The Role of the South Papua People's Assembly in Empowering Local Communities

Ethnographic Study: Traditional school teaching program in the Muyu tribe in Boven Digoel Regency, South Papua Province

Abstract

Papua’s Special Autonomy framework formally mandates the South Papua People’s Council (Majelis Rakyat Papua Selatan/MRPS) to act as a cultural representative of Indigenous Papuans, yet community empowerment programs often remain disconnected from the lived socio-cultural realities of adat communities. This paper investigates the institutional role of MRPS in empowering the Muyu indigenous community through the implementation of an indigenous school (sekolah adat) in Boven Digoel Regency, and analyzes the forms and mechanisms of collaboration among actors that sustain the school’s operation. The study employs a qualitative approach with institutional ethnography, drawing on participatory observation, in-depth interviews, and documentation with MRPS members, Muyu customary leaders, indigenous teachers, village government, the local Education Office, churches, NGOs, and community members. Data were analyzed through staged ethnographic procedures, including reduction, domain analysis, taxonomic analysis, componential analysis, and the formulation of cultural themes.  The findings demonstrate that MRPS operates not merely as a symbolic representative body, but performs three integrated institutional functions: cultural representation, policy and budget advocacy, and cultural oversight of the Muyu indigenous school. Through these functions MRPS acts as an institutional entrepreneur that bridges the gap between the formal rules of Special Autonomy and the living rules of the adat community, thereby securing normative, cognitive, and regulative legitimacy for the indigenous school. The study also shows that the Muyu indigenous school is embedded in a relatively nonhierarchical, multi-actor collaborative ecosystem, with MRPS as a bridging institution, customary leaders as holders of cultural authority, indigenous teachers as daily pedagogical agents, and village government, churches, NGOs, and the Education Office as structural and social supporters. Adat-based deliberation that is formalized into modern procedures, together with dual channels of formal and customary communication, creates a collaborative governance regime that generates a strong capacity for joint action. This study concludes that the sustainability and effectiveness of the Muyu indigenous school as a space for identity transmission, local knowledge protection, and community empowerment depend on the synergy between MRPS’s institutional role and a culturally rooted collaborative governance arrangement.