Islam and process of democratization in Southeast Asia

Islam and process of democratization in Southeast Asia

Hassan Wirajuda, Jakarta

There are two realities that dominate national life in
Indonesia today -- realities that also define the positive image
Indonesia enjoys in the eyes of the world at large.

The first of these two realities is the fact that Indonesia is
home to the world's largest Muslim population -- 90 percent of a
total population of 220 million, or some 198 million people. It
is a Muslim population that is by and large moderate.

Most of the Muslims of Southeast Asia are, of course, moderate
and there are moderate Muslims everywhere else. It just happens
that international observers take a special view of this huge
concentration of moderate Muslims in Indonesia. Perhaps it
reassures them that the largest part of Islam is not a threat but
a friend and contributor to civilization. At any rate, we are
happy and proud that our country is considered the home of
moderate Islam.

The second of the two dominant realities in our national life
is the fact that Indonesia today is considered the world's third
largest democracy.

It is important to note that following last year's successful
direct presidential election, the first in our history, local
direct elections have started to take place this year for
governors, regents and mayors.

We are acutely aware of the fact that democracy in Indonesia
is still very much in need of further consolidation.

In this process of transition, Islam, as a moral force in
support of reform, has played a strong and positive role,
although it must also be said that there have been times when
Muslim militants and extremists loomed as part of the problems we
were grappling with.

This is not a new role for Islam. Muslim intellectuals and
religious leaders have always participated in the political
dynamics of Indonesia since our struggle for freedom and
sovereignty. The debate about the relationship between Islam and
the state was already taking place before we became an
independent country, especially when our Founding Fathers drafted
our Constitution. However, when we finally won our independence
in August 1945, our Founding Fathers reached a consensus that
Indonesia should not be an Islamic state based on sharia, and
Islam should not be the religion of the state.

But this is not the secularism that the West is well known
for, in the sense of a constitutional separation between the
state and religion. Instead, by constitutional mandate, the state
has the obligation to promote the religious life of the people.

It is important to note, however, that there has also been a
convergence between "Islamist" and "nationalist" political
orientations. For example, a good number of significant Muslim
leaders have formed political parties with nationalist platforms
-- such as the National Awakening Party (PKB) and the National
Mandate Party (PAN).

Political Islam by itself did not make any headway in the
country's transition to a more fully democratic system. In the
1999 general election, all 40 of the Islamic parties combined got
no more than 17.8 percent of the votes cast. Subsequently, the
proposal for the adoption of sharia, initially planned to be
tabled by two parties, was graciously withdrawn in the
legislature.

In the elections last year, only one Islamic party performed
well, i.e. the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS).

To be sure, not every Indonesian Muslim is a moderate. There
are a small number of extremists in Indonesian society -- and
they are not all Muslims -- who have resorted to violence to
advance their respective agendas.

Thus, for many years, Indonesia has grappled with terrorist
activities -- some of motivated by religious intolerance, others
by separatist ambitions. These terrorist activities were at the
outset purely homegrown but eventually acquired regional and
international links in the early 1990s.

In October 2002, Indonesia itself suffered a massive terrorist
attack in Bali, which killed 202 people. Since then, terrorists
have struck with murderous effect, twice in Jakarta -- at the
Marriott Hotel in August 2003 and in the vicinity of the
Australian Embassy in September 2004 -- and once again in Bali
last October.

In the wake of each of these attacks, Indonesia responded in
the way a democracy should: balancing security needs, the
democratic process and respect for human rights. Our police
authorities brought the perpetrators to justice through patient
investigation and without any violation of human rights. We could
not have done less than that, as it was demanded by our people.
Because of past experiences, the Indonesian people are very
sensitive to the way our police and the rest of the security
apparatus work.

While the police are bringing terrorists to justice -- or
killing them if they resist lawful arrest -- the government and
Muslim leaders are working together to kill terrorist ideas
through peaceful and democratic debate.

This, then, is the sum of Indonesia's experience with Islam
and democracy: True Islam is moderate and enlightened. Not only
can it flourish side by side with democracy, it can also work
together with a democratic government to defend society from its
attackers and to reform society. There is no debate about that
any more -- not in Indonesia and not in various other Muslim
countries.

The Indonesian experience confirms that democracy is not an
exclusively Western value that may sometimes be transplanted to
the Orient -- it is universal. It belongs to all civilizations.
It belongs as much to Muslims, Hindus and Buddhists as to
Christians.

The debate on the merits of democracy and its compatibility
with Islam is over. The challenge in Indonesia today is how to
make Islam and all other religions an even more effective force
for reform and democratization. It is a pragmatic challenge that
demands a pragmatic response.

Democracy, too, has its pragmatic challenge: How can we make
our democracy an effective one? To my mind, the answer to that
challenge lies in an earnest effort at capacity building -- such
as the capacity for free and fair elections, the capacity to pass
just and wise laws, the capacity to mete out justice. In sum, we
have to make democracy work for the welfare of our people.

It is our hope that in the course of this endeavor, Indonesia
and all the other participating countries will come out with
practical ideas and plans on how to translate the democratic
impulse in their own cultures into durable institutions and wise
processes in which their citizens can fully participate.

To be sure, those ideas and plans will vary from country to
country, since democracy has no prescribed template.

But even after such capacity building, there are no guarantees
that a country's attempt at democracy will succeed. The
infrastructure of democracy is not unlike physical
infrastructure: It is useful and indispensable but it does not
work by itself. It takes human beings to make the infrastructure
work.

It takes good citizens -- good men and women -- to make
democracy work. Decent men and women who are imbued with civic
discipline and high values -- such as the discipline and values
of Islam.

This article was condensed from a speech given by Minister of
Foreign Affairs Hassan Wirajuda in Jakarta on Dec. 6 at the
second international roundtable on Islam and Democratization in
Southeast Asia: Challenges and Opportunities.