The Critical Importance of Local Engagement and Listening

This chapter demonstrates the universality demonstrated within West Papua experience of the absolute necessity of placing emphasis on listening, local empowerment and engagement, and the impact that quite small but well targeted financial contributions could make. High levels of funding by donor strategies not local can even have a negative impact or be irrelevant. A particular case was an international agency’s program on the island of Siberut where they built a mosque though the people were not Moslems and the only use of the Mosque was its sound system which ended up in the local karaoke bar. Lessons from working with communities across other areas of Indonesia follow. This chapter explores these lessons including introductory comment on healing the traumatized society left behind by the massive Tsunami that devastated Aceh in 2004, and in the transition to independence and democracy in Timor Leste after the invasion by military-employed militia to kill and devastate the territory to ensure suffering for voting the wrong way when Indonesia offered possible independence. In both cases, Stephen and his team were there so this book is based on direct experience.