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SESSION II
ISLAM POST-9/11: TRENDS AND OPPORTUNITIES FOR
MODERNIZATION IN INDONESIA: A CASE STUDY
Askiah Mohd. Adam
INTRODUCTION
Islam in Indonesia is a phenomenon that excites awe
in other Muslims. For, there is no one country in the
world that can lay claim to pluralism in Islam as the
Indonesians can. Here, in a country where Muslims
form an absolute majority—at least 85 percent of the
population—its very physical and cultural disparateness,
arguably, prevents any possibility of Islam incarnating
itself as a homogenous, monolithic whole. Local variations
of Muslim festivals that can vary substantially from
region to region are but a single example of such diversities.
Further, that Muslims in places like Jogjakarta subscribe
to celebrations peculiar to the kingdom, which harks
back to its Hindu past is another. But, these differences
are not conceived by some as proof of Indonesian Islam’s
plural character.
Scholars of Islam such as Professor Abdullahi Ahmed
An-Na’im of Emory University in Atlanta, the United
States, in his talk “Islamic Law and the Upholding of
Human Rights” of 13 February 2005 delivered in
Jakarta sees the Indonesian Islamic experience as “very
diverse” but not necessarily plural. He argues that diversity
is a physical phenomenon while empirical pluralism is
a concept, a value: that of accepting of diversity. That
voices for an implementation of the Shariah as a formally
codified legal system as opposed to the current application
of the Presidential Edict of 10 June 1991 can still be
heard may suggest that he could be right. The call to
an Islamic state by some quarters only reinforces this
position.
While there are voices asking for the establishment of
an Islamic state, it is obvious that the inability to make
any substantial electoral impact by parties proclaiming
themselves to be the embodiment of political Islam
indicate the opposite. Indonesian Muslims are largely
unimpressed by calls for an Islamic state. In fact, they
appear uninterested in even supporting advocates
merely of the Shariah, as the Partai Keadilan Sejahtera
(PKS) was in the 1999 general elections. 1 It was not until
the PKS took on a more practical electoral approach
that the party dramatically improved its performance
in the 2004 elections. A pragmatic PKS abandoned the
proposal to implement the Shariah and, instead chose
to take on as its platform more assuredly appealing
issues such as the eradication of corruption and poverty
Ref lections on the Human Condition: Change, Conflict and Modernity
The Work of the 2004/2005 API Fellows
alleviation. In April 2004, as a consequence, they took
the capital city by storm and won the largest number of
seats in DKI Jakarta’s legislative body.
That the Jakarta Charter, a principle intended to propel
the law towards Islamization, was never overwhelmingly
popular is one more proof of the largely skeptical attitude
of Indonesian Muslims towards attempts at codifying
the Shariah. The Islamists faction of the Investigative
Committee for the Preparation of Indonesian
Independence (Badan Penyelidik Usaha Persiapan
Kemerdekaan), a body whose construction was encouraged
by the Japanese occupiers at the point of their defeat,
had wanted to include the “obligation for adherents of
Islam to carry out Islamic law” 2 in the first principle
of the Pancasila, the national ideology, which is the belief
in God, and that it would ultimately be part of the country’s
Constitution. The secular nationalists were, however,
against such an inclusion not least because its very
general tenor leaves the parameters of its enforcement
largely uncertain. And so the so-called Jakarta Charter
was dropped and in its stead, and at the urgings of the
country’s Nahdlatul Ulama (NU) leadership, a compromise
was reached and the first principle was amended to bring
it closer to the Islamic doctrine of tauhid, the indivisibility
of the oneness of God. Where once, as first proposed,
the first principle was a simple matter of belief in God,
it now stands as belief in “Ketuhanan yang Maha Esa”,
a singular God. Not that the Islamists, as embodied by
Masyumi, 3 were ever properly satisfied.
Bearing in mind the Muslim dominance of the country,
there is an expectation— especially by others—that Islam
should easily be able to find an official foothold that
would allow for the construction of an Islamic polity.
Instead, the indication is that there is every incentive
by the powers that be to limit this expectedly massive
potential. Both Soekarno’s Old Order and Suharto’s
New Order made it a point to curb the influence of
Islamic political parties.
Then again, the country’s electoral history seems to be
pointing to a seeming tendency by Indonesians themselves
to hold political Islam at bay. The 1955 election result
is an indicator of this inclination, which has proven to
be resilient despite 32 years of choking political con-