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In this volume, political scientists, religious scholars, legal theorists, and anthropologists examine the theory and practice of Indonesia's democratic transition and consider whether it can serve as a model for other Muslim countries. It looks at the events of 1998, when Indonesia's military government collapsed, igniting fears that economic, religious and political conflicts would complicate any democratic transition. It shows that, despite these concerns, in every year since 2006, the world's most populous Muslim country has received high marks from international democracy-ranking organizations. The book compares the Indonesian example with similar scenarios in Chile, Spain, India and Tunisia, as well as with the failed transitions of Yugoslavia, Egypt and Iran. The chapters explore the relationship between religion and politics and the ways in which Muslims became supportive of democracy even before change occurred. They also describe how innovative policies prevented dissident military groups, violent religious activists and secessionists from disrupting Indonesia's democratic evolution. The book concludes with a discussion of Indonesia's emerging “legal pluralism” and asks which of its forms are rights-eroding and which are rights-protecting.

This book provides an in-depth portrait of Afghanistan's recent elections as experienced by individuals and communities, and reveals how the elections have actively contributed to instability, undermining the prospects of democracy in Afghanistan. It shows how, since the invasion of the country in 2001, researchers, policymakers and the media have failed to consider the long-term implications of the country's post-conflict elections. The book is based on fieldwork in provinces across the country and interviews with more than seven hundred candidates, officials, community leaders and voters. The book merges political science with anthropology, and documents how political leaders, commanders and the new ruling elite have used elections to further their own interests and deprive local communities of access to political opportunities. It retraces presidential, parliamentary and provincial council elections over the past decade and exposes the role of international actors in promoting the polls as one-off events, detached from a broader political landscape. It shows how this approach to elections has allowed existing local powerholders to solidify their grip on resources and opportunities, derailing democratization processes and entrenching a deeper disengagement from central government. The book argues that Western powers need to re-evaluate their most basic assumptions about elections, democracy and international intervention if they are to prevent similar outcomes in the future.

Even well-established democracies need reform, and any successful effort to reform democracies must look beyond conventional institutions—elections, political parties, special interests, legislatures and their relations with chief executives—to do so. Expanding a traditional vision of the institutions of representative democracy, this book examines six aspects of political practice relating to the people being represented, the structure of those who make law and policy, and the links between those structures and the people. The book concludes with a discussion of where successful institutional reform needs to take place: we must pay attention to a democratic ordering of the constant reconfiguration of decision-making patterns; we must recognize the crucial role of information in deliberation; and we must incorporate noncitizens and foreigners into the political system, even when they are not the principal beneficiaries.

This book critically examines “tolerance,” “secularism,” and respect for religious “diversity” within a social and political system dominated by Sufi brotherhoods. Through a detailed analysis of Senegal's political economy, chapters here trace the genealogy and dynamic exchange among these concepts while investigating public spaces and political processes and their reciprocal engagement with the state, Sunni reformist and radical groups, and non-religious organizations. The book provides a rich and nuanced historical ethnography of the formation of Senegalese democracy, illuminating the complex trajectory of the Senegalese state and reflecting on similar postcolonial societies. Offering rare perspectives on the country's “successes” since liberation, the volume identifies the role of religion, gender, culture, ethnicity, globalization, politics, and migration in the reconfiguration of the state and society, and it makes a contribution to democratization theory, Islamic studies, and African studies.