296. (Mis-)Leading Religion and Politics: Islamization(s) in South and Southeast Asia

Session Submission Type: Organized Panel

Abstract

This panel adopts a comparative lens in order to explore the political and epistemological heterogeneity of Islamization. Although, broadly speaking, the concept of Islamization is often defined as the increasing presence of Islam in the public and private spheres, and its interplay with politics, the process’s meanings and underlying mechanisms of articulation are highly varied because they are contextually contingent. The panel highlights how Islamization has been distinctly interpreted and applied in two directions - top-down and bottom-up.  On the one hand, programs of Islamization may at times be employed by state actors as a political strategy meant to strengthen the state’s legitimacy. Malaysia and Brunei represent relevant examples of this top-down articulation of Islamization.  In other Asian settings, however, certain non-state actors have promoted Islamization in striking contrast to official understandings, as a means of challenging the status quo or, alternately, justifying radical contention or even violence. In Indonesia, non-state actors endow Islamization with universal and sometimes even progressive value contours, while in India home-grown Islamist extremist factions have employed Islamization as a justification to wage violence against a seemingly oppressive Hindu majoritarian state. In Malaysia, fringe social groupings emerged in response to the government’s politicization of Islam which is misconceived as a semiotic and ideological quest for the “right” Islam. This panel brings together junior and senior scholars of Islam in Asia, and it encourages cross-generational, cross-field, and cross-disciplinary perspectives on an issue of great scholarly and policy importance.

Area of Study

• Southeast

Session Organizer

• Aida M. Arosoaie, RSIS, NTU

Chair

• Aida M. Arosoaie, RSIS, NTU

Individual Presentations

• The Bureaucratization of Islam and Its Socio-Legal Dimensions in Southeast Asia: Outlines of a Collaborative Research Project - Dominik M. Müller, Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology

• Which Islamization? According to Whom? Varieties of Shariah Normativization in Indonesia Today - Robert W. Hefner, Boston University

• Islamizing the Law in Malaysia - Kerstin Steiner, La Trobe University

• Righteousness and Honour: Bottom-Up Islamization in Malaysia and India - Aida M. Arosoaie, RSIS, NTU

Discussant

• Patricia Sloane-White, University of Delaware