Islamic militancy, Sharia, and democratic consolidation in post-Suharto Indonesia

• Main Author: Noorhaidi Hasan
• Other Authors: S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies
• Format: Working Paper
• Published: 2009
• Subjects: DRNTU::Social sciences::Military and naval science::Strategy::Asia
• Online Access: https://hdl.handle.net/10356/79795; http://hdl.handle.net/10220/4399
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

The current strategy for the comprehensive implementation of sharia (Islamic law) pursued by a number of Indonesia's militant Islamic groups, including MMI (Majelis Mujahidin Indonesia), the Council of Indonesian Holy Warriors), HTI (Hizbut Tahrir Indonesia, the Indonesia Islamic Party of Liberation) and FPIS (Front Pembela Islam Surakarta, the Islam Defenders' Front of Surakarta), has gradually shifted towards campaigning for sharia from below. Keeping pace with the narrowing space for manoeuvring that has been available to these groups, the democratic consolidation that has been taking place over the last five years has enables various forces of Indonesian society and political parties to appropriate sharia for their own interests. Through parliamentarian channels, sharia has become formalized and institutionalized, and transformed into a dozen products of (regional) legislation. The application of these regulations indicates that attempts made by the groups have proved fruitful, despite their failure to demand a constitutional status for sharia. Indeed, the groups' high-profile politics to enforce sharia at the state level had faded away, along with the intensifying global campaign against terror. Nevertheless, their dream and aspirarion to see the supremacy of sharia in the world's most populous Muslim nation remain intact. Herein lies the significance of the regulations as the key for them to continue moving towards this end.