Institute for the Study of Islamic Thought and Civilizations as an actor in the process of Islamization in modern Indonesia

Abstract

The presented article analyzes the features of development and the main vectors of transformation of conservative Islam in modern Indonesia in contexts of the activities of the organization known as the Institute for the Study of Islamic Thought and Civilizations (INSISTS). INSISTS is supposed to be the intellectual center of contemporary Islamic traditionalism in Indonesia. The article analyzes the problems of the intellectual agenda of conservatives, including the ideas of the Islamization of science, the rejection of liberal Islam and the criticism of feminism. The article considers the main directions of Muslim conservatives activity as a reaction to the modernization of the Ummah and the temporary success of liberal Islam, although its influence on Muslims was extremely limited. It is believed that INSISTS appeared as an attempt to institutionalize and legitimize conservative and traditionalist trends in modern Indonesian Islam in the form of their expansion into the space of scientific knowledge and political criticism. It is shown that INSISTS, as a formally conservative institution, actually uses liberal discourse, trying to actualize the contemporary problems related to gender and feminism in the political agenda of traditionalists. Therefore, it is assumed that the conservative trends in the modern history of the Indonesian Ummah actualize the significant adaptive potential of the traditionalists.