defined bodies (i.e., village government, kewang, church).
11. Low or no financial cost to the formal government i.e., kewang members and church
leaders involved are not paid wages, although they may receive a share of harvests.
Local government offices may also receive income from the sale of harvesting rights
for communal resources.
12. Resilience and the ability to evolve.
7.5.3 Island synopses
Haruku Island has the largest proportion of existing adat sasi and is also unique in that every
village has some form of sasi and most have village sasi. Of all the islands, Haruku has the
lowest incidence of gear restrictions and local fisheries rules, and the highest incidence of
marine resource rental or auction.
Saparua, a predominantly Christian island, is exceptional in that over half of all villages have
marine sasi, and a further four villages have lost this form of sasi in living memory.
Nusa Laut is entirely Christian, and the villages are uniformly small. Church sasi prevails.
Adat sasi persists in only one village and marine sasi and village sasi have died out entirely.
None of the villages has written sasi rules. In the past, however, most of these villages practiced
some form of marine sasi and/or sousoki (communal fishing).
The villages at Ambon Island had the least sasi. On this island, the coastal villages are mostly
large (>3,000 people) and over half are Muslim. Because we did not include urban satellite
villages in the inventory, the actual occurrence of sasi on the island is even less than indicated
from our survey results.
Two-thirds of the sasi villages investigated on Seram have written rules and half perform adat
ceremonies. Marine sasi as practiced in Seram is distinctive in that it may involve only fisheries
rules. Area restrictions, where they exist, may not apply to local residents. Because the number
of villages studied in Seram was very limited, this cannot be assumed to be generally true for
the island.
7.6 Conclusions
Sasi, the local resource management institution, has a long history. The application of sasi to
marine resources, however, has always been limited in scope and some modern forms of
marine management date back only a few decades. As an institution, sasi has never been
static but has changed with the times and been used by different proponents for different
economic and social reasons, not simply for resource management. Sasi and the underlying
adat culture have waxed and waned over time, absorbing and reflecting the impacts of
colonialism, war, economic development and social change. However, despite past predictions
of imminent demise, sasi and adat persist and are, therefore, resilient.
The majority of central Maluku villages still retain some form of local sasi institution, but
only a quarter of them have rules pertaining to marine management. In the past, half of these
villages had local marine management rules. Village leaders perceive sasi as a useful
institution. Sasi practices vary from village to village. The governing and enforcing authorities
may be adat, church, local government and/or private individuals holding harvest rights. In
Christian villages, the church is an important supporter, whereas the role of Muslim leaders
in sasi appears to be much more limited. Marine sasi is most prevalent in mid-sized villages
Result of The Inventory of Sasi 79