internal dynamics of the prosperous justice party and jamaah tarbiyah 45
competitions in Indonesia in the last five decades. These institutional
settings are characterised by a complex triangular antagonism and an
alliance between the Suharto regime, the military and Islam-based
politics.
The first institutional setting faced by Islam-based political actors was
the refusal by the newly founded New Order regime in the mid-1960s
to revive the banned Masyumi party as well as the return to politics
of ex-Masyumi leaders. In this setting the antagonism was between
the Suharto regime, backed by the military, and Islam-based politics.
The situation forced Islam-based politics to split their resources: on the
one hand, they relied on younger politicians to get involved in political
competitions through the newly created Parmusi party; on the other
hand, the ex-Masyumi politicians created the non-political Indonesian
Islamic Dakwah Council (ddii). It was the ddii that started a systematic
synthesis of religious propagation and political activism, and spread it
among secular university students.
The second institutional setting was Law No. 3/1975, which forced
all Islam-based and Muslim-based political actors to fuse into a single
party named the United Development Party (ppp), while the other
parties were lumped into the Indonesian Democratic Party (pdi). In this
setting, the antagonism was between the Suharto regime and Islam-based
politics and other political parties, whereas the military suffered an
internal fracture between Suharto aides and his critics and stayed aloof.
Meanwhile, complexity increased in internal Islam-based politics as
the fusion combined two bitter rivals, the traditionalist and modernist
groups. This political ordeal in the mid-1970s brought university students
into the limelight as they were involved in riots in Jakarta in January
- This urged the regime to react by issuing a law that prohibited
students from engaging in political activities, known as the Normalization
of Campuses’ Life/Student Coordination Body (nkk/bkk), issued in
May 1978. On the one hand, this succeeded in suppressing student
political activism. Instead of discouraging, however, this policy further
intensified student political radicalism. In fact, it was under such a
political atmosphere that senior members of the jt and pks matured
during the late 1970s and early 1980s.³⁵
The third institutional setting was the regime’s move to mobilise
former Darul Islam rebels in a pretext to intercept the return of the
Adam Johnson and Jonathan Paris, eds.,The Politics of Post Suharto Indonesia
(New York: Council of Foreign Relations, 1999), 33–35. Damien Kingsbury,The
Politics of Indonesia(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002), 84–86.