Islamic Populism in Indonesia and the Middle East

Abstract

In a novel approach to the field of Islamic politics, this provocative new study compares the evolution of Islamic populism in Indonesia, the country with the largest Muslim population in the world, to the Middle East. Utilising approaches from historical sociology and political economy, Vedi R. Hadiz argues that competing strands of Islamic politics can be understood as the product of contemporary struggles over power, material resources and the result of conflict across a variety of social and historical contexts. Drawing from detailed case studies across the Middle East and Southeast Asia, the book engages with broader theoretical questions about political change in the context of socio-economic transformations and presents an innovative, comparative framework to shed new light on the diverse trajectories of Islamic politics in the modern world.

Being a Young British Muslim in the Age of the ‘War on Terror’: A Critical Reflection on Interviewing a Young Muslim in Britain

“…Against this backdrop, the project has tried to avoid such reductionism and essentialism in researching Muslim. On the contrary, it embraces the notion that the Muslim identity in the contemporary world is deeply influenced by global rivalry rooted in political and economic interests between Muslim's world to resist the global domination of the West (Roy, 2004;Sidel, 2007;Hadiz, 2008Hadiz, , 2016. In this vein, the centrality of 'global imagined Ummah' in the West seems relevant to be critically examined (Roy, 2004).…”

Populism in Indonesia and its Threats to Democracy

“…Vedi Hadiz tried to see the rise of Islamic populism from their economic and political downsides in global competition and especially in Western hegemony [3]. According to him, the Muslim Brotherhood movement is one example of the rise of Islamic populism which later developed into influential parties in Egypt, Algeria, Palestine, Turkey and Indonesia.…”

“…According to him, the Muslim Brotherhood movement is one example of the rise of Islamic populism which later developed into influential parties in Egypt, Algeria, Palestine, Turkey and Indonesia. Islamic populism thus according to Hadiz should be traced to historical and sociological roots of Islamic decline [3]. This deterioration is also reflected in the form of terrorist movements in Afghanistan and Iraq.…”

“…Similarly, Aspinall wrote about how Prabowo rose as a strong Presidential candidate using populism [2]. Then Vedi Hadiz wrote a book on the social and historical foundations of the rise of Islamic populism and how this populism fills the absence of leftist criticism of capitalism in Indonesia [3]. In line with Hadiz, Jati argued that Islamic populism grow in some Islamic states to liberate the Muslim community from economic imbalances and marginalization [4].…”

From Civil Islam towards NKRI Bersyariah? Understanding Rising Islamism in Post-Reformasi Indonesia

“…The theoretical insights of the oligarchy school has recently been extended in the analysis of hardline Islamic groups in Indonesia. For these, see Hadiz 2016 andMudhofir 2017. While political oligarchy scholarship has given meaningful insights on the political economy, material, and power-seeking motivations of hardline Islamic movements, it underplays the role of ideology as a key determinant to the political motivation of these groups, thereby it has troubles explaining why these misbehaviors and abuses of power of the oligarchs sometimes were reported by the media and different civil society organizations have come out to criticize their abuses, these did little to keep their powers in check, as there are few state institutions that could effectively check their powers and effectively prevent them from committing corruption or other forms of misdeeds while they are holding a public office.…”