Harvesting Uncertainty: Rural Lives in Conjuncture: Climate Perceptions, Neoliberalism, and Agrarian Struggle in Lombok, Indonesia

This dissertation examines the agrarian struggles of smallholder farmers in Lombok, Indonesia, amid the pressures of climate change, neoliberal development, and long-standing structural inequalities. Based on twelve months of ethnographic fieldwork, it investigates how farmers experience intensifying uncertainty and how they respond to these challenges. The central question asks how smallholder farmers experience and respond to climate change, and how their adaptation strategies, knowledge systems, and agency are shaped through the interplay of traditional practices, modern interventions, and wider governance structures. The thesis weaves three interconnected themes: perceptions of climate change (Chapter 2); community practices and socio-political dynamics (Chapters 3–5); and the disjuncture between global policy frameworks and local realities (Chapter 6). This telescoping structure reflects the layered nature of adaptation—at once intimate and geopolitical. Chapter 1 outlines the theoretical framing, regional background, and methodology. It situates the study at the crossroads of the anthropology of climate change, the political ecology of adaptation, and the political economy of smallholder agriculture. The dissertation contributes to these debates by advancing: (1) a conjunctural anthropology of climate change grounded in sensory experience, spiritual cosmologies, and everyday practice; (2) a political ecology approach highlighting adaptation as hybrid and contested within unequal governance legacies; and (3) a political economy perspective theorising adaptation as shaped by structural constraints and commodity chains yet animated by aspiration and creativity. The chapter also explains the selection of field sites—Masbagik, Gangga, and Batukliang Utara—based on their microclimates, crop choices, and cultural differences, and outlines how positionality shaped field access. Chapter 2 examines climate perception through sensorial, epistemic, and evaluative lenses. Farmers interpret environmental change through embodied attunement, intergenerational knowledge, and spiritual authority. Their vocabularies—kepanasan dunia (global warming), perubahan iklim (climate change)—reveal diverse causal understandings and differing alignments with scientific narratives. More-than-human relations, illustrated through the betel plant and the mangku bumi, show how humans, spirits, and plants co-produce environmental knowledge. Yet climate change disrupts cues and ritual cycles, creating strain within these systems. Perception is thus culturally patterned and embedded in lived environments. Chapter 3 turns to adaptation strategies. Using Roncoli’s fourth axiom of perception—response—it shows adaptation emerging not as a divide between tradition and modernity but as ongoing negotiation shaped by political-economic constraints. Legacies of the Green Revolution persist through agrochemicals, plastic mulch, and drip irrigation, which increase yields but create new dependencies and ecological risks. Some farmers turn to organic fertilisers, traditional governance systems such as awiq-awiq, sangkep warige, and Water User Associations, or to migration to stabilise household economies. Adaptation is contingent, situated, and limited by ecological capacity, cultural norms, and resources. Chapter 4 explores generational change and aspirations. Conventional farmers often remain tied to Green Revolution logics, while millennial farmers pursue digital, entrepreneurial, and organic pathways. Government programmes targeting youth intensify these divides, granting opportunities to younger farmers while excluding many older ones. Religious institutions mediate aspirations by framing environmental stewardship as spiritual practice, yet tensions persist as technological change reshapes authority and expertise. Chapter 5 examines the political economy shaping adaptation. Climate uncertainty interacts with entrenched inequality, elite capture, gendered norms, and contract farming arrangements that deepen dependency. Debt becomes both a survival mechanism and a structural trap. Decentralisation reinforces clientelism and corruption, making governance failures as central to farmers’ experiences as climatic variability. Chapter 6 situates Lombok within global agricultural governance. Market-oriented adaptation frameworks often neglect structural barriers such as insecure tenure and indebtedness. Commodity chains and certification schemes benefit capitalised actors while marginalising smallholders. Yet agroecological practices reveal alternative pathways grounded in local knowledge, reciprocity, and ecological care. The conclusion ties these chapters together and reflects on the future of smallholder farming.