The Use of Traditional Conflict Resolution: A Case Study of Timor Leste

Timor Leste or previously known as East Timor is one of the youngest democracies in the world. It has faced numerous challenges in its journey to build sustainable peace. Recognized as an independent country seventeen years ago, Timor Leste has gone through serious political crises, violence, and land disputes. Despite these problems, the Timorese have reached important achievements in the past few years: a decent economic growth, a decrease in child mortality rates and peaceful elections. Although there are some challenges,such as the unemployment and poverty rate which is still quite high, Timor Leste has managed to emerge from a war-torn country into a stable peaceful nation. This has been achieved, so far, by the use of traditional conflict mechanism that has been deeply rooted in the Timorese society. This paper briefly explains development of Timor Leste conflict, approaches to dealing with those conflicts, and several examples of traditional conflict resolution done by the Timorese. It suggest that eempowering local people to resolve their own conflicts through traditional mechanism is seen as more powerful to resolve disputes and re-establish harmony and bringing lasting peace to the young nation.