Few figures have championed the cause of Indonesia’s farmers and rural communities more than Gunawan Wiradi, who has died aged 88. Born in Solo, a mid-size city in Indonesia’s Central Java province, Gunawan authored several influential books and, in 1994, co-founded leading nonprofit group Konsorsium Pembaruan Agraria (KPA), or the Consortium for Agrarian Reform. Gunawan remained a leading figure in the agrarian reform movement for half a century, spanning radically different political eras: from Soekarno’s Guided Democracy (after Indonesia declared independence) to Suharto’s authoritarian New…
