"The Diversity of Indonesian Islam and its Impact on Democracy"

Christoph Schuck, Indonesia Research Unit (IRU) at the Institute of Political Science, Justus-Liebig-University Giessen/Germany

The question whether the combination of Democracy and Islam is possible has strongly influenced both current scientific studies and the debate in society. A considerable number of people, including some political scientists and Islamists have repeatedly underlined that Democracy and Islam would be a contradictio in adjecto. While, for example, Samuel P. Huntington has argued that “Islamic culture explains in large part the failure of democracy to emerge in much of the Muslim world”, the Islamist Seyyid Qutb stated that in democracies people “have established assemblies of men which have absolute power to legislate laws, thus usurping the right which belongs to God alone“. What is ignored by both, however, is that Muslims differ considerably over how an Islamic society should be organized and that Islam – just like all the other religions – is “multivocal” (Alfred Stepan).

The study of Islam in Indonesia sheds light on the diversity of Islam. On the one hand, the majority Muslims has welcomed the introduction of democracy, stressing that Islam and Democracy were based on the same values and considerations. On the other hand, the rise of Islamist groups, especially since the beginning of the 1990s, has contributed to an increasingly fragile political environment. Paying attention to both groups, the moderate and the radical, leads me to the following hypothesis: It is not Islam but Islamism which cannot be combined with Democracy.

Dr. Christoph Schuck is founding member and director of the Indonesia Research Unit (IRU), scholarship-holder (2005/06) of the German Research Foundation (DFG) and a lecturer on international relations/foreign policy, Institute of Political Science, Justus-Liebig-University, Giessen/Germany. He has been a recurring visiting researcher at Parahyangan Catholic University (UNPAR) Bandung/Indonesia. He is also a member of the European Union’s EU-GARNET Network-of-Excellence, Brussels/Belgium and vice-chairman of the development project Tausend Huegel e.V. His research interests are: Transition and Development Theories, Democracy and Islam, Southeast Asia. Christoph Schuck is the author of Der indonesische Demokratisierungsprozess. Politischer Neubeginn und historische Kontinuiaet (Nomos-Verlag, 2003) and an editor (together with Bob S. Hadiwinata) of the book: Democracy in Indonesia: The Challenge of Consolidation. With a Foreword by former Indonesian President Abdurrahman Wahid. Forthcoming, Nomos-Verlag, October 2006. Email: christoph.schuck@sowi.uni-giessen.de ;
Internet: http://www.indonesia-research-unit.com

For current Yale SEAS Seminars and Events schedule, see: http://www.yale.edu/seas/Seminars.htm