ADAT PERPATIH AND DEVELOPMENT Abdul Samad Hadi1, Rosita Mohamad Nordin2, Siti Rafidah Mukdan3 1.

Principal Fellow of Institute for Environment and Development, Universiti kebangsaan Malaysia & Chairperson of Unit Adat Perpatih, LMNS. 2 &3 Officers of LMNS Seremban

Abstract Adat Perpatih, the customary practices and laws of the everyday life of the Malays of Negeri Sembilan, provides the necessary human values for development frame among the local people. These human values traceable in the Adat sayings about all aspects of life involving individual acceptable behavior; norms and guidelines for inter-personal interactions; education and training; law and order for the welfare and well-being of the community and society at large, and also values pertaining to the environment (hence resources). All of these values are couched within the social organization of the Negeri Sembilan society, at the level of the individuals, families and communities. Relating to the need for development, these values are development friendly. What constitutes development for the discussion?. It entails varied references, for example referring to economic- wealth accumulation usually measured in global index as G.N.P (Gross National Product) or the G.D.P (Gross Domestic Product); social development, seen in the form of physical infrastructures, social infrastructures and amenities, education, health and training. In this presentation we would take a broader perspective to articulate development as empowering society to enable individual members of the society to realize his/her potential in life so that he/she can participate in the economic and social spheres inclusively. In this sense, the Adat Perpatih is an enabler for societal development. And the development experience is best set in the sustainable development framework, bringing into focus the triple bottom lines, economic, social and environmental with the fourth line running across to govern the sustainability. A path to development for the Malays of Negeri Sembilan in this context should start with the situation in pre-contact scenario of olden times where the triple bottom lines are in harmony. The transition begins when the Western colonial intrusion initiates changes through policy change, instilling the concept of market and handling the flow of capital. Material progress is however achieved even though it was largely for the colonial administration. Dualism in development was evident-the Adat values for the peasant economy in rural Negeri Sembilan and the colonial-market values for the modern sector. The second transition is Independence and after, whereby industrialism transformed the ability for wealth accumulation; Progress is visible. But the Adat Perpatih and its values remain on the margin. The Negeri Sembilan society has embraced largely the socio-economic values of the developed world. INTRODUCTION

The discussion in this paper is focused to take a position in that the Adat Perpatih (henceforth- Adat) is rich in human values to leverage the socio-economic development required to sustain the society. Human values here are beliefs and ideas in the Adat, which are assessed to be better to guide the members in their everyday life. But more than two hundred years of colonial domination of the society sees that the Adat retreats to become more relevant to local expediency in shaping human resources that have high positive human values. The values in turn can be made to serve the process of socio-economic development. At the general national level socioeconomic development process has relied heavily on global values based mainly on the flows of capital ( Harvey 2010) for commercial productions of agriculture, industries, services and talents, all being shaped through the modern (western) biased education. Development should embrace ideas beyond merely talking about the normal measure of attainment in Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and the Gross National Product (GNP) and the usual discussion on the socio-economic indicators. It should be seen as a process in which every person in the society is empowered to realize his/her potential in life, embracing the economic, the social (including health, education), the environment (resources), and management of all of them to sustain himself /herself, the family and the society. There is then the element of inclusivity so that no one in the Adat society is being left out or being marginalized. To quote a friends book, Dato Dr. Hashim Wahab, Development is happiness. The outcome of such a process of development is that there should be not only happiness among the people but also in Amartya Sen,s words (2009) a sense of justice in life for all. On a broader plane happiness emerges from the conditions that all basic needs of the people have been met. Every person then has access to job, good education, decent shelter, and to modern infrastructures as well as to modern amenities. Development then is about humanizing the world that we live in. For the present discussion the socio-economic attainment is also important. Thus, it is argued that the Adat has the necessary values for sustainable development especially in preparing the human resource needed for the development. Human Values in Adat Perpatih, and Development We shall begin deliberating on humanizing the Malay world in the Malay-Polynesian land by highlighting the social values in development. Social values as deliberated by scholars are beliefs that have been accepted by the people. The beliefs become nowadays the standard operating procedures, ensuring the best for every person in the society. The Adat is impregnated with values related to the individual, community and society at large. These social values can move the process of development for the good of all people. To illustrate the richness of social values in the Adat, we venture to highlight some of the values (e.g. Hj Kamarudin Kachar 2008; Hj. Khalid Bonget 2009; Lembaga Museum Negeri Sembilan n.d.; Swift 2001; Mohd Rosli Saludin 2009) as follows: Values derived from the social organisation- matrilineal but matrilocal in marriage, and the special position of the female members as guardians of family properties Values related to the political relations in the wider community-between the Adat leaders, the religous heads and the people- tiga tungku sejerangan; tiga tali sepilin

Values related to family members, between families in the clan (suku) and Values related to empowering individuals- education, skill, wealth. Values embedded in merantau in migratory movements for wealth accumulation, experience etc.

A framework to situate the human values embedded in the Adat for development is the sustainability framework. The sustainable framework surfaced only in less than thirty years worldwide, and the essence of values in the Adat makes the framework useful for the purpose in this paper. The theoretical basis of sustainable development or its essence sustainability, is in search of a balanced growth that has been much discussed in the second half of the last century but with emphases purely on the economic and the social sphere, almost neglecting the environment (resources) side (WSCD 1987). Yet the reality of life everywhere involves the people in economic activities for social progress with needs to protect the resources (environment) for sustainability and survival. The earth convention in Rio de Janeiro, 1992 declared that sustainable development is to be the framework of development that takes into consideration the triple bottom lines of economic, social and environmental with a fourth one- governance, to manage the sustainability. The framework also infuses time as an important element, giving considerations to the present and the future generations quality of life. So that the present generation can meet their needs without prejudicing the ability of future generations to meet their needs. Journeying back in time, in its pristine form and practices as narrated by Adat scholars, the human values referred to above are present in the sustainable living of people in those yesteryears, couched much in the spirit of the contemporary concept of sustainable development. To illustrate this point we will examine briefly the people in the Adat area through three phases, namely: Adat in pre-contact time; Adat during colonial administration; and Adat after independence, by highlighting the main factors that have caused the transition to change to the Adat practices and development. a) Adat in Pre-contact Peoples Life Pre-contact life among the Negeri Sembilan people here refers to conditions of communitys life before colonial intrusion and colonial effort at spreading colonial economic values. Referring to Figure 1, the triple bottom lines of sustainability- the economics, society and the environment- offer a workable framework for the people to move their everyday life in a sustainable way. We are reminded that, The environment is spread far and wide to teach ( alam terbentang jadikan guru) So goes the Adat saying that the environment has an important place in the peoples life; the environment provides the necessary resources for shelter and day to day needs, and above all the environment educates the people about the rich biological diversity, geological formations and the landscapes, about meaningful interactions within the family, between the families, in each perut (the clan), and between the people and the environment, that is resources. The people then were homogenous

(from the Malay stock), and their social organization was simple but functional to unite and mobilise activities for the benefit of all.

Environment

Economy

Society

Figure 1 Pre-Colonial Period There are rules and guidelines as to how the people should interact with one another, the young with the elderly, ordinary people with the Adat office bearers; to approach and extract resources for housing materials, for daily food items- including protein, greens and vitamins, drinking water and energy needs. All are sourced from the environment. Guided by the symbiotic relation of man with his environment the people do not destroy the resources that support them. Thus, the following Adat sayings illustrate the care given to the resources; Examples of Adat saying on the relationship of people with the environment; Orang dulu dulu bersebati dengan bumi Kerana di sinilah tempat mencari nafkah Tempat berkait dengan kebudayaan Tempat berkait dengan kepercayaan Hidup bergantung kepada alam Kalau tiada laut,hampalah perut Bila tak ada hutan, binasalah badan (Rosli Saludin 2009 ,p.213) Some researchers may observe and debate that the symbiotic relation between man and the environment was possible at the time because the population density was low. Further, the people engaged in self sufficient production of all things that were required to meet their daily needs. Market for exchanges of produce was still rudimentary, taking place often between individuals on behalf of family members. Pax Britannica, and Marginalising of Adat Perpatih

Adat Prpatih was encapsulated into the so-called traditional sector by the intrusion of Pax Britannica, symbolizing the intrusion of western mode of administration, the introduction of market principles and the steady process of pluralising the population, the rise of new economic values based on market, investments and trade. The introduction of western education with greater emphasis on learning English as the new communication means enhanced the speed of embedding the new values among the Adat people in Negri Sembilan. The Adat was still widely in use due to its resilience among the people who had been inadvertently encapsulated to the rural and traditional territory, conveniently structured spatially by the British colonial administration in the 19th and the first half of the 20th centuries to support the recruitment of foreign workers to hasten its commercial ventures in rubber plantation and tin mining. Thus, the role of the Adat in development during the time was limited to refining the human resource for the traditional village occupations, and for the rural people who ventured to participate at the edges of colonial commercial activities or to respond to the market by selling forest produce, rubber from their smallholdings or as workers in mining areas. That the availability of primary education in Malay and later on secondary education in English uprooted further the Adat people, especially the youth who got engulfed in the new so-called modern values, largely founded on modern market economy. Thus, without English education the Adat youth could only participate in the modern sector as lower ranking workers, as security personnel, drivers, house helpers and gardeners. Only the few, both from those high birth and educated in English, managed to get into the colonial mainstream white collar positions in the production of goods and trade. The whole components of the colonial development framework is shown in Figure 2 from which it has become clear that the environment (resources) have been altered; The economic activities changed the relations of people with the environment, giving considerations more to the market and the wider society in the country. The wider society had by then become more multi-ethnic, multi-religious and multi-cultural with different levels of modern skill and education. An outcome of the rising market sector, the rural youth in the Adat heartland began to go merantau-peripatetic movements in search work, at first engaging in circular movements (merantau pipit -sparrow) to participate in works that pay cash or in kind, travelling from home to the work place and returning home in the evening. Later some of them went ( merantau) to the towns to search for work in the commercial areas, or in the agriculture plantation. The absence from the villages might be seasonal, yearly or for the whole of their working life with occasional return visit to their parents. In the process these people have been able to develop the skills and knowledge to participate in these modern jobs, nonetheless marginal ones. It should be pointed out that the Adat had prepared them with some skills earlier on. While the Adat had infused them with basic human values useful in the respective jobs but these values might not be able to stand up against the rising values based on the market and on the flows of capital (Harvey 2010).

Economy

Limited commercial activities for the local

Society
Forest reservation Colonial exploitation

Commercial activity of the migrant population

Environment

Figure 2 Colonial Period The Transition: Seraching for Adat Resiliency in Development. The inter-relationships between the three pillars in the development framework earlier are set to change further when the factors of development change with the changing development policies. New development objectives require new development values. In venturing into industrialism after Independence Negeri Sembilan went for industrialization, to build upon the commercial experience of rubber commercial ventures epitomized by some leading rubber estates founded during the colonial administration era, and later on (since 1956) the land schemes under the Federal Land Development Authority. Industrialism was necessary to propel Negeri Sembilan out of the poverty syndrome. Industrial expansion in the last forty years relied heavily on foreign direct investment as well as on local capitals. Development values guiding the progress of the economy hinge on the process of globalization, hence the globalization values based on market. The emerging development values revolve around economic liberalization, ease in doing business, market competition and economic efficiency, and so on. There is a need to have mutual trust between the local partners and the foreign investors. That trust relies more on the rising values from global economic pursuits. The relations between the triple bottom lines after Independence are shown in Figure 3, from which a balance is represented in the centre. The sustainable development area in the centre of the Figure has to increase in the long term to ensure sustainability. To achieve that the Negeri Sembilan people in the Adat area have to evolve values that are suited to the need of the global capital flows.

Economy Society

Environment

Figure 3 Merdeka Period (1957/1963) Capital flows in search of locations worldwide are for profits, gained through production activities in the host countries. Negeri Sembilan participates in capturing the capital flows, evidenced in presence of Japanese,Korean and European capitals, in addition to local ones, operating in the industrial areas in Seremban and Nilai, Negeri Sembilan. Lest the Negeri Sembilan people got marginalized further in the globalization process, there is a need to empower local values that can absorb the homogenizing threat of the globalizing process on the host countries. We hear always the exhortation by informed observers that we should think global but act local. For acting local in Negeri Sembilan the local values should be able to moderate the outcomes of the globalization process on the local people. Much of the sought local values are found in the Adat. From Adat sayings, daily practices shown by village people still in their traditional forms and research outcomes by scholars on the Adat, provide windows to some of the positive human values which can help the Adat people to participate in the globalizing development. In another direction the Adat can protect the people from the homogenizing advances of the globalization process. In the global-local face to face interactions, the Adat provides the base to make adjustment to the globalization process if we cannot confront it. The Adat, very resilient, provides the values for humanizing the globalization process. Below, we will highlight some of these ; The philosophical basis of the Adat in Negeri Sembilan recognized the interrelatedness of Adat and religion,; so goes the saying; Adat bersendi hukum Hukum bersendi Kitabullah Syarak mengata Adat mengikut

The faith in the tenets of Islam provides a strong base for character building. The Adat provides norms and guidelines to bring order to the conduct of everyday life. By combining both the people will have a strong moral and ethical foundation to face the real world outside.The Adat supplements this with practices and norms that do not contravene the religion. To surrender oneself to the God Almighty sets the bottom line of conducting (and thinking about) our everyday life. Readers of the Adat have narrated all good things about the finely crafted social organization of the people, who are organized on individual households subscribing to a clan (about 13 of them in all). An Adat leader is elected to an Adat office through the Adats own brand of democratic way. The ibu soko- the knowledgeable, respected and wise with age ladies- lead the women group and has a special position in the clan. Within the social organization there has developed inter-relations within and between the families, guided by social values- full of understanding, helpful to one another, always ready to help one another, and the elderly always giving guidance and advice to the younger ones and the young people are full of respect for the elderly people. In short, the elderly members of the community lead an exemplary life, showcasing good behavior par excellence. They become the icons, can recite the doa (prayer) when the occasion arises, show skills in many aspects of the day to day living. Indeed elderly people of the Adat are looked up to. The wider members of each community are always ready to participate in collaborative works for the community. They visit each other in time of needs, such as a member is having continuous health problem. Members of the clan exchange village produce, and always ready to help the unfortunate members of the clans. Further, everyone is important to the clan; has a spefic function as shown by the saying; Yang alim hendakkan doanya Yang kaya hendakkan bantuannya Yang pekak pembakar meriam Ynag buta penghebus lesung The Adat then offers values that can push the communities to work for progress of the individual family which in turn together they move forward for the community. The leadership at all level, from the family to the clan, is there to see that members are always together. Any problems will be discussed together for solution. Any wrong doing will be settled amicably and with punishment according to the seriousness or graveness of the issue. Thus the saying; Biar mati anak Jangan mati Adat If for example, someone has committed a murder, irrespective of the standing of his family in the community he has to be punished accordingly. The punishment fulfills the religious decree and thus upholding the faith. The Adat remains intact as the punishment was carried out according to the established rule of the religion and the Adat norm. In short, the Adat frowns upon corruption. More examples can be brought into the discussion but suffice it to show that the Adat has values that discipline

members of the each community, bring members together and thus bring all able bodied in the village to participate in all kind of activities for mutual benefits. Some may observe that all the positive values embraced in the Adat seem to be idealistic somewhat and may not be relevant to the globalised world of today. Taking the stand that the globalised world of today is the progression of the transformation of the capital flows from the heyday of mercantilism, through colonial capitalism and the tattering of the developmental state in the few decades after Independence to the present liberalised world and the capital flows have impacted deep and wide of the Adat communities in Negeri Sembilan, the Adat values have remained vibrant in its own localized world. The way forward should give attention to the possibility of empowering once again the Adat and its values among the people to negotiate a development perspective that is local in content but has aglobal relevance. That the Adat has been adaptive in the yesteryears is a point in its favour to uplift the humanising values along side of adapting to the need of the globalizing world. Let us humanize the globalization process, tame it within the Adat values. The outcome could be the answer to the homogenizing culture of the globalization process. In a globalizing development of the world there has been constant call for the role of ethics in development so that a sense of justice is there for all. This earth is for all people and not just the owners of capital only. CONCLUDING REMARKS We have taken an historical perspective to unravel the adequacy and relevance of the values drawn from Adat Perpatih. The Adat emerges as an important ,unique and adaptive system of social life among the majority of the Negeri Sembilan Malays. In pre-contact era, the Adat helps to showcase a democratic way of life with its prescribed guidelines as oppose to a more authoritarian systems. There are many values that can be garnered for the present needs to face the globalization process; The homogenizing material values espoused by the globalization process can be humanized for the benefits of many. The Adat however, was marginalized by the capital flows during the colonial administration, bringing with them the new culture of market economy, the need to trade and also the need to learn new knowledge related to investments, trade , money income, selling ones sweat, skills and knowledge. The capital flows were intensified after Independence, in the need to develop the country, to fight poverty and to raise the quality of life of the people. Consequently, the impacts on the Adat are direct,eroding the role of the Adat in bringing order to the peoples everyday life. Yet at the juncture when there is global call for looking back at local knowledge and unearthing of local values in the face of the globalization process, the Adat offers ready humanizing values that need to be dis-embedded again from its marginalized space.

Acknowledgements. We would like to record our appreciation to En Shaharudin Idrus of Fellow in LESTARI for the three diagrams. Abdul Samad Hadi would like to record his thanks to the following for funding the rsearches, from which some information for the paper is extracted.

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