Since 9/11, many Americans have associated Islam with violence and hostility, and they have also begun to scrutinize more closely the activities of Muslim minorities in their midst. Public discussions of differences between Muslims and the West nearly always revolve around the role of women, with Islam cast as disempowering them. Many Islamists reinforce this perception by insisting on gender segregation and control over women’s status and physical appearance. In a context where Islam and feminism are frequently seen as irreconcilable, how do women engage with these global discourses? And why do some women come to see Islam and feminism as compatible, while others reject feminism as un-Islamic?
One of the most interesting places to examine this question is Indonesia. The country has the world’s largest Muslim population and it has been hailed by American leaders as a “Muslim democracy.” More than a decade after the collapse of a lengthy dictatorship, Indonesia has transitioned to an electoral democracy, with an energetic civil society, including many women’s organizations. It has diverse ethnic groups and religious minorities and cultural traditions that give women economic autonomy. As such, Indonesia has much to tell us about the intersections of religion, gender, and politics.
Democratization in Indonesia has opened up new space for social movements. As a result, Islam has become more prominent in the public sphere. However, Islam is not the only influential discourse in Indonesia. Feminism and ideas about women’s rights have become more widespread in Indonesia as well, due to the transnation women’s rights movement. These social and political shifts have resulted in competing ideas about gender as well as religion’s place in public life. While recent scholarship and media coverage often depict revivalist Islam and feminism as being at odds, this book uses Indonesia as a case study to investigate how women activists localize global discourses of Islam and feminism. It examines how the rise of Islam in the public sphere affects a range of women’s mobilizations, from struggles for political and social equality to attempts to forge a more Islamic state.
This study of women activists—conservative, moderate and liberal—looks closely at how women draw on Islam and feminism to argue for a wide variety of political and social changes. It explores the many ways women negotiate ideals of feminism and gender equality with Islamic practices, and it argues that different approaches to interpreting Islamic texts are closely linked to different kinds of political activism. This book is also a study of activist women’s personal ideals and experiences– how they adapt feminism and Islam in their daily lives and relationships.
“Mobilizing Piety” is unusual because of its comparative ethnographic approach, which helps to demonstrate that popular “clash of civilizations” frameworks are simplistic in their analysis of religious politics. By studying different groups of women activists, the book reveals important differences in women's interpretations of Islam, and it illustrates how the global Islamic revival is multi-faceted.