Hefner Coordinates Workshops on Indonesian Electoral Campaign
Robert Hefner, Professor of Anthropology and International Relations at the Frederick S. Pardee School of Global Studies at Boston University, recently returned from two weeks in Indonesia, where he was involved in organizing and coordinating the second of his workshops related to six films that he and his Indonesian research partners are producing on “Islam, Plurality, and Citizenship in Indonesia.”
The workshop is related to Hefner’s second film, which highlights the role of Islam and Muslims in the 2019 presidential electoral campaign, which was officially launched in January and concludes with national elections in April. With Islam and politics much in the air, and with conservative Islamist populists attempting to flex their muscles in the presidential campaign, Hefner also received invitations from five different universities and institutes to talk on Islam, democracy, Islamist populism in Indonesia today.
The talks included events at Paramadina University, the Nahdlatul Ulama University-Jakarta, the Hidayatullah State Islamic University, Sunan Kalijaga State Islamic University, and the Center for Security and Peace Studies at Gadjah Mada University.
“There’s a lot of anxiety among Indonesia’s large, Muslim-democratic community,” Hefner said. “Because 20 years into the Muslim world’s most successful democratic transition once-marginal conservative Islamists appear to be gaining ground. But the democratic system is stable, and, although some developments in society are trending more conservative, Islamically speaking, I am confident that the Muslim democrat enter is yet going to prevail.”
Robert Hefner has directed 19 research projects and organized 18 international conferences, and authored or edited nineteen books. He is former president of the Association for Asian Studies. At CURA, he directed the program on Islam and civil society since 1991; coordinated interdisciplinary research and public policy programs on religion, pluralism, and world affairs; and is currently involved in two research projects: “The New Western Plurality and Civic Coexistence: Muslims, Catholics, and Secularists in North America and Western Europe”; and “Sharia Transitions: Islamic Law and Ethical Plurality in the Contemporary World.” You can read more about him here.