Wand distributed the information via all social media sites. In the next few days, articles about the secretive landing appeared in local newspapers in which Bupati Foni Pananbunan criticised the renewed activities of the mining company (BeritaManado.com, March 28, 2016, March 30, 2016). The images, which showed one barge full of building materials, cranes and unloading trucks, were used as striking evidence of the company’s illegal activities. Following the publicity, the company stopped further unloading. Therefore,

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social media facilitated the rapid transmission of information and pictures, as well as fast communication, amongst members of the networks. The company was caught in the act, proven by the images transmitted, which convinced local politicians and journalists to speak out against the company’s disregard of court decisions. The networks used in social network sites such as WhatsApp and Facebook as part of Web 2.0 are more expanded than before, as they provide simultaneous interaction with anyone located anywhere in the networks (Ogan 2014, VIII).

By legitimising the struggle against the company and providing the example of a “clean,” not-corrupted politician, the supportive stance of politicians such as Bupati Foni Pananbunan further promoted the anti-mining campaign (see Hamideh 2015). Newly elected in 2016 and strongly opposed to the mining plans on Bangka, she demanded the immediate end to all illegal activities. She successfully started investiga- tions regarding illegal employment by PT MMP, as most of the company’s workers with Chinese nationality stayed on a tourist visa in Indonesia. Her actions were documented by a local newspaper, posted to the Save Bangka Island Facebook group and enthusias- tically followed by users. Comments to Facebook showed appreciation for using her position and her actions. For example, one user (June 22, 2016) stated, “Good Job Madame. . ..”

In addition to transmitting information fast, scholars point out the low cost of social media content transfer, as “[s]ocial network sites allow for an easy and cheap transfer of content from one platform to another” (Della Porta and Mattoni 2015, 54). This observation is generally valid for Indonesia, where a person has access to an internet- connected mobile phone. In Bangka, the internet is hardly accessible via the mobile phone network because of a weak signal, except in tourist resorts which provide an external modem. This restricted internet access for villagers underlines the observation of Willnat and Aw (2014, 4) on the digital gap in some Asian countries, adding: “This digital gap is closing slowly, as smartphones linked to the Internet are increasingly affordable. Yet large population segments in less-developed Asian nations will remain excluded from the digital world for the foreseeable future.” Communication amongst villagers opposing the mining activities is most often carried out personally. Usually, in each village, a handful of villagers gather knowledge and information about court rulings, strategies of activists in Manado, reactions of politicians or media coverage, and pass it on to others. Villagers also communicate with resort owners personally or get information from other villagers who work at resorts. The flow of information is two-way. One diving resort, is located close to Kahuku village, where some of the employees of the resort reside. The workers who oppose the company’s activities get information about developments on the nearby company’s premises from Kahuku villagers and share them with the resort owners, who in turn can disseminate informa- tion to other tourism operators.

Communication between villagers and activists in Manado is either by phoning or sending SMS, by travelling to Manado and meeting personally, or villagers may ask resort owners to post information at social networks. Activists in Manado often personally transfer information, knowledge and documents – as photocopies of the court decisions or newspaper articles – to villagers who travel to Manado and meet them. Sometimes they also pass on documents to villagers who work in Manado so that they can transfer them to Bangka when they visit their families.

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Members of resort owner networks such as the BCF communicate mostly via their established WhatsApp group, which is also the case between them and activists in Manado. Usually two to three tourism operators interact regularly with activists in Manado to keep them updated about the situation, to transfer pictures and to discuss strategies. This group of resort owners and activists in Manado establishes contacts with the local press and with politicians to inform them, to organise press conferences and invite them to Bangka. The Manado activists maintain contact with journalists, activists and politicians in Jakarta to exchange information, discuss strategies and engage in lobbying activity in Jakarta, also mostly via WhatsApp and telephone. Eku Wand edits the information and posts it to the Facebook Save Bangka Island group and other social media where he is an administrator and responsible for moderation. According to Eku Wand, moderation means maintaining the information flow to keep the communica- tion going, increasing awareness and promoting the member engagement.

Including, Excluding and Bridging

As suggested above, amongst the alliance, different members have different levels of access to information and information channels. Activists and resort owners use mainly WhatsApp, while villagers use predominantly personal meetings as their regular base to communicate and share information. Consequently, there is no equitable generation and distribution of information in social media networks by different members of the alliance. As villagers in Bangka have little access to Facebook and WhatsApp in contrast to other members of the alliance, they sometimes lack information about newspaper articles or statements by politicians at multiple levels, which is usually shared via WhatsApp or Facebook. Those members in turn, if they do not live in Bangka or regularly meet villagers, have little insight on the situation in the villages. Within the alliance, encapsulated groups are formed – villagers, activist/resort owners in Bangka/ Manado, Jakarta-based actors – who generate their own knowledge about the mining activities, the campaign and about the other groups. To ensure constant information transfer and co-operation within the alliance, the respective groups rely on members who bridge the disruptions within the communication by informing other group members and sharing information and knowledge. The ability and capacity to establish social networks between socially heterogeneous groups and to bridge diverse social cleavages can be linked to the concept of bridging capital as a form of social capital (see Putnam 2000). Resort owners and the Manado-based activists bridge the gap to villagers by transferring information to them via telephone or through personal meetings. These villagers then transfer information to other villagers in personal communication. Manado-based activists sum up events and activities at the village, regency and pro- vincial levels, and sometimes translate the information into English and transfer it via social media to Jakarta-based actors. They in turn process the information to a global audience by summarising important activities, giving background information, some- times translating into German, and posting the information to social media. When the mining company was landing equipment in 2016, key members of the respective groups shared information and bridged information gaps. When some members requested more information or further explanation, it mostly was provided quickly. Therefore, in situations of mixed internet access, strong personal networks, interpersonal

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relationships, bridging capital and communication channels through which information of villagers’ concerns are spread through national and international actors are one factor for success.

In contrast to the protest in 2016, a co-operative and quick communication and sharing of information is not always the case. Members of the alliance mentioned that the transfer of information is sometimes halting. Moreover, there are barriers due to different languages, as the communication on social media is carried out in Indonesian, English and German. Villagers, by contrast, communicate in their local language.

Participation and Representation

The limited access of villagers to social media leads to their exclusion from discussions and information shared by different actors at the provincial, national and international levels on Facebook and WhatsApp. In addition, because of their limited access to WhatsApp, villagers tend to be less informed of strategic planning by resort owners and Manado-based activists. Some villagers feel this exclusion and express a lack of awareness about joint actions with the Manado- and Jakarta-based activists. At the same time, Manado- and Jakarta-based activists complain that villagers could be more active in joint activities. Villagers tend to plan protest activities amongst themselves, and as most villagers and activists have little capacity to communicate, for example, via telephone on a regular basis, villagers tend to not communicate about their protest activities with other alliance members.

Those who are directly affected by the mining activities are villagers and resort owners, but only the latter are active in social media. Those who predominantly communicate via Facebook and WhatsApp do not live in Bangka and are not directly threatened by the mining activities but nevertheless fight with and for villagers against the mining company. Their online fight may be linked with Salem’s (2015, 183) stress that in social media, inclusions and exclusions according to social class are reproduced. In the Bangka case, the point is not to criticise the use of social media and the practice and strategies of the online campaign, as it strongly supported the successful anti-mining campaign. Rather, the over-simplified celebra- tion of Facebook revolutions in the Middle East and elsewhere should be modified to acknowledge illusions that social media hierarchies are dissolved and undermined, and against perceptions that social media used in protest movements automatically mirrors the voice of the oppressed. However, as stratified spaces, Facebook and WhatsApp do facilitate participation among certain actors while social structures separating participants are maintained. This reinforces Fuchs’ (2008, 2010, 2011) and van Dijck’s (2009) critical discussions of representation in commercial social media where participation is highly dependent on the financial strength and social class of the user. One possibility for reducing technical hindrances which exclude villagers in Bangka in certain processes would be to improve internet access by providing smartphones and external modems. Nevertheless, stressing the importance of the inter-connections between offline and online activities, with strong networks always linking locals without access to social media with other actors, Facebook and WhatsApp function to support local campaigns.

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Facebook, Solidarity and an Imagined Community

Of the 7,728 members of the Save Bangka Islands Facebook group, only approximately 0.2% post regularly and approximately 1% comment on postings. The majority of those who post contributions are activists, divers, tourism operators and their relatives or friends. Those who post also comment frequently on the postings of others. Most of the active users have been to Bangka and have met some of the other contributors but after that only communicate via Facebook, as they live in different parts of Indonesia or different countries. The active users attest and reassure through comments, photos and videos, and links to their positions, views, moral standards and political opinions related to the activities of PT MMP. Furthermore, the display of their engagement and individual standpoint on Facebook is closely related to their communication with others in the form of comments on posted texts, images and videos. During the 2016 crisis when PT MMP landed equipment and the governor did not intervene, posted newspaper articles criticising the company’s activities or photos which showed these were posted, prompting comments such as: “I cannot understand this. If Indonesia again colony under chinese?” [sic] (June 19, 2016) or “D: [emoticon sadness] feeling shocked” (April 12, 2016). In addition, the immediate activities of the anti-mining campaign received affirmative comments, for example, “Oh. . .[thumbs up emoticon] hope everything will be OK” (April 13, 2016). Active users of the Facebook group stated in interviews that the affirmative comments of others on their postings motivate them in their engagement against PT MMP. In turn, active users aim at motivating others in the group and show their support and solidarity through their supportive comments. Users described feeling a part of a group of individuals scattered across the world who are engaged against mining activities in Bangka. This was strengthened through posts and comments on texts, pictures or videos posted by the Facebook group. For example, two Facebook group members posted a picture on June 30, 2016 of their visit to the Komodo National Park in Eastern Indonesia, depicting them holding a banner with the text: “Save Bangka Island in North Sulawesi. Chase PT MMP away. Solidarity for Earth.” This solidarity action saw positive responses like: “Thks for All. . .Gb” and “Terima kasih Mathilde Chanvin dan kawan-kawan (Thanks, Mathilde, Chanvin, and friends)” (June 30, 2016). Therefore, the Facebook group not only delivers, informs and reports but also is intertwined with social worlds; thus, technological and social infra- structures are in a mutual relationship.9 Furthermore, for active Facebook users, online–offline levels more likely complement each other and are both parts of the same reality. The active user group of the Facebook site Save Bangka Island could be conceived as an “imagined community” (Anderson 1983). Their Facebook activities convey a feeling of belonging, community and shared identity although they are not bound to the same place or territory. They create common visions, are involved in joint projects and share common social and historical contexts. Participation in the imagined community reinforces social ties with people located in different places, enhancing cohesion within the alliance. The active user group shares a common project – stopping the mining activities in Bangka – with a joint vision and identity, which is to fight against the opacity and injustice of the state and the company. They reinforce social ties with people located in different places, enhancing solidarity and cohesion within the community. Thus, one of their motivations is the maintenance and the strengthening of

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existing relationships.10 Members share their aims and ideas, exchange emotional support, and develop a transnational communication culture (Cottle 2011) in which sharing of visual pictures of injustice (Olesen 2013) contributes in forming their collective identity. This collective identity is seen in online activism. Following PT MMP landing material in 2016, angry comments included “Hunting these criminals from the island!” (March 22, 2016) or “Mana KAPOLDA, Mana KAPOLRES, Mana KAPOLSEK, Mana aparat pengayom masyarakat ??? Apakah wewenangnya masih mencakup P.Bangka ??? (Where are the national and the local police, where are the security forces protecting the people??? Does their area of responsibility still cover the island of Bangka???) (July 24, 2016), or “Whats happened to Indonesian dignity and pride! Lawlessness and pillage is now the rule??” (April 13, 2016). The posted text, pictures and videos express the same concerns, viewpoints and social goals with other members, building the imagined community that proves its existence in the collective actions of members identifying with the ideals of the protest. In this sense, Facebook is a tool not only for sharing information but also for enhancing solidarity and establish- ing an imagined community.

“The Effect of the Whole is Greater than the Effect of the Sum of the Parts”

In the context of the anti-mining campaign, the emergence of the internet, smartphones and social media as new infrastructures has fundamentally changed the possibilities of how people can disclose and gather information and are able to discuss contentious political issues with others (Howard and Hussain 2011, 2013; Johanssen 2016a). Facebook and WhatsApp were useful in organising events, spreading content and providing a platform for encountering information. The social network platforms and smartphones enhanced mobilisation, communication, knowledge transfer and transpar- ency for those who have access to social media. WhatsApp supported the daily com- munication, co-ordination, and rapid information transfer among key actors of the alliance and was especially important during urgent actions, as shown in the example of the protest in 2016, where immediate response was made possible.

However, social media sites are stratified spaces where villagers – the main affected group – were excluded owing to their lack of internet access. This could be countered by interpersonal relationships and personal communication channels through which villagers could be informed of the campaign, and villagers’ concerns could be spread through national and international actors in social media. Therefore, an important factor for the success of the anti-mining alliance was the interaction between offline and online activities. Also essential were personal social networks which already existed before the anti-mining campaign to which activists could refer, also described as important for the protest in the Middle East and North Africa (see Salem 2015; Sayed 2011).

Another success factor of the anti-mining campaign was the simple narrative and its linkage to an ideological meta-narrative, which Lim (2013) also pointed out for the successful anti-corruption movement in 2009 and the case of Coins for Prita Mulyasari in Indonesia. In Bangka, the narrative was that a “fierce” foreign mining company destroys the “paradise” that provides the livelihood of “poor” villagers. This could be linked to the ideological meta-narrative of victimised villagers and intact nature

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threatened by a foreign company. The success of the anti-mining campaign thus was celebrated as a success of “David against Goliath.” Therefore, a broad range of people such as human rights activists and environmental conservationists could be addressed by the campaign.

Other key aspects were the experience, determination and engagement of members of the Manado-based organisations who prepared lawsuits and lobbied in Manado and Jakarta. They also functioned as an important link between the local and national levels. In addition, the high solidarity, endurance and effectiveness amongst key members of the alliance contributed to the success, as they were, despite exclusions and various interests, characterised by high idealism, determination, experience and good networking.

Social media are not the saviour of oppressed people and not the panacea for participation. Through social media, certain processes in the anti-mining campaign were enhanced, amplified and accelerated. WhatsApp enhanced the daily communica- tion, the co-ordination of events and the rapid information transfer. Facebook was important to disseminate information to a broader range of people and to strengthen their solidarity and their sense of community. The active users of the Save Bangka Island Facebook group became an imagined community sharing common visions, solidarity and a collective identity. The site helped in community building within the anti-mining alliance and enhanced cohesion. Through solidarity, voluntary work was strengthened, which helped in turn to further the dissemination of information and to smoothen communication. Moreover, through solidarity and community formation, financial resources were acquired online and offline, which were necessary to finance lobby visits and lawyers. Consequently, the successful court sessions enhanced enthu- siasm, engagement, and solidarity amongst the members of the alliance.

The anti-mining campaign was not predominantly orchestrated by villagers but fulfilled their aim of stopping mining activities. In summary, the success of the campaign was due to the interplay of diverse online and offline activities, mutually reinforcing each other, which were organised and maintained by engaged and experi- enced members of the alliance and, as Eku Wand put it, “The effect of the whole is greater than the effect of the sum of the parts.”

Notes

1. The island stretches 4,778 hectares and is inhabited by 2,829 people who live in the four villages of Kahuku, Lihunu, Libas and Ehe. These people make their livelihood by fishing, agriculture, a few cash crops and wage labour. Almost all villagers are Protestants and the local language is a mixture of the languages Bahasa Manado, Bahasa Sangihe and Minahasa.

2. In addition, Bangka is part of the Sulu Sulawesi Marine Eco-Region Action Plan, and the Coral Triangle Initiative on Coral Reefs, Fisheries and Food Security (CTI-CFF). The CTI- CFF, established in 2009, is a multilateral agreement between the involved countries of the Coral Triangle to address poverty reduction through economic development, food secur- ity, sustainable livelihoods for coastal communities, and the protection of biodiversity. The regional office of the CTI-CFF is situated in Manado, the provincial capital of North Sulawesi. In 2009, the first meeting of the Coral Triangle Summit, the World Ocean Conference, and in 2014, the World Coral Conference was held also in Manado. However, the institutions engaged in maritime conservation who met in Manado did not strengthen

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the engagement of the anti-mining alliance to protect Bangka’s marine biodiversity. Moreover, the organisers of the World Coral Conference requested activists demolish their information booth about the mining plans on Bangka.

3. For example, articles in a 2013 Journal of Contemporary Asia special issue on “New Media in Asia” deals with the social and political impact of new information communications technologies and social media (Abbott 2013), the article by Leong Mei Lin, Pan, Ractham and Kaewkitipong (2011) on community empowerment through social media during flooding in Thailand in 2011 and Rodan (1998) on political control and the internet in Singapore.

4. While network theories are not the conceptual framework for this article, they relate to aspects of it by referring to connections between actors to analyse power relations. Analyses of networks are aimed at more accurately describing how people connect, relate and affiliate, as focusing on networks better describes people’s initiative and maintenance of relationships than bounded local groups (Wellman 1979). Therefore, networks can be physical or digital (Hogan and Wellman 2014).

5. We Are Social states that the average percentage of social media users in Southeast Asia in 2016 was 37%. Indonesia is situated in the lower third, with 31% of the population using social media. The highest was Brunei (69%), followed by Singapore (67%), Malaysia (59%), Thailand (58%), Philippines (47%) and Vietnam (40%). Below Indonesia are Timor-Leste (24%), Cambodia (22%), and Laos, as well as Myanmar (14%) (We are Social 2015c).

6. Commercial social media like Facebook and WhatsApp are owned by media companies which generate profit through advertising and by selling users’ data to private companies that use these profiles to target their advertising strategies (Fuchs 2010). Scholars criticise this accumulation of capital through the exploitation of users and low-paid employees (Fuchs 2008; Knoche 2005). However, amongst the members of the anti-mining alliance, those critics were not mentioned.

7. The relationship between PT MMP, state representatives and the military in this case underlines the continuing ubiquity of elite money politics, corruption and the failure of state institutions to enforce laws in post-Suharto Indonesia (Hadiz 2013). However, it also shows that the anti-mining alliance could successfully challenge patrimonial structures with the support of legal institutions at the national level. Therefore, in Indonesian’s new democratic order, patronage and state power can be newly negotiated in some contexts (Aspinall 2013).

8. WhatsApp Messenger, owned by Facebook since 2014, is an instant messaging service established in 2009. It is a cross-platform mobile messaging app for smartphones, using the standard mobile phone number and the internet for sending messages, and cost only $0.98 per year in 2016. In addition to sending text messages, users can send an unlimited number of images, video and audio files, and can create groups of users. WhatsApp had one billion active users per month worldwide in April 2016. In Asia, it is the second most popular social media platform, based on the frequency with which users log in. It is a common messaging service in Indonesia, used frequently for private and work-related co- ordination and communication; thus, many people in Indonesia install the app and use it frequently.

9. Although creating new identities online plays a role in discussions about the role of social media, scholars assert that slipping into a non-self-identity is rare (Gross 2004). Participation in communities like Facebook tends to require a certain degree of authen- ticity due to the constant monitoring by online and offline friends. Back and colleagues (2010) assert that social network sites serve as a medium for self-expression rather than for constructing an idealised virtual identity.

10. Generally, scholars affirm that Facebook users draw their contacts commonly from existing social networks and aim at strengthening them rather than establishing new networks (see Boyd and Ellison 2007; Ellison, Steinfield, and Lampe 2007).

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Acknowledgements

My deepest respect is expressed to the people in Bangka who risked their lives in resisting mining activities. I thank the families in Bangka, Manado and Jakarta who hosted me, and the villagers, resort owners and activists who welcomed and helped me. Furthermore, I want to thank the members of the academic network Contested Plural Ecologies: Anthropological Perspectives on Southeast Asia. My special thank goes to Birgit Bräuchler, Eku Wand, three anonymous reviewers for commenting on earlier versions of this article, and Sophia Bäurle.

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

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