Introduction
On 8-9 February 2025 Segara Nusa Nawasena and Yokosuka Council for Asia Pacific Studies (Japan) with funding from the Hollings Centre for International Dialogue (United States) co-organised ‘Ocean dependent communities in Southeast Asia’s Maritime Security Governance: Reflections and Actionable Pathways’ workshop in Makassar, Indonesia. The workshop brought together representatives of Indigenous Peoples and local communities, academics, and civil society organisations from Indonesia, Malaysia, and the Philippines.
The workshop aimed to assess in a more rigorous manner the implications of involving marginalised stakeholders in Southeast Asia. Marginalised communities who rely on the ocean, including women, Indigenous Peoples and other minority ethnic/religious groups, youth, and low-income groups are disproportionately impacted by maritime insecurities. These insecurities include those arising from often competing and conflicting ocean economy. Ocean-dependent communities also play critical roles in ocean and coastal development and security. However, their role is often not fully understood, and they are marginalised from decision-making processes. As such, the workshop was embedded in the intersection between maritime security, development, and justice.
Key messages
From Segara Nusa Nawasena, Dr Senia Febrica, Dr Herson Keradjaan and Suzie Sudarman contributed to the event. During a presentation session titled “Navigating the depth of maritime security” Dr Febrica shared insights from “Ocean Justice and the Blue Economy” research and her own work on maritime security in Indonesia. Key messages from her presentation are outlined below:
Maritime security governance is deeply entangled with communities and the social, political, cultural as well as historical context where the communities exist. Due to the intensified sovereignty struggles and geopolitical sensitivity surrounding regions such as the Indo-Pacific, the discussion of maritime security tends to be state centric.
The role of communities in maritime security is more often also defined in a very narrow sense, referring primarily to how local civilians can help to meet government security needs. In Indonesia for example, this can be traced to pre-colonial time, the long interaction with Portuguese, and Dutch colonial authorities, the legacy of revolutions following Japanese occupation in 1942-1945 and the Suharto’s New Order security practices (Ahram 2011, 533, 540; Silverstein 1982, 282; Simpson 2013, 10-11; Robinson 2001, 279-291; Ryter 1998, 48-54; Barker 1998, 12 as cited in Febrica 2023a). Portuguese and Dutch colonial authorities throughout the 18th and 19th century, and the Japanese occupation forces during World War II (1942 to 1945), for example, recruited local civilians to meet their security demand.
This narrow definition of security and role communities have become embedded and are reinforced in ocean governance processes and associated research that set societal patterns of prioritisation and exclusion (Niner et al., 2024).
Whilst current maritime security governance still suffers from a legacy of state-centrism, within other sectors of ocean governance – particularly related to ocean biodiversity its evolution to a more inclusive governance is increasing on global political agenda.
The sustainable development goals (SDGs), arising from the Rio declaration (1992) set out a pathway to do this, despite their limited influence (Biermann et al 2022 as cited in Niner et al., 2024; Germond-Duret et al., 2023).
Other actions include the United Nations Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development that prioritises the co-design and co-delivery of solution-oriented research by diverse actors to promote a spirit of inclusivity and openness (Ocean Decade, 2021, p.6, 7 as cited in Niner et al., 2024). In support of this transformation, the Ocean Decade has also a cultural framework programme that recognises Indigenous knowledge as important to transform ocean sciences and conservation, and encourages support for action (see Febrica, 23 June 2022, Niner et al., 2024).
Furthermore, the recent Agreement under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea on the conservation and sustainable use of marine biological diversity of areas beyond national jurisdiction, the BBNJ Agreement explicitly outlined a mandate to respect, promote and consider the rights of Indigenous Peoples and local communities “when taking action to address the conservation and sustainable use of marine biological diversity of areas beyond national jurisdiction” (Article 5(j) of the BBNJ Agreement as cited in Niner et al., 2024).
It is widely acknowledged in the literature that bridging or integrating different stakeholders or knowledge holders and their knowledge systems into governance in general is not easy, let alone in the maritime security sector that is jealously guarded by State authorities. However, what is less well acknowledged and explored are the importance of:
Coastal communities’ participation in decision-making processes is needed to increase buy-in from communities and therefore, ensure the success of security initiatives.
Coastal communities often have a more holistic view of what constitutes threats. Issues that are deemed as threats to them could come from unsustainable blue economy projects (e.g. those that caused overfishing, pollution, habitat destruction) and safety of those that use the maritime domain (Okafor-Yarwood & Onuoha, 2023; Febrica, 2017, 2023a; 2023b).
There are often discrepancies between what coastal communities view as pressing threats with those identified by government or foreign interests (Febrica, 2017). The “framing of what constitutes threats and responses to counter them by state and foreign interests could undermines a holistic notion of maritime security that could benefit the communities” (Okafor-Yarwood & Onuoha, 2023).
Dr Febrica also facilitated the participatory session at the workshop that was centred around the use of Horizon Scanning. Horizon scanning is a participatory process for detecting emerging issues and trends, collecting, as well as interpreting and synthesising information to inform decision-making. It refers to the future we envisioned (3rd Horizon), the way issues are dealt with in present policy and strategy (1st Horizon), and pathways to achieve our vision (2nd Horizon) (Rivers et al., 2024).
Some of the solutions identified by workshop participants to achieve the fair and inclusive maritime security governance that we want include:
Reforming legislation to ensure inclusivity. There is an urgent need for legislation to explicitly mention the rights and role of ocean-dependent communities, particularly women and girls in ocean governance.
Decolonising maritime policies by co-crafting these policies locally.
Redress and granting collective reparations by former colonial powers for harms suffered from injustices and discrimination by Indigenous Peoples.
Recognising intangible cultural heritage, customary law and practices in designing and implementing maritime security policies and legislation.
Creating more spaces for engagement between varied and relevant stakeholders and not just the “usual suspects.”
Asking stakeholders to identify what constitutes risks or threats to them to inform responses.
Establishing community-based maritime security programmes that involve coastal communities in monitoring and reporting illegal activities.
Implementing a community education programme on maritime security.
Translating maritime security policy into accessible and easy to understand language.
Rethinking business models to help Indigenous Peoples and local communities to adapt to maritime challenges, including the changing climate.
Providing immediate support to ensure the wellbeing of the Indigenous Peoples and local communities (e.g. education, health)
Empowering stakeholders to ensure their meaningful participation in various consultation and decision-making processes.
During the event, Dr Keradjaan also presented findings from Segara Nusa Nawasena’s research on Small-scale fishers’ perception of risks in Indonesia’s cross-border region of North Maluku. Here are the key points from our study:
In defining what constitutes as a threat to them the fishers reveal that threats dimension that they face daily involves a combination of safety of life at sea (or in this instance the lack of it), climate change and maritime crimes.
In terms of safety of life at sea or work accidents, small-scale fishers identified a range of threats that are common to them such as vessel sunk or capsized during extreme weather conditions and fire caused by the spill of oil following vessels encountered with high wave.
Climate change has been identified as posing serious risks to fishers. Fishers are aware of the impacts of climate change on weather pattern, height of wave, and declining fish stocks, and have actively made various adaptation measures to adapt to the changing climate such as:
getting insurance,
observing weather report,
adjusting fishing time in line with the weather report,
building supplementary livelihoods
In terms of ocean crimes, destructive and illegal, unreported, unregulated fishing has been pointed as a key concern. Fishers make connections between these acts of crimes in their surrounding waterways with the decline of fish stocks and subsequently, their income.
Paper from this research is now published in Marine Policy journal.
Outlook
Following the in-person workshop, an online workshop will be organised in the later part of 2025 to include more diverse stakeholders including representatives from governments, regional and international organisations.
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