Assalaualaikum rang lapau kasado alahe,
Terlampir artikel tulisan kawan ambo, Dr. Giora Eliraz, Indonesianist asal
Israel yg barusan terbit di Jarusalem Post. Mudah2an bamanpaaik andaknyo.
Wassalam,
Suryadi
JPost.com » Opinion » Op-Ed Contributors » Article
Apr 5, 2008 21:28 | Updated Apr 6, 2008 10:04
Will Indonesia's breeze of democracy reach here?
By DR. GIORA ELIRAZ
PrintSubscribe
E-mailToolbar
Shape public opinion:
What's this?
Talkbacks for this article: 11
While strolling through bookstores in London years ago, I happened upon a book
by Deliar Noer entitled Modernist Muslim Movement in Indonesia, 1900-1942
(Oxford University Press, 1978). Leafing through it, I was surprised to learn
that the Islamic modernist stream of thought originating in the Middle East -
Egypt in particular - found its way to Indonesia in the first decades of the
20th century, firing the imagination of Indonesian youth and challenging the
traditional order. I wondered how had these ideas found their way to the remote
eastern edge of the Islamic world? More importantly, why has the Indonesian
archipelago proved itself to be a successful habitat for Islamic modernism -
for both conceptual and organizational growth.
A Jakarta woman reads the Koran at the Istiqlal Mosque.
Photo: AP
The riddle propelled me years later to start my own intellectual journey to
Indonesia Studies. There I was exposed to the centuries-old interaction, in an
Islamic context, between Indonesia and the Middle East, which created
widespread feeling of close bond among Indonesia's large Muslim population to
the Middle East - where Indonesia itself, however, remains nearly unknown, as
it does to most peoples around the globe.
Yet as Indonesia engages in building the third largest democracy in the world,
it's worthwhile asking if this process has caught any attention in the Arab
Middle East.
WHILE NOT evoking much interest in the Arab media, Indonesian democracy has not
gone totally unnoticed by observers there. They see it as encouraging evidence
for both the possibility of a country switching to democracy after a long
period of authoritarian rule and for the compatibility of Islam and democracy -
particularly as Indonesia is home to the world's largest Muslim community.
Reports on Indonesia's democratic parliamentary elections and the first direct
democratic presidential elections of 2004 made some headlines in the Arab
Middle East, not only in countries conspicuous for political reform but also in
countries where the political system differs strongly from the model suggested
by liberal democracy. Indonesia demonstrates that the global process of
democratization does not leave predominantly Muslim countries untouched and
suggests that the current state of democracy in the Arab Middle East is not
related to Islam.
Still, the applicability of the Indonesian model of democracy to the Middle
East is rarely debated there, perhaps due to the lack of in-depth analysis of
Indonesia as a complex of polity, society and culture. The causal connection
between democracy in Indonesia and both the pluralistic nature of its society
and the moderate, tolerant type of religious belief that dominates the Muslim
mainstream there are discussed only slightly in the Middle East media and then
mainly in articles by foreign commentators and experts.
But while Indonesian matters are not prominent in the Arab media, the country
is mentioned in other contexts as the eastern border of the Islamic world and
as the nation with the largest Muslim population. After my article "Democracy
in Indonesia and Middle East countries" appeared in The Jakarta Post on
November 30, 2007, a prominent Indonesian scholar wrote me that democracy in
Indonesia has increasingly attracted attention in growing circles in the Middle
East. He noted that over the last few years he has been invited to regional
capitals to speak on both Islam and democracy in Indonesia.
Ideas from the Middle East have traveled for centuries to Indonesia - much less
so in the opposite direction. Perhaps now is the time for the breeze of
democracy from "the lands below the winds" (that is, the Malay World or more
generally, Southeast Asia) to blow towards the Middle East.
The writer is associate researcher at the Truman Institute for the Advancement
of Peace at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
________________________________________________________
Bergabunglah dengan orang-orang yang berwawasan, di di bidang Anda! Kunjungi
Yahoo! Answers saat ini juga di http://id.answers.yahoo.com/
--~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~
===============================================================
UNTUK DIPERHATIKAN:
- Wajib mematuhi Peraturan Palanta RantauNet, mohon dibaca & dipahami! Lihat di
http://groups.google.com/group/RantauNet/web/peraturan-rantaunet.
- Tulis Nama, Umur & Lokasi anda pada setiap posting.
- Hapus footer & bagian tidak perlu, jika melakukan reply.
- Email attachment, DILARANG! Tawarkan kepada yg berminat & kirim melalui jalur
pribadi.
- Posting email besar dari >200KB akan dibanned, sampai yg bersangkutan minta
maaf & menyampaikan komitmen mengikuti peraturan yang berlaku.
===============================================================
Berhenti, kirim email kosong ke: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Daftarkan email anda yg terdaftar pada Google Account di:
https://www.google.com/accounts/NewAccount?hl=id
Untuk dpt melakukan konfigurasi keanggotaan di:
http://groups.google.com/group/RantauNet/subscribe
===============================================================
-~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
