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Challenging the Secular State examines Muslim efforts to incorporate shari'a (religious law) into modern Indonesia's legal system from the time of independence in 1945 to the present. The author argues that attempts to formally implement shari'a in Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim state, have always been marked by tensions between the political aspirations of proponents and opponents of shari'a and by resistance from the national government. As a result, although pro-shari'a movements have made significant progress in recent years, shari'a remains tightly confined within Indonesia's secular legal system.

The author first places developments in Indonesia within a broad historical and geographic context, offering a provocative analysis of the Ottoman empire's millet system and thoughtful comparisons of different approaches to pro-shari'a movements in other Muslim countries (Saudi Arabia, Iran, Pakistan). He then describes early aspirations for the formal implementation of shari'a in Indonesia in the context of modern understandings of religious law as conflicting with the idea of the nation-state.

Later chapters explore the efforts of Islamic parties in Indonesia to include shari'a in national law. Salim offers a detailed analysis of debates over the constitution and possible amendments to it concerning the obligation of Indonesian Muslims to follow Islamic law. A study of the Zakat Law illustrates the complicated relationship between the religious duties of Muslim citizens and the nonreligious character of the modern nation-state. Chapters look at how Islamization has deepened with the enactment of the Zakat Law and demonstrate the incongruities that have emerged from its implementation. The efforts of local Muslims to apply shari'a in particular regions are also discussed. Attempts at the Islamization of laws in Aceh are especially significant because it is the only province in Indonesia that has been allowed to move toward a shari'a-based system. The book concludes with a review of the profound conflicts and tensions found in the motivations behind Islamization. ... Read more

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Customer Reviews (1)

Indonesia Reader
Its not a history book; but a collections or snippits of informations, the average reader would get a very brief overview of Indonesia. Just a wetting of the tongue; and a shallow view. Read PRAMOEDYA ANANTA TOER (Buru Quartet - 4 books) and then this book. ... Read more

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This book examines the relationship between foreign companies and government within the Indonesian oil industry. It is concerned in particular to identify those factors which determine the balance between central regulation and untrammelled company activity, in order to evaluate the choices which the government has to make in the creation of its policies. Given the extent of foreign investment in the mineral extractive industries of many of the less-developed countries, such policies are of major importance. From his study of the operation of Indonesian oil contracts, Dr Khong concludes that the formal terms of an agreement may well give a misleading impression of the actual allocation of the benefits from petroleum extraction. The common perception that a basic shift in favour of host governments has occurred is shown to be largely misplaced, whatever relative advances they may have achieved. ... Read more

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Indonesia: Foreign Policy & Government Guide (World Business Intelligence Library) ... Read more

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Since the beginning of the New Order period in 1965 under General Soeharto, Indonesia has seen the establishment of the authority of the central government in every part of the country as well as the gradual delegation of authority to local provincial governments. This collection of essays analyzes development and change in public policy and administration during these years, and will be an invaluable resource for both development professionals and students. ... Read more

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As in many other LDCs, in Indonesia small-scale industries (SSIs) are important, particularly with respect to the creation of employment opportunities. SSIs are expected to absorb many millions of workers who have been displaced by current economic crisis. This work seeks to explain the pattern of development of SSIs in Indonesia within a broader theoretical framework. It also deals with a number of SSI development-related aspects that in Indonesia so far have never or rarely been studied, such as the formation of strategic alliance, cluster development, and application of theories of flexible specialization to the LDCs. The book also tries to examine empirically the effects of the current economic crisis and to assess theoretically the likely impact of the full implementation of the agreed IMF reform package on SSI development in the country. Main problems faced by small producers and the government policy environment are highlighted through several detailed examples. ... Read more

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Increased interest in Indonesian culture and politics is reflected in this work's effort to advance and reject various notions of what it means to be Indonesian. It also addresses perceptions of how Indonesia's citizens and state officials should interact. Because, in recent times, the Indonesian state has been so strong, much of the book is about state-sanctioned and state-supported notions of Indonesian identity and culture and efforts to come to terms with -- or sometimes to challenge these official or dominant notions.

The contributions presented here represent a wide range of disciplines, points of view, and ideological orientations. Taken together they convey the notion that much might be gained if the idea were abandoned that a single understanding of what constitutes Indonesian culture is possible or desirable. ... Read more

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Although Indonesia has the fourth largest population in the world, its history is still relatively unknown. Adrian Vickers takes the reader on a journey across the social and political landscape of modern Indonesia, starting with the country's origins under the Dutch in the early twentieth-century, and the subsequent anti-colonial revolution which led to independence in 1949. Thereafter the spotlight is on the 1950s, a crucial period in the formation of Indonesia as a new nation, followed by the Sukarno years, and the anti-Communist massacres of the 1960s when General Suharto took over as president. The concluding chapters chart the fall of Suharto's New Order after thirty two years in power, and the subsequent political and religious turmoil which culminated in the Bali bombings in 2002.Adrian Vickers is Professor of Asian Studies at the University of Wollongong.He has previously worked at the Universities of New South Wales and Sydney, and has been a visiting fellow at the University of Indonesia and Udayana University (Bali). Vickers has more than twenty-five years research experience in Indonesia and the Netherlands, and has travelled in Southeast Asia, the U.S. and Europe in the course of his research. He is author of the acclaimed Bali: a Paradise Created (Penguin, 1989) as well as many other scholarly and popular works on Indonesia.In 2003 Adrian Vickers curated the exhibition Crossing Boundaries, a major survey of modern Indonesian art, and has also been involved in documentary films, including Done Bali (Negara Film and Television Productions, 1993). ... Read more

Customer Reviews (3)

Good for a quick overview of Indonesian modern politics
I read this book to prep for a business school paper I was writing for a global economics final project.I needed a complete summary of Indonesian modern history as quickly as possible.

This book provided the facts that I needed and proved to be a fast and easy read. Some of the timelines traced in the book got a bit confusing, but once I had the background details, I found other online timelines to help with clarification of names and dates.Nothing on line provided, however, provided the detail of this book.It was invaluable in giving me information about politics in Indonesia.

I do not recommend this as a fun or relaxing read, but if you are searching for facts and general knowledge about Indonesian politics, this book is a good start.

10 Things I learned from A History of Modern Indonesia
1. History is best told when it isn't a litany of dates and places and names.

2. History is better told when it attempts to describe the zeitgeist of the era, when it makes a time and place alive for you.

3. Vickers accomplishes this in describing the history of modern Indonesia, from the late colonial period to the present day. He includes the important dates, but takes special care to note the discourses and debates that shaped the events, and the daily lives of the poor and the rich and those struggling to hold their place in between.

4. I read this book for my research, but found it so compelling that I began to read it for pleasure, a rare turn.

5. Vickers makes sense of the complex and often covert history of Indonesia, which has experienced several volatile changes in the 20th century.

5. The radical shifts in leadership, ideology and policy - from colonialism to Sukarno's near-communism to the still-unsolved coup that confirmed Suharto's dictatorial technocracy, to the protests that overthrew him and invited a string of presidents in the last nine years -are illustrated by how it affected peoples' lives.

6. This is a history that takes into account the effect of political climate on art, literature, film and other manifestations of culture. It notes these arenas as both evidence for the contemporary mindset and as catalysts for change.

7. Vickers uses the voices of Presidents, the voices of laborers, and the voices of everyone in between to bring to life more than one hundred years of history.

8. Whereas other histories treat the cultural sphere and lived lives as separate matters, as anecdotes, as separate chapters, or not at all, Vickers' work is infused with these voices and cultures.

9. In addition, it offers the known history and biographies of important people who helped shape it.

10. One of the best books on Indonesian history that I've read, A History of Modern Indonesia is recommended to the scholarly as well as the curiousfor a comprehensive and compelling look at the recent history of the fourth largest country in the world.

A great read..if your interested in Indonesia's history..
My wife is Indonesian and I plan on going soon. So with the problems Indonesia seems to have, I thought it would be wise and educate myself with the people and history. Very good for people that might want to go on extended stays and try to understand the mind set of these people. ... Read more

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Why do some authoritarian regimes topple during financial crises, while others steer through financial crises relatively unscathed? In this book, Thomas B. Pepinsky uses the experiences of Indonesia and Malaysia and the analytical tools of open economy macroeconomics to answer this question. Focusing on the economic interests of authoritarian regimes' supporters, Pepinsky shows that differences in cross-border asset specificity produce dramatically different outcomes in regimes facing financial crises. When asset specificity divides supporters, as in Indonesia, they desire mutually incompatible adjustment policies, yielding incoherent adjustment policy followed by regime collapse. When coalitions are not divided by asset specificity, as in Malaysia, regimes adopt radical adjustment measures that enable them to survive financial crises. Combining rich qualitative evidence from Southeast Asia with cross-national time-series data and comparative case studies of Latin American autocracies, Pepinsky reveals the power of coalitions and capital mobility to explain how financial crises produce regime change. ... Read more

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It has sometimes been argued that many Indonesians had little sympathy with western notions of elections being events for the contesting and transfer of power and that they rather supported the New Order's use of festivals of democracy', elections as occasions at which the mass of ordinary Indonesians were given the opportunity to celebrate the country's achievements under the rule of its New Order leadership as well as legitimize the continued rule of these leaders.
But the need to stage-manage these elections' as New Order triumphs finally undid the regime. The beginning of the long fall of Suharto could arguably be sited with the prelude to the 1997 general election, when the ejection of Megawati Sukarnoputri from leadership to opposition PDI party was engineered in 1996. The President's authority was weakened - and crumbed even further at the onset of the economic crisis that followed a few months later. Events since Suharto's resignation in May 1998 have been far from orderly, but today many Indonesians would argue that the current turbulent political scene - not so different from the parliamentary vitality (not chaos') of the 1950s - is the true face of Indonesian politics, that the stability of Suharto's New Order was an aberration. The June 1999 national elections saw Megawati's rejuvenated PDI take the biggest vote, but not a majority, and many other parties are now represented in parliament. This result, many would argue, is Indonesia's true festival of democracy'.
Looking beyond the narrow details of the June 1999 national election, this book explores the wider issues sketched above. With chapters describing the last New Order election and the first free election in the post-Suharto era, this volume makes an important contribution to our understanding of the demise of the New Order, and the directions being taken by the emerging regime. ... Read more

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The success or failure of democratic reform in Indonesia is a key question for Indonesia itself and for the surrounding region. Although Indonesia's transition to democracy holds out the promise of good governance, this cannot be taken for granted - as the recent military takeover in Thailand shows. This book is about the challenge of making democracy work in Asia's third-largest nation. ... Read more

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The book explores the social and cultural dynamics of political change in Indonesia since the mid-1990s. Within and historical framework, the book examines a number of traditions which prevail in Indonesian society and analyzes their contemporary relevance. ... Read more

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This report tries to establish the facts about Indonesia s public expenditures, presenting trends over time and analyzing the composition across sectors and levels of government. The report presents comprehensive information on key sectors, including sub-national governments and state-owned enterprises in key infrastructure sectors. Based on these facts, the report asks: Who benefits from these substantial amounts of public resources? Where are the gaps? Which regions are well-endowed? Which regions are lagging behind? In addition to these questions, this report also tries to respond to key concerns that are in the minds of many ordinary Indonesians and friends of Indonesia, such as: Can Indonesia afford to spend more? Is the current level of education and health spending sufficient? How to revitalize infrastructure investment, and which sectors are the priorities? Why is it so difficult to disburse funds through the government budget system? How unequal is Indonesia and how should fiscal transfers be structured to equalize disparities?Spending for Development: Making the Most of Indonesia's New Opportunities is an essential source of analysis for all stakeholders in public finance in Indonesia, some of the most important findings include: 1 Thanks to the fuel subsidies cuts in 2005, Indonesia freed up US$10 billion in 2006 to spend on development programs. An additional US$5 billion also came available from increasing revenues and declining debt service.2 Despite the 2005 domestic fuel price adjustments, Indonesia still spends US$12 billion on subsidies annually, mainly on fuel and electricity. 3 Thirty-six percent of all public spending is now in the hands of sub-national governments. 4 While spending on education since the crisis has nearly doubled and spending on health has increased almost 70 percent, spending on infrastructure investment remains significantly less than pre-crisis levels (below 3.4 percent of GDP). 5 Indonesia spends about 50 percent of its total annual capital expenditure in the final quarter of the year. ... Read more