The Muslim intelligentsia of Indonesia : a genealogy of its emergence in the 20th century

Abstract

This thesis examines 'the genealogy of Muslim intelligentsia (and power) in twentieth century Indonesia'. The main concern of the thesis is with the genealogy of the collective entity of Muslim 'intelligentsia'. Even so, attention will also be given to the role of individual 'intellectuals' as fomulators and articulators of the Muslim intelligentsia's collective identities and ideologies. Although the Indonesian intelligentsia has been the ruling stratum of Indonesian society, there has been no single systematic study under the rubric of Indonesian (Muslim) 'intelligentsia'. The very few available studies related to this issue have used the term Indonesian (Muslim) 'intellectuals' but have examined the ideas of individual intellectuals rather than provide an analysis of the structural position and collective representation of the Indonesian people of ideas. To a certain degree, Indonesian intelligentsia has been studied under the rubric of the Indonesian 'elite'. The mainstream analysts of the Indonesian elite tended to restrict the notion of power struggle to the purely political and bureaucratic fields, while power struggle in the realm of knowledge and meaning was not taken into serious consideration. Based on the assumption that Indonesian Muslims had frequently failed to win elections and control parliament, many analysts came to the conclusion that Muslim politics had been defeated. Moreover, most of these studies focused too much attention on individual time, without considering the time of the 'longue durée'. In considering intellectual performance and politics as an end product rather than as a process, as a synchronic state rather than as a diachronic development, these studies underestimated the regenerative capacity of Muslim intelligentsia. Such a conclusion is problematic in the context of the current preponderance of Muslim intelligentsia in the political and bureaucratic elite. This thesis is a dynamic, interactive and intertextual approach to the study of Indonesian Muslim intelligentsia and its relations to power. The dynamic approach of this thesis attempts to situate synchronic states within a diachronic context. This approach reveals that throughout the 20th century there have been diachronic Muslim intellectual networks across generations that made possible the continuity of Muslim intellectual political traditions. At the same time, there have been continuous synchronic changes in the formulation of Muslim intelligentsia's identities and ideologies across generations. The interactive approach of this study attempts to see the development of Muslim intelligentsia and power as the result of a dynamic interplay between past and present, between and within various intellectual-political traditions, and between various arenas of power relations. This approach reveals that ideological formulation and power strategies of a particular generation of Muslim intelligentsia cannot be isolated from the influence of the previous generation, the presence of significant others and the interplay of various arenas of power relations. The intertextual approach of this study attempts to mobilise interdisciplinary studies and to sec the interconnectedness of texts and discourse. This approach reveals the interdependence of inter-generaticnal texts of Muslim intelligentsia and the relationality of diverse texts as well as of discursive and non-discursive formations.