ABSTRACT
Islamic education remains central for Muslim communities in Indonesia, just like somewhere else in the Muslim world. In countries such as Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Sudan and Malaysia, where Islam is regarded as the state’s offi cial religion; Islamic education has persistently been receiving support from both the government and civil society. In Indonesia, Islam and Muslim communities have also enjoyed certain privileges thanks to Indonesia’s position as the world’s largest Muslim country. Since the 1960s or at least 1970s, the Indonesian government has been instrumental in facilitating, both administratively and fi nancially, the spread of Islamic educational institutions throughout the Indonesian region. This does not mean, however, that Islamic education provision is exclusively at the hand of the state agencies. A vibrant and active participation of civil society organisations, partly represented by Muslim NGOs, philanthropic organisations and transnational Islamic organisations, in ‘schooling Islam’ may also indicate the centrality of Islamic education among Indonesian societies (van Bruinessen, 2008; Hefner, 2009).
