Kobayashi Yasuko (Aichi Gakusen University)

Destination: Indonesia
Dates: August 3 - September 3, 1998

Though Islam-oriented books and seminars continue to increase and Islamic Studies itself are becoming popular in Indonesia, these activities are still virtually unknown in Japan. This study trip was arranged to help understand the themes, methodology, and resources that pertain to the contemporary Islamic Studies in Indonesia, and at the same time to confirm the position the local researchers hold in the area of Indonesian Islamic Studies and where they are headed.

I visited five institutions of the National Islamic Religious University (IAIN, 14 locations nationwide) located in Jakarta, Yogyakarta, Semarang, Surabaya, and Bandung, as well as private Islamic studies institutes such as P3M, Paramadina Foundation (both in Jakarta), and LKiS (Yogyakarta). I also met research fellows from the Indonesian Institute of Social Sciencesome and freelance researchers. The IAIN is the central force in Islamic Studies in Indonesia, and in the light of two schools in Jakarta and Yogyakarta being model schools, I spent more time in these two universities looking over submitted dissertations. I asked questions to researchers pertaining to their interests in particular on historical studies, such as Islamic law and gender studies because Islamic study itself is such a broad-ranged study.

I would like to refer to some of the internal reports pertaining to IAIN's functionality and research capability as a resource to discuss the IAIN. My impression was that IAIN is still in transition. Though the IAIN has a task of inheriting and developing the traditional studies of Islam, the dissertations I read have illustrated the point that most of the studies pertained to the classical texts and hence lacked relativity to modern society. This form of study often limits itself to the study of "notions" and "norms" where they does not deal much with the actual historical experiences of Muslims. However, the IAIN has embarked to strengthen its level of expertise in the field of social science to realize an integration with conventional studies of Islam.

The "Studia Islamika" published within the IAIN (the reports themselves are written in English or Arabic along with an Arabic or Indonesian summary) deals with issues of Islam with historical and sociological underpinnings. It often features reports written by foreign researchers, and is about to become one of the most important academic publications concerning Islam in Indonesia.

In addition, their efforts to train their researchers by sending out its graduates to Western graduate schools (mostly sent to Canada's McGill University), and the renaming of itself as a "University" and not an "Institute", is culminating in leading them out from their conventional to become a more social science-oriented university. However, they are confronted with financial setbacks arising from the local economic crisis which is seriously hindering the prospects for their plans.

Now, let me lay down the research trends of the three fields. In terms of history, several studies concerning the Indonesian ulama of the 17-18th Century were found. Notable points were that it stepped further into the philosophy of the ulama of the past and that Arabic resources which conventional studies did not use were utilized. However, as IAIN admits, in general their weakness in the methodology utilized and the lack of linguistic capacity to utilize foreign resources is not yet overcomed in the historical studies. The Islamic law studies have been the most successful field. Although most of them deal with more theoretical issues, the arrival of a new form of study, where Islamic laws are considered in the context of Indonesia, is producing "renewal". It is increasingly becoming a practical field, particularly where it attempts to critically reexamine the Islamic law from the perspective of women's rights, but it is yet to accomplish a concrete result. The gender studies related to Islam have only begun, and their destination or direction is still uncertain. It is also much expected that NGOs and freelance researchers along with the IAIN will play a big part in this endeavor. It is rather a pitty that despite the many seminars held in Indonesia there was less chance of them coming out in the form of publications, organizing the results.

In contrast, in the private Islamic studies institutions, open-public seminar and study sessions were commonplace, addressing the issues that confront today's Indonesian society (intra-religious dialogues, environmental problems, human rights issues, etc.) as subjects of a new discourse in an attempt to re-interpret the Islamic doctrines in the context of today's Indonesia. In addition, the books and magazines issued by these institutions have enriched the Islamic literature to broaden interest in Islamic issues. However, at this moment we cannot neglect the fact that inflation in printing costs since the currency crisis of last summer has somewhat slowed down the publication activity.

Also brought back to our realization was that many of the terms and names commonly used in discussing Islamic issues in Indonesia are still mostly unknown (or out of reach) in Japan. During the past 20 years we have intensively studied Indonesia as a whole but not Islam. Be it a repercussion or the cause of such neglect, this deficiency should be removed as soon as possible.

Lastly and almost certainly, the effects of the May demonstrations that brought down the 32-year-old Suharto regime and the reactions of the Islamic Universities and intellectuals were also of our concern. Though universities got back to functioning normally after the fall of Suharto, anxieties toward the still-worsening economic conditions and ambiguous political future seemed to reign. Also, although Islamic organizations and movements were "de-politicized" (or "pro-politicized) under the Suharto regime, Islam has been increasingly being used as a political ideology before. What this represents in the complex society of Indonesia or umma itself is of grave importance and needs serious attention. The re-opened freedom of speech will also have a great impact in the field of research.