Hand, heart and handphone: State shari`a in the ageof the SMS

R. Michael Feener

# Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2013

Abstract The state implementation of Islamic law in the special autonomous regionof Aceh (Indonesia) presents a complex and compelling case for examining some ofthe central themes of this special issue, particularly the attempt to understand thecomplex entanglements of secular nation states with contemporary religious move-ments. These dynamics are particularly energized in contemporary Aceh, where astate-directed project for the formal implementation of shari`a has been pursuedalongside broader agendas for social reconstruction following the devastating 2004tsunami and the subsequent end of decades of violent conflict between the ‘Free AcehMovement’ (GAM) and the central Indonesian government. This article explores aheretofore un-examined source base – that of ‘Text Messages (SMS) to the Editor’printed in a local newspaper – to gain new perspective on local debates over the roleof Islam and official state structures in building a ‘new Aceh’. This material presentsa striking example of the complexity and contestation of popular discourses onIslamic law and society well beyond the realm of specialist spokesmen.

Keywords Islamic law . Indonesia . Aceh . Media . Sms . Public sphere

The state implementation of Islamic law in the special autonomous region of Acehpresents a complex and compelling case for examining some of the central themes ofthis special issue, particularly the attempt to understand the complex entanglementsof secular nation states with contemporary religious movements. These dynamics areparticularly energized in contemporary Aceh, where a state-directed project for theformal implementation of shari`a has been pursued alongside broader agendas forsocial reconstruction following the devastating 2004 tsunami and the subsequent endof decades of violent conflict between the ‘Free Aceh Movement’ (GAM) and the

Cont IslamDOI 10.1007/s11562-013-0244-0

R. M. Feener (*)Asia Research Institute (ARI), National University of Singapore, 469A Tower Block,#09-04 Bukit Timah Road, Singapore 259770, Singaporee-mail: arifm@nus.edu.sg

central Indonesian government (Feener in press). In the process of massive reconstruc-tion and ambitious reconciliation projects following the traumas of intense naturaldisasters and prolonged periods of armed conflict, many Acehnese have becomeactively engaged in wide-ranging public discussions of the moral and legal foundationsof their society.1 These discussions have been greatly facilitated by the lifting ofrestrictions on publishing, as well as by technological advances making possible newand hybrid fora in the expanding public sphere of post-Suharto Indonesia. One suchforum is the ‘Aspiration’ (Aspirasi) section of local daily newspapers, where the formal‘Letters to the Editor’ sections have been replaced by a page full of un-edited mobilephone text messages (SMS) on topics of current interest.

Modes of moral action in Islamic tradition

This article will analyze the ways in which competing discourses on rights and justiceare elaborated and deployed within the context of official and popular views on theenforcement of Aceh’s shari`a by-laws in the early years of the twenty-first century.In particular, the discussion examines one of the ways in which a particular conjunc-tion of ‘old’ (print) and ‘new’ (digital) media has facilitated the emergence of newspheres of discourse on one of the central tenets of Islamic ethical and legal thought:that of ‘commanding right and forbidding wrong’ (al-amr bi’l-ma`ruf wa’l-nahy `anal-munkar). Michael Cook (2000: 9) has characterized this crucial point of doctrine as“the presence, within the mainstream of Islamic thought, of a strikingly—not to sayinconveniently—radical value: the principle that an executive power of the law ofGod is vested in each and every Muslim.” His landmark study explores thecomplexities of its diverse interpretations over more than a millennium of Muslimhistory in the Middle East, with particular emphasis on what he refers to as the ‘ThreeModes’ tradition:

‘Whosoever sees a wrong (munkar),’ says the Prophet, ‘and is able to put it toright with his hand (an yughayyirahu bi-yadihi), let him do so; if he can’t thenwith his tongue (bi-lisanihi); if he can’t then with [or in] his heart (bi-qalbihi),which is the bare minimum or faith.’2

This tradition is at the heart of extensive discussions of ‘commanding right andforbidding wrong’ that range across the entire spectrum of Muslim scholastic tradi-tions. In tracing the history of its interpretation, Cook places considerable importanceon the role of Abu Hamid al-Ghazali (d. 1111) and his influential re-framing ofdiscussions of the concept within a decidedly ‘activist’ mode (2000: 427–459). Cook(2000: 507) argues that the salience of al-Ghazali’s invigorated stance on the impor-tance of this duty has become “even more pronounced in modern times,” particularlywith regard to the continuing appeal of al-Ghazali’s reading of the ‘three modes’tradition to modern fundamentalists such as Sa`id Hawwa, Ali Belhadj and Khalid b.

1 For discussions of the dramatic changes in contemporary Acehnese society, see: Daly et al. (2012).2 This tradition is related in the Sunan of Abu Dawud, Nasa’i and Bayhaqi, among other sources. For afuller discussion of this tradition in its various versions as transmitted through Islamic tradition, see Cook(2000: 33ff).

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`Uthman al-Sabt (Cook 2000: 507–508, 526). At the same time, however, Cookmakes it clear that there are also divergent interpretations that have proved compel-ling to other exponents of modern Islamic revivalism.

In his discussion of the work of Sayyid Qutb, Cook (2000: 528) writes, “It mustseem paradoxical that it is precisely one of the most radical of fundamentalist visionsthat has gone furthest in modern times towards voiding the duty of the individual toforbid wrong.” What makes the difference for Qutb is the importance he places onhaving a supra-individual sanction for ‘commanding right and forbidding wrong.’ ForQutb, only someone in legitimate authority can ‘command’ and ‘forbid’—and thisrequires the existence of a ‘genuine’ Muslim community: “A Muslim society isindeed one that enables a Muslim to devote himself to forbidding wrong, withouthis attempts being reduced to pointless gestures or made impossible altogether as inthe case in the Jahili societies that exist today.” Cook (2000: 529) is careful to statethat the view espoused here by Qutb in which a broader conception of total socialtransformation must take precedence over individual activist initiatives to deal withparticular cases of wrongdoing is by no means ‘standard fundamentalist doctrine.’ Itdoes, however, open up a much broader field for discussion of the idea of forbiddingwrong among those engaged with activist modes of modern Muslim thought. Indeed,it is precisely this range of views on the role of the state vis-à-vis the individual in‘commanding right and forbidding wrong’ that is central in much of the materialdiscussed here: SMS messages published in the popular daily newspaperMetro Aceh.

With the ending of armed conflict between the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) andthe Indonesian government, and the opening of the province to visitors of all kindssince early 2005, the Acehnese have been introduced to a diverse range of new ideasby activists and institutions from elsewhere in Indonesia and beyond. Since then,Aceh has become increasingly open to a wide range of outside influences, includingan increasingly contested range of contemporary interpretations of Islam. This hascontributed to a lively development of public discussions of a wider range of socialissues, in which participants draw on an often eclectic array of sources in support oftheir various arguments. In the SMS messages that will be discussed below there areno explicit references to the work of Qutb, Hawwa, or any other sources. In fact, thevery form of the digital text message implicitly discourages any kind of footnoting orother documentation of sources. Nevertheless, these short texts on shari`a and societyecho arguments from the debates of Islamic scholars of the medieval and modernperiods, and are thus framed broadly within parameters recognizable from the realmof more specialist discussions of religious law and moral responsibility. On a moreproximate level, the general contours of the discourse contained in these short textsalso reflect general points along the broad spectrum of such contemporary Islamicinterpretations that circulate in the form of sermons, handbills and the programsadministered by various branches of the state’s new Islamic bureaucracies in Aceh.

Shari`a institutions in the ‘Special Autonomous Region’ of Aceh

The state implementation of shari`a law in contemporary Aceh facilitated the emergenceof new and contested expectations and activities in the pursuit of Islamic religious andsocial ideals. After Indonesia initiated its ‘Reformasi’ decentralization process in 1999,

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Acehwas granted the authority to formally implement Islamic law in the province.3 LawNo.44/1999 formally recognized the ‘Special Status of the Province of Aceh SpecialRegion’ in the fields of religion, education, and customary law (adat), and LawNo.18/2001 conferred (at least in principle if not in practice) broader powers of self-governance to the province in the fields of religion, governance, economics, security anddefense. This made it possible to develop more vigorous shari`a regulations by allowingthe local legislative assembly to move forward with working out the details of newlegislation (qanun), including those defining the new institutions by which the shari`awould be implemented (Ichwan 2007: 219–222).4

The first piece of substantive Islamic legislation in Aceh’s twenty-first centuryshari`a system was passed in 2000. This law presents a vision of activist Islam inwhich the implementation of shari`a morality is viewed as essential to ensuringjustice and prosperity.5 More specifically related to the theme of ‘enjoining rightand forbidding wrong’, this law mandates that “Every citizen is responsible forundertaking and supporting the work of ‘al-amr bi’l-ma`ruf wa’l-nahy `an al-munkar’ to the extent of their ability to do so.”6 This general invocation of a powerfulIslamic ideal, combined with the ambiguity as to the specific forms of its observancemandated within this particular modern legal system, have served to re-inject con-temporary discourse in Aceh with keenly felt dynamic tensions that echo long-standing debates over this central moral tenet of Islam.7

Subsequent legislation has since moved in the direction of an even further level ofsymbolic state engagement with the particulars of Islamic belief and practice in Aceh.8

However, in terms of actual enforcement the most important Acehnese qanun have beenthree laws passed in 2003: No. 12 on the consumption of alcohol, No. 13 on gambling,and No. 14 on khalwat (“improper covert association” between members of the oppositesex).9 As the only new statements on the content of shari`a to be applied in Aceh to date,

3 For legislation on the implementation of Islamic law in contemporary Aceh, see: Himpunan Undang-Undang, Keputusan Presiden, Peraturan Daerah/Qanun, Instruksi Gubernor, Edaran Gubernor berkaitanPelaksanaan Syari`at Islam, 7th edition. Banda Aceh: Dinas Syari`at Islam.4 The first major pieces of legislation defining Aceh’s Shari`a institutions were: Peraturan Daerah ProvinsiNanggroe Aceh Darussalam No. 33/2001 tentang Susunan Organisasi dan Tata Kerja Dinas Syariat Islam;and Qanun Provinsi Nanggroe Darussalam No. 10/2002 tentang Peradilan Syariat Islam.5 For more on the activist and utilitarian vision informing Aceh’s contemporary Islamic legal system, see:Feener (in press).6 Peraturan Daerah Nomor 5 Tahun 2000 tentang Pelaksanaan Syariat Islam di Provinsi Daerah IstimewaAceh, IV.13.7 A broad range of these debates as they have taken shape in diverse Muslim historical contexts ismasterfully presented in (Cook 2000).8 Other laws along these lines include Qanun Provinsi Nanggroe Aceh Darussalam Nomor 11/Tahun 2002tentang Pelaksanaan Syari’at Islam Bidang Aqidah, Ibadah dan Syi’ar Islam, and Qanun No.12/2004tentang Kebudayaan Aceh. Qanun Provinsi Nanggroe Aceh Darussalam Nomor 23/2002 tentangPenyelenggaraan Pendidikan also contains provisions for Islamic education to be “based on the Qur’anand the Sunna,” while also subject to the stated objectives of the Indonesian national educational system.The most dramatic instance of such, however, has been a proposed code of Islamic criminal law known asthe Qanun Jinayat. This bill attracted global media attention to its hard-line stance on issues of sexualmorality, and in particular for its stipulation of the penalty of execution by stoning for convicted adulterers.While this bill was passed in the last hours of a lame-duck session of the provincial legislature in 2009, thegovernor of Aceh refused to sign the bill, and to this date it remains in effect a dead letter.9 This explanation of the term is borrowed from William Roff’s work on analogous developments ofregulating Islamic morality in the Malay Peninsula (2009: 98).

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these have been the focus of most of the new activities of the shari`a courts and othernew, or newly reformulated, institutions of Islamic law there.10 The shari`a bureaucracycomprises a number of distinct but inter-related bodies. In this system, the State Shari`aAgency (Dinas Syariat Islam/DSI) performs coordinating functions in working with theother major institutions involved with the implementation of Islamic law in contempo-rary Aceh: the shari`a courts (Mahkamah Syariah/MS), the Ulama Council (MajlisPermusyawaratan Ulama/MPU), the ‘shari`a police’ (Wilayatul Hisbah/WH).

The shari`a courts (Mahkamah Syariah)

Like other areas of Indonesia, Aceh has long had an operative system of Islamicreligious courts tasked with ruling on divorce and other matters.11 Under the midtwentieth-century Darul Islam movement in Aceh, these courts laid claim to a broaderjurisdiction.12 In 2002, Aceh’s religious courts were redefined as Pengadilan SyariatIslam through Qanun No.10/2002, which also, at least in theory, restored some widerjurisdiction to Aceh’s shari`a courts. However, the major changes in Aceh’s religiouscourts came in 2003 when a Presidential Decision under President MegawatiSukarnoputri (No.11/2003) and a Decision from the head of the IndonesianSupreme Court (KMA/070/SK/X/2004) renamed the courts as Mahkamah Syariahand transferred jurisdiction over these courts from the Ministry of Religious Affairs tothe Indonesian Supreme Court as part of the “one roof” (satu atap) policy (Lindsey etal. 2007: 251).

The 2006 Law on Governing Aceh (UU No. 11/ LOGA) affirmed most of thesearrangements that established Aceh’s new shari`a courts as part of the broaderIndonesian national system, providing for cassation and review of shari`a courtdecisions by the Indonesian Supreme Court. Under these arrangements, funding,technical support for and administrative authority over Aceh’s shari`a courts continueto come from the Indonesian Supreme Court in Jakarta. Thus in terms of their actualday-to-day operation, Aceh’s shari`a courts appear to be little different from Islamiccourts in other Indonesian provinces. The vast majority of the cases before the courtcontinue to be related to divorce, followed in number by inheritance—and these casesare generally decided according to rules and norms commonly found in the decisionsof religious courts elsewhere in Indonesia. To date, cases involving gambling, alcoholconsumption and khalwat in 2006–2007 have never amounted to a significant portionof the shari`a courts’ caseload, and all across Aceh there has been a sharp decrease inthe number of cases involving these offenses since 2008.13

The Ulama Council (Majlis Permusyawaratan Ulama/MPU)

Aceh’s Ulama Council is the oldest state-affiliated body of its kind in Indonesia, andin fact in its original formulation in 1965 served as the model for the nationalIndonesian Council of Ulama (Majelis Ulama Indonesia/MUI) when that was later

10 The courts have had far fewer cases related to the subsequent Qanun No.7/2004 on Zakat.11 For an overview of the development of the earlier development of these institutions, see: Lev (1972).12 For an overview of the Darul Islam movement in Aceh, see: van Dijk (1981: 269–339).13 Statistics compiled by Muhammad Yusuf, Panitera/ Sekretaris Mahkamah Syari`iyah Aceh, 5 June 2009.

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founded by Suharto in 1975. In its current form, Aceh’s Ulama Council (MPU) wasestablished through Regional Regulation (PerDa) 3/2000, which strengthened theexisting provincial ulama council and restored its original name.14 Its definition andadditional powers were later confirmed by the 2006 Law on Governing Aceh(LOGA), which stipulates that the MPU is to be composed of both ulama and‘Muslim intellectuals.’ This diversity of members reflects political considerationson both the local and national levels, and it has also been one of the biggestchallenges to the institution’s effectiveness in defining the shari`a agenda for theAcehnese government.

The MPU is given, at least on paper, a very powerful position in the new legalorder of Acehnese society. As the LOGA states, Aceh’s Ulama Council is positionedto be an equal partner with the provincial government and is supposed to be deeplyinvolved in the processes of conceptualizing and drafting legislation. The MPU islikewise invested with the right to issue fatwas—whether solicited or not—on mattersof government, development, economy and social development (LOGA 140.1a). Todate, however, the MPU has been unable to exercise all of these powers and in facthas faced some considerable obstacles in terms of internal fractiousness, competitionfor influencing policy, and in terms of resources and facilities.

The ‘shari`a police’ (Wilayatul Hisbah/WH)

Perhaps the most commented upon new shari`a institution in contemporary Aceh hasbeen the Wilayutal Hisbah (WH), which is often referred to in English-languagediscussions as Aceh’s ‘shari`a police.’ When the WH was first established, it onlyoperated in and around Banda Aceh. By late 2006, however, WH had establishedoffices at the district level (kabupaten) across the province. The WH was first createdthrough the enactment of Regional Regulation No.5/2000, and further defined insections of Qanun No.11/2002, where its officers are invested with the authority to‘reprimand’ (tegur) and ‘advise’ (nasehat) those caught violating the shari`a asdefined by Acehnese qanun (VI.14). The WH does not, however, have the authorityto formally charge or detain alleged offenders and thus must work together with thecivil police and the public prosecutor’s office in order to bring a case to the IslamicCourts.

According to Qanun No.11/2002, the WH can be organized and deployed at alllevels of provincial administration down to that of the village (gampong) level(VI.14(1)). However, this kind of reach has proven impossible to achieve due tothe chronic and acute shortage of resources allocated to them. Indeed, for the past twoyears the WH has faced considerable problems in both hiring new staff and payingthe salaries of those already employed. To cope with their manifest inability to handlethe enforcement of Aceh’s shari`a laws on their own, the WH have also begunworking on new models of cooperation with village level officials (geucik/imeummeunasah) and of adat institutions to handle local infractions of the qanun. Theability—or lack thereof—of the WH to carry out its mandate in the enforcement of

14 Aspects of its redefined activities and the workings of its administration were further elaborated in LawNo.43/2001 and Qanun No.9/2003.

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shari`a regulations on issues of public morality is thus one of the most frequentlydiscussed institutions in the Acehnese public sphere.

Metro Aceh: Low-brow tabloid in a shari`a state

The formal institutions of Aceh’s shari`a legal system have obviously faced consid-erable challenges that have comprised their effectiveness. This has led to heateddiscussions of both the ideals and pragmatic realities of implementing Islamic law inthe popular media. Here I will explore these debates as they are elaborated in thepages of Metro Aceh, a thin daily noted for its dramatic color photos and vividheadlines blaring news of crime and sex scandals. It is a relatively new publication,part of an explosion of popular media in Indonesia that followed the easing ofcensorship laws during the post-Suharto Reformasi period. Metro Aceh itself firstgrew out of another popular daily, Rakyat Aceh. Rakyat Aceh began to appear in theNorth Aceh town of Lhokseumawe in January 2005, just weeks after a massivetsunami had leveled the provincial capital at Banda Aceh. It is a relatively standardtype of Indonesian newspaper and projects a modicum of mainstream respectability.Its sister publication Metro Aceh, on the other hand, is deliberately aimed at a lower-brow audience. This is evident in both the selection of what it publishes, andparticularly in the language used, which the editorial staff itself describes as verydirect (blasblasan) and even ‘vulgar’. Metro Aceh was the first daily of its kind toappear in Aceh, and to introduce this new product to the market, it was firstdistributed in January 2008 as a free insert to all copies of Rakyat Aceh. Todayreaders of Rakyat Aceh continue to receive Metro Aceh for free, and vice-versa thosewho buy or subscribe specifically toMetro Aceh get Rakyat Aceh along with it—for atotal daily circulation of 8,000 copies each (Editorial Staff).

Each edition of Metro Aceh contains, among other things, a full-page sectionentitled ‘Metro Obis’ that is dedicated to celebrity gossip about both Indonesianand international figures—mostly about love affairs, breakups, and the like. Themasthead logo for this section features silhouettes of two shapely women with looseflowing hair, and the celebrity page is always heavily illustrated with at least a halfdozen photos, almost exclusively of female models, actresses and singers (Fig. 1).The vast majority of them appear without any form of Islamic head-covering andoften in sleeveless dresses, short skirts, tight pants, in short, just about every

ILLUSTRATION 1:

Masthead for Metro Aceh’s ‘Celebrity Gossip’ sectionFig. 1 Masthead for Metro Aceh’s ‘Celebrity Gossip’ section

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infraction of Aceh’s contemporary shari`a dress code one might imagine. It isobviously a popular section with readers, and it manages at times to balance itsprovocative photo imagery with occasional and rather insipid moral messages. Allthis occurs in the center of a daily newspaper whose colorful front-page is almostinvariably splashed with tales of sex scandals, drug trafficking and bizarre cases ofviolent crime.

The focus of this article will be on the page printed on the reverse of this celebritygossip section—a daily feature under the rubric ‘Aspirasi’. It is a daily feature takingup most of page six, where approximately 20 SMS are printed in between sidecolumns of another kind of text message —personal ads for women seeking men(cewek cari cowok) and men seeking women (cowok cari cewek). The terms usedhere for ‘men’ (cowok) and ‘women’ (cewek), it should be noted, are not the standardformal Indonesian terms for men and women, but rather taken from the repertoire ofthe (Jakarta) urban slang popular in media directed toward Indonesian youth (bahasagaul). This demographically marked usage is indicative of Metro Aceh’s position in abroader stream of Indonesian popular culture as opposed to a more self-consciouslyIslamist cultural sphere.15 Indeed the language and tone of many such ads could beconsidered scandalous by some local moralists; for example, a 12 December 2009posting by a 35-year old childless widow who ends her sms message with the words“dijamin ashyik” (‘good time guaranteed’). The pages ofMetro Aceh are thus a spaceof considerable moral ambiguity in the public sphere of a province under an evolvingcontemporary Islamic legal regime.

Aspirasi: Virtual tongues in a new public sphere

The daily Aspirasi section presents us with one of the most vibrant and internallydiverse discursive spaces on issues of religion and law anywhere in contemporaryAceh (Fig. 2). Each day, the Aspirasi page contains a number of postings on issuesrelated to shari`a implementation and Islamic morality, conveying widely divergentpositions in a space characterized by the free intermingling of conversations on abroad range of religious and more worldly issues. The editorial staff of Metro Acehinsists that they are not trying to shape public opinion (“bukan mencoba membentukopini”) and maintain that they only want to show the reality that the shari`a system isnot yet universally embraced by all of Acehnese society. Its various members do,nevertheless, seem to share in the widespread opinion that the state shari`a regulationshave tended to be disproportionately applied to the ‘lower and marginal classes’.16

There is then a pronounced populism to the overall tone of Metro Aceh—a sense thatits work is one of facilitating the ability of common people to ‘speak truth to power’.This notion is, of course, a significant part of traditional Muslim conversations aboutthe mode of commanding right and forbidding wrong ‘with the tongue’. Cook (2000:512–513) has noted a long-established connection between this duty and Muslim

15 Najib Kailani has remarked how in some contemporary Indonesian Islamist publications ‘secular slang’terms (bahasa gaul) have come to be replaced with Arabic-derived neologisms such as ikhwan and akhwat(2008).16 Interview with the Editorial Staff of Metro Aceh, 21 October 2009 at Lhokseumawe.

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conceptions of ‘freedom of expression’ as well as some modern extensions of thesediscussions in terms of a moral obligation for journalists. The editors of Metro Aceh,however, do not express their position in Islamic religious terms. What they do statethat they are doing is rather to create a space in which Muslim individuals espousingdiverse views can express the aspirations of their heart’s desire via the new ‘mode’ ofthe handphone.

They insist that there is no process of censorship involved in their production ofthis digital-age update of the ‘letters to the editor’ section. The only conditions,

ILLUSTRATION 2:

A sample page of Metro Aceh’s daily ‘SMS to the Editor’ sectionFig. 2 A sample page of Metro Aceh’s daily ‘SMS to the Editor’ section

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printed clearly on the top of each daily issue, are that the messages containinglibelous accusations or disparaging comments on any racial, ethnic or religious groupwill not be published. As long as a posting meets those minimum requirements it willbe printed as-is, as Metro Aceh takes a hands-off approach to the texts of SMS.17 Theonly change that the editors claim to make is to obscure the last four digits of theoriginal phone number to protect the anonymity of the person who sent it. This, theysay, encourages people to express themselves more freely. There have reportedly beencases in which state officials have contacted Metro Aceh demanding that the editorsrelease the contact details of those who sent in messages critical of their departments.However they maintain that they have always ‘protected’ (melindungi) those whosent such messages and instead of turning over their numbers, they simply agree toprovide space for any offended party to publish a note of response or ‘clarification’ inthe next day’s issue.

Text messages and social movements

There is an expanding literature on the social impact of SMS technology, including abody of work on the role of this new medium in mobilizing popular participation inpolitical movements.18 Digital technology like the mobile phone are now viewed asfacilitating new conceptions of collective social action in which people “are able toact in concert even if they don’t know each other” (Rheingold 2003: xii). Thepremiere case of this has been that of the role played by mobile phones in themobilization of the mass demonstrations leading to the toppling of Philippine pres-ident Joseph Estrada in 2001 (Pertrierra et al. 2002). Commenting on these develop-ments, Vicente Rafael (2005: 287) has called attention to the ambiguity of the SMSmediasphere, in which the politics of this new media “reveals the unstable workingsof Filipino middle-class sentiments” while facilitating contrasting trends for both thechallenging and reinforcement of established social order. Over the decade since then,mobile phone and SMS technology have played powerful roles in mass politicalaction in countries ranging from South Korea to Spain, India and the United States(Castells et al. 2007; Jeffrey and Doron 2012). In Aceh itself, this technology has alsoplayed a critical role in the conflict between the Free Aceh Movement (GAM), andthe central Indonesian government. As one senior figure in that movement onceboasted to an interviewer, “GAM was the first group that led a war via SMS”(Missbach 2012: 87). The technologies were used in ways that reflected aspects ofthe diverse social contexts in which they were deployed. In all of these cases,however, the mobilization of political sentiment was largely, if not exclusively, acrossdigital networks – and thus generally bypassed more established forms of communi-cation, including the popular press.

In what follows, I would like to call attention to a previously under-studiedphenomenon in which digital mobile communication in the form of text messages

17 Because of the sheer volume of messages received, however, there can sometimes be a backlog ofbetween two to five days before a message appears in print.18 For an introduction to the design, language and social dynamics of SMS technology, see Harper et al.(2005). For an overview of the early history of ‘texting’, see Ling (2004: 145–149).

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moves beyond an interpersonal mode of communication and into the broader publicsphere with the print publication of text messages from readers on the pages ofpopular newspapers in contemporary Indonesia. This combination of old and newcommunications technologies creates a unique space for public discourse, and pre-sents us with an unprecedented new field in which to observe the formation anddevelopment of contemporary Muslim debates on Islamic law and other social issues.The format for this new arena of discourse presents a remarkable new arena for socialengagement - combining aspects of individual digital communication, network for-mation, and the more familiar form of a print-culture public sphere in ways that fitdistinctive social and market niches within Aceh. In this they bring together diversesegments of its rapidly evolving public sphere in ways that might also prove potentfor other developing societies, although to date such conjunctions of these ‘old’ and‘new’ media have yet to receive adequate scholarly attention.

SMSing on Shari`a and society

To provide a sense of the issues discussed and the range of views expressed asAspirasi each day in Metro Aceh, I will present here a selection of texts on variousissues related to the ideas and realities of Aceh’s current shari`a regime. These sixteenexamples were chosen as representative texts for key points along a range of the mostfrequently expressed opinions on Islamic law and legal institutions in Aceh.19 In themwe see striking examples of contemporary Muslims taking on a host of perceivedsocial ills, as well as the policies and practices of particular government agenciesestablished for the implementation of shari`a in Acehnese society.

Each day on page 6, readers can rapidly read through dozens of short statements ofradically different opinions on such fundamental issues as the role of the state inenforcing public morality. For example, the Aspirasi page for Wednesday, 3December 2008 presents us with both calls for government officials to pay moreattention to enforcement of shari`a by-laws regulating aspects of public morality:

Hey, my brothers holding power in Nanggroe Aceh Darussalam, please payattention to the shari`a here. There are so many violations of shari`a norms –especially in ‘tourist areas’.

As well as direct calls for the state apparatus of shari`a enforcement to give up ontheir efforts to enforce regulations on women’s headscarves and tight clothing:

To the WH and Shari`a Agency, no need to bust those with tight pants orwithout headscarves. They’re just caught up in the modern culture on TV. Will

19 The materials discussed here represent my attempt at drawing a representative selection from overfourteen months of daily columns that were collected for me by Mahdi Syihab and his colleagues at thePasee Institute of Research (PIR) in Lhokseumawe. Reading through this material it has become clear thatmany of the messages posted in the Aspirasi section repeat not only the sentiments, but also sometimes theexact wording of earlier texts. In some cases these come from what may be the same phone number, but notalways. Thus in a number of cases I have found nearly identical messages reprinted over a series of severalmonths.

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you chase them out of Aceh? They’re Indonesian citizens—can’t do that, sir!Mind your own business with the family at home.

With this last sentence we have a reflection of a strikingly direct tone of rebuketoward those who would impose their own preferred visions Islamic morality upontheir fellow citizens, as well as a sharp sense of distinction between public and privatespheres in relation to the coercive enforcement of Islamic morality.

Sharp criticism of governmental institutions and the individuals employed by themare common in the SMS messages printed as aspirasi each day. Many issues (forexample, that of 7 October 2009) publish complaints launched against the police aswell as demands for other sectors of the civil service to address issues under theirmandate, including such things as the need to improve and maintain the physicalinfrastructure of roads and drainage systems. The general tone of dissatisfaction withgovernment officials is concisely and compellingly expressed in an SMS messageprinted on 1 November 2009:

OH GOD, OPEN THE HEARTS OF OUR GOVERNMENT OFFICIALS sothey can understand how hard it is for the ‘little people’… (1 November 2009).

There is a pronounced tone of moralism to these complaints about the performanceof the state apparatus in contemporary Aceh. This becomes even more pointedlyexpressed when the topic of discussion has to do with the institutions of the newshari`a bureaucracy—something that is a common feature to every single daily pageof Aspirasi. Sometimes, though rarely, these are claims that both the substantivecontent of shari`a by-laws and the role of the state in coercively enforcing them arewrong:

You can’t force women to wear headscarves! Only if they uncover their privateparts, do you have to force them to cover up! Awoman’s hair is her crown! If shewants to go to hell or to heaven, leave her to it. Why make a fuss and throw awaythe people’s money? Let’s take care of our own families first (13 November 2009).

Much more common, however, are criticisms of particular institutions that do notquestion the authority of the shari`a system, but rather the way in which its rules areenforced. Frequent criticisms include assertions that WH officers behave ‘arrogantly’(arogan), as well as accusations of hypocrisy and moral laxity upon those whose jobit is to enforce public morality in line with shari`a norms:

THE SHARI`AVIOLATED BY OFFICIALS

…Lots of local officials violate the shari`a. We often see them going to sleep atmotels during working hours and flirting with other men’s wives. The WH dothe same—putting on airs of religious learning while they are actually evenmore of a problem than civil servants (14 October 2009).

Criticism along these lines also often includes calls for individual introspection inthose who would work to impose their own visions of shari`a morality upon others:

You in the State Shari`a Agency ‘inspect’ others because of Islam, but I amsurprised, have you ever ‘inspected’ your own heart, your own words, or evenyour own sincerity with regard to the shari`a (13 October 2009).

Cont Islam

Statements of such views at times also contain sarcastic accusations againstparticular government officials:

JUST WEAR A SARUNG

For the Regent of West Aceh, just order all citizens in your Regency to wearsarungs. It would then be as if we are all ‘Islamic’. Does your own family trulycarry out the shari`a? (3 November 2009).20

One can even find occasional threats to take physical action against corrupt WHofficers:

Peace be upon you, respected officers of the WH. I only want to ask that youwatch and control your own children. Who would want to listen to the WH ifyou yourselves violated the shari`a? If you don’t act yourselves on this, then wewill have to interfere to stop those WH officers who go around with theirgirlfriends night and day—and even worse go together to ‘isolated places’ (30November 2008).

Such invocations of the possibility of individual Muslims to forbid wrong withtheir own hands are relatively rare in these transcripts of virtual tongues. Theirpresence within the broader discourse, however, signals the continued resonance ofclassical Islamic injunctions in public discourses on law and morality in contempo-rary Muslim societies.

A more frequent trope in these messages is found in appeals to make sure thatshari`a by-laws are applied fairly across all sectors of Acehnese society, with dailyrepeated expressions of the common perception that sanctions are rarely, if ever,applied to government officials and wealthy individuals.

STONING FOR EVERYONE

Peace be upon you, I ask to our legislative representatives that before carryingout the penalty of stoning on ‘the people’ that the Legislative Assembly firstissue a formal statement that if members of your families violate the law thatthey will also be held to the laws that are in place (3 November 2009).

The daily criticism and complaints are sharp and myriad, but they share the pagewith other postings enthusiastically supporting the work of the state shari`a apparatus.Messages of this type sympathize with the work of the WH:

THE WH FOR ‘GOOD’

Why is it that so many in Aceh don’t like the WH, when in fact the WH onlydoes good? Like when someone says ‘Just mind your own business’—that’s

20 The particular reference here is to Ramli MS, the Regent (Bupati) of West Aceh who has made name forhimself through his campaign to implement Shari`a morality in the area under his jurisdiction by morevigorous enforcement of what he views to be ‘proper Islamic dress’ regulations for women—most notablyby his public pronouncements that any woman caught wearing tight trousers will be confronted by the WHand provided with a loose skirt (sarung) to provide proper coverage. This is such an important public issuefor Ramli that he has recently promulgated a new special regional regulation on the matter of ‘Islamic dress’for his Regency (Peraturan Bupati Aceh Barat No. 5/2010 tentang Penegakan Syari`at Islam dalamPemakaian Busana Islami di Kabupaten Aceh Barat).

Cont Islam

wrong. You must understand that the WH is for you and in the service of allsociety (19 October 2009).

Others thank them for working to fight against social ills:

I SALUTE THE WH

Peace be upon you. To the officers of the WH: I truly salute you because youhave arrested adulterers. Thank you (7 October, 2009).

Those who do write in support of the WH not only endorse their current work, butsometimes also actively encourage the further expansion of their role in Acehnesesociety:

RAIDS TO MAKE ACEH MORE ISLAMIC

I salute the officers of the WH in Bireuen who strive to implement the shari`a byapprehending hundreds of Acehnese women not dressed in an appropriatelyIslamic way. We hope that this is not just a fleeting exercise that will notcontinue. The violators of the shari`a by-laws are not just the women in tightclothing, but also lots of others including men who do not attend Friday prayers,as well as the many brothels operating under the cover of ‘salons’, and thecontinuing close association between unmarried couples. We want all of theseproblems acted upon in the hope of making Aceh truly Islamic (12 October2009).

This includes suggestions of new programs:

DON’T JUST BLAME THE WH

My suggestion to the people of Aceh is that we shouldn’t keep criticizing theWH, give them a break! How great it would be if we could form WH corps inthe villages under the direction of local religious leaders (imam meunasah),who would be supported by other local officer to prohibit village girls fromwearing tight clothes when they go out… (5 November 2009).

Sometimes this even extends to specific ‘tip-offs’ mentioning places where somethink the WH should be stepping up their patrols. Other supporters suggest expandingthe mandate and activities of the WH to get at the roots of perceived social ills:

WH Officers, please don’t just conduct raids on those wearing tight clothing,but it would be better if you also raided those who sell the tight clothing in thefirst place. This would be better, because if there were nonesuch on sale, then noone would be able to buy them (28 November 2008).

The subjects of tight clothing and loose morals is a constant theme of discussionon the daily pages of Aspirasi, with regular laments over the current state of Aceh’syouth, under such subject lines as ‘Young Acehnese Women are Too Free’ (RemajaPutri Aceh Terlampau Bebas, 23 October 2009). For example:

To the respected officers of the WH in the area of Sigli, Pidie: Do you no longerhave any teeth in apprehending those who violate the shari`a in Sigli, where thelifestyle of young women is increasingly secular, no longer reflecting the values

Cont Islam

of ‘Eastern’ culture? They freely sway their hips, walking around as if on acatwalk. They wear tight clothing and there are even some who go about withtheir heads uncovered (14 October 2009).

Postings that echo this sense of moral panic see the situation as dire, and someeven advocate further extensions of laws and more severe sanctions to addressproblems ranging from adultery to terrorism (13 November 2009).

Some supporters of the current shari`a system in Aceh appear to give absolutely noquarter to opposition:

LOOK FOR ANOTHER WORLD

The shari`a is the law revealed by God, not the creation of human beings.Whoever does not support it should just leave this world created by God. Goand find another world for yourself. Please print this inMetro Aceh (29 October2009).

Despite such extreme rhetoric, advocates of such positions are unable even to keepcritical voices off the very page on which they are printed. Instead they findthemselves forced to share a highly contested public space with those holdingradically different views on the state management of shari`a in Acehnese society.

State shari`a and the public sphere in contemporary Aceh

The diverse views expressed on page six of Metro Aceh each day involve contem-porary Muslim aspirations for justice, as well as significant reservations about theability of the state apparatus to realize them. Paying attention to such voices in under-studied sources of this kind can provide us with a window onto the micro-dynamicsof popular Acehnese debates on Islam, and presents a striking example of the widerange of opinions on shari`a and the state currently being expressed by Muslims theretoday.

With the ending of armed conflict, Aceh became for the first time able to enjoy thenew freedoms of post-Suharto Indonesia.21 This allowed local newspapers, maga-zines and broadcast media to flourish, and facilitated the emergence of hotlycontested debates on a wide range of social, legal, and political issues. This newwave of popular publications also included innovative combinations of digital andprint media that allowed for new dynamics of engagement with the public sphere byincreasingly wider sectors of society. Inviting SMS messages to be printed on thepages of daily newspapers significantly lowered the bar for participation in printdebates over the current state and future direction of Acehnese society. This, in turn,had the effect of allowing for a new proliferation of voices, often very direct in theirforms of expression, to enter into the public sphere.

These technological and cultural innovations came at a particularly poignant timein Aceh, when debates over religion and law were taking on powerful new valencesin the context of broader conversations on the rebuilding of Acehnese society after

21 For a stimulating collection of studies on diverse reconfigurations of media and politics in post-SuhartoIndonesia, see: Sen and Hill 2011.

Cont Islam

the twin traumas of war and natural disaster. In the process many Acehnese becameactively engaged in wide-ranging public discussions of the moral and legal founda-tions of their society. Since 2005, this rhetoric of radical reconstruction spread acrossAceh, far beyond the coastal areas affected by the tsunami. Combined with theeuphoric discourses surrounding the dawn of a new peace in a region long plaguedby violent conflict, there emerged a pervasive sense of the possibility of creating a‘new Aceh’ that would transform the lives of a people who had suffered so much warand devastation. This sense was reflected in the motto of the special governmentoffice established to coordinate reconstruction: ‘Build back better’ (BRR 2006).

The idea of ‘building back better’ was, however, understood in different ways byvarious parties in Aceh, and just what this new and improved Aceh might look likewas a subject of extensive debate in the newly energized public sphere.22 Many of theresources of state agencies were concentrated on physical reconstruction and eco-nomic development. On the other hand, the great influx of NGOs and foreign aidorganizations into post-disaster/post-conflict Aceh brought other perspectives andconcerns to these conversations—often emphasizing issues such as how restoringlivelihoods and economic development could contribute to the promotion of broadersocial improvements toward human rights, gender justice, and democratization. Atthe same time, other sectors of the local community put forward a diverse range ofreligious responses to the experience of disaster and the challenges to remake society(Feener 2012: 282–284). While some religious leaders advanced views that echoedthose of the secular government agencies and NGOs about the opportunity that thesecrises presented for building a new society, others saw the presence of outsideagencies deployed in Aceh for this work as a threat, and appealed to visions ofshari`a as a bulwark against cultural pollution and moral contamination.

The vision of Islamic law and its role in the remaking of post-tsunami/post-conflictAceh promoted by those who have designed, created and implemented the province’sIslamic legal system have been the subject of extensive treatment elsewhere (Feenerin press). Their efforts have, however, not met with the success to which thesearchitects and agents of state shari`a in Aceh have aspired. Rather, their pretensionsto directing social transformation through the formal application of Islamic law havebeen significantly challenged from various sectors of the broader community. Oneplace in which the extent and intensity of contestation over the official ideals andexisting institutions of state shari`a in Aceh can be clearly seen is in the pages of SMSmessages published daily in Acehnese newspapers, including Metro Aceh.

Free, vibrant, and direct debate on issues of Islamic law is not something generallyassociated with societies in which the state has formalized the implementation ofshari`a. The material presented here, however, is a striking example of the complexityand contestation of popular discourses on Islamic law and society well beyond therealm of specialist spokesmen. These short digital messages, widely circulatedthrough the popular print media, demonstrate significant aspects of the diversity ofpopular Muslim discourse in just such a setting – one in which the application ofreligious law by the coercive structures of a modern state has clearly not been able tocleanse the public sphere of what Armando Salvatore has referred to as its “inherent

22 For an attempt at dealing with the connotations of this slogan in relief and development circles workingin Aceh, see: Kennedy et al. 2008.

Cont Islam

pluralism and agonism” (2007: 249). Instead there one finds debates about theinstitutional form and substantive legislation of the Islamic legal system adding toan already heady mix of other visions of what it would mean to build a better society– a ‘new Aceh’. Participants in these debates are, moreover, locked into mutualengagement at many levels of social discourse. Sources such as those explored in thispaper can help us to better appreciate the ways in which dramatic juxtapositions ofopinion on issues of religion and law regularly appear in shared spaces accessible tonon-specialists, extending well beyond academics, activists, and the professionallyreligious.

Acknowledgments I would like to thank Merle Ricklefs, Patrick Daly, Anthony Johns, Marion Katz,Janet Steele, Robin Jeffrey, Susanne Dahlgren and Samuli Schielke for their helpful comments on earlierdrafts. I am also grateful to Hongyan Li for her help with editing and formatting this article for publication.I, of course, am solely responsible for any and all faults that remain in this published version. This workwas undertaken partially with the support of the Singapore Ministry of Education’s Academic ResearchFund (MOE AcRF no. R-110-000-029-750).

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