Recognition without restitution: reclaiming land as resistance after legal defeat in Indonesia

Why does land reclaiming persist after an adverse legal outcome? This article examines the long-running Persil IV agrarian conflict between residents and state plantation company PTPN II in North Sumatra. Drawing on 17 semi-structured interviews, field observations, and documentary analysis conducted in 2023–2024, it traces how cultivation, guarding, organisational ties, household practices, religious gatherings, historical documents, and external alliances sustained a territorial claim after legal defeat. Using Bourdieu relationally, the analysis distinguishes connections from mobilisable resources and records from the legitimacy they acquire in particular arenas. It identifies recognition without restitution: local, moral, historical, and intermittent legal recognition sustained organisation and territorial presence but did not translate into authority over enforcement or land return. Gender claims are limited to the three women interviewed, while leadership is analysed as distributed coordination rather than assumed consensus. Conflict resolution therefore requires institutional pathways connecting recognition to enforceable settlement.