ABSTRACT
Islamic extremism is no longer the biggest threat to peace and stability in Southeast Asia. This is a remarkable achievement when compared with the outlook one might have had just six or seven years ago. If we were to look back to 2002 or 2003, violence committed (or uncovered plots envisioning violence) in the name of Islam dominated security discussions from the Philippines and Indonesia (where a great deal of violence and terrorist activity occurred), to normally stable and secure countries like Singapore, Malaysia, and Thailand (where a number of arrests were made and evidence was gathered of terrorist activity foiled). While the chance of a terrorist attack has not vanished entirely, as the July 17, 2009 bombings on the Marriott and Ritz Carlton hotels in Jakarta illustrate, the threat has been significantly reduced and governments around the region have learned how to share intelligence and to use good police work and the courts to deal with terror suspects. This chapter will mostly focus on the state of militant Islamic groups in just two countries, the Philippines and Indonesia. While other countries will be discussed, the possibility for renewed violence and conflict is highest in these two states. This chapter will then analyze what the author sees as the new dynamic in Islamic political mobilization which is a “normalization” of political activity and contestation, rather than increased radicalization or militarization. By normalization I mean that instead of seeing Islamic politics as a choice between groups willing to use violence to achieve their goals, and groups seen as more moderate or complicit with the regime (those who were willing to work with governments to assert influence through allowed political channels), instead Islamic politics has become more nuanced, with both an increase in the number of Islamic actors having input into the political process, and a wider variety of methods and goals employed by such groups. From 1998 to 2004, the news from Southeast Asia was full of horrific accounts of
sectarian violence and attacks from militant Islamic groups. This time period represents a moment of transition in Southeast Asia. Countries had been devastated by the 1997 financial crisis, political regimes had fallen or faced significant new political challenges and challengers (Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia, Philippines), and overall the region could be characterized by increasingly weak state institutions. Radical Islamic groups were motivated by local, regional, and global concerns. The primary grievences of militant Islamic groups in this period were directed at individual governments and were driven by a sense that these secular regimes were illegitimate. Increased Islamic activity (both from groups willing to use violence to achieve their aims and from more moderate organizations) developed in Southeast Asia through the 1970s and 1980s. There was a great increase in mosque-building, attendance at Friday prayers increased, and there were greater numbers of people studying in religious schools, making the pilgrimage, and zakat
(donations). There are several reasons for this: (1) there was an increase in literacy which made studying and adherence to customs and practices more likely; (2) the official state curricula (in Malaysia and Indonesia) had religious components to them so more people were exposed to formal religious ideas; (3) participation in organized religion was a relatively safe outlet for expression and a sphere of life not totally controlled by the state (in Indonesia).1 Some Islamic groups in Southeast Asia worked within the parameters allowed in each state, others opposed the regimes they lived under and some of these developed into more militant organizations that sought to achieve an Islamic state or even to create an Islamic caliphate that stretched from the Philippines through Indonesia, Malaysia and into Southern Thailand. For these groups, the illegitimacy of authoritarian leaders provided a justification for violence and militancy.
