Contemporary Islamic Law in Indonesia

The introduction of sharia (Islamic law) in Indonesia after the regime transition in 1998 has attracted considerable scholarly and media attention. The special autonomous region of Aceh is an especially popular site for research because the region not only is known for its traditionally strong Islamic identity, but also is the only province that has attained a special autonomous status in the process of implementing sharia. Arskal Salim’s Contemporary Islamic Law in Indonesia offers a rich and interesting ethnographic study that looks into a number of relevant questions not only in Aceh, but also in other parts of the archipelago and religiously plural societies more generally. His primary concerns are the formation, interpretation, and enforcement of sharia in settling disputes within the Acehnese communities related to inheritance, lands and properties, and matrimonial problems. Those issues have become especially problematic in Aceh after the tsunami—disaster, having raised broader questions about the mode of adjudication, conflict of judicial jurisdiction in a secular-dominant pluralistic legal structure, and conflict of authority among religious elites (including sharia court judges) and communal leaders (such as village heads), because of the lack of popular consensus regarding how to settle the issues that have dramatically increased after the disaster. In fact, as discussed throughout the chapters, especially in chapters 4-5, there has not been a coherent national legal structure that binds together the civil and religious courts, which make up the two parts of the legal apparatus, to adjudicate personal matters according to a standardized set of laws, rules, and principles. To make the situation even more complex, jurisprudential plurality in the Islamic tradition leaves Indonesian legal practitioners with extensive discretion in the process of interpreting and adjudicating cases in hand (chapter 1).

Adjudication · Comparative law · Geography · Islam · Jurisdiction · Legal pluralism · Legal realism · Political science · Sharia · Sociology · Gender and Women's Rights · Law · Legal Studies and Policies · Marriage and Family Dynamics