Problems, Challenges and Prospects of Indonesian Muslim Community in Sydney for Promoting Tolerance

Ahmad Muttaqin,Firdaus Wajdi,Achmad Zainal Arifin

doi:10.15294/komunitas.v8i2.5971

Abstract

This paper elucidates a map of Indonesian Muslim communities around Sydney in order to observe the possibility to promote a moderate and tolerance of Indonesian Islam worldwide. Indonesian Muslims who live in Australia are relatively small if we consider that we are the closer neighbor of Australia and have the biggest Muslim populations in the world. Most Indonesian Muslim communities in Sydney are in a form of kelompok pengajian (Islamic study group), which is commonly based on ethnicity, regionalism (province and regency), and religious affiliation with Indonesian Islamic groups. The main problems of Indonesian Muslim communities in Sydney are an ambiguous identity, laziness integration, and dream to home country. Most Indonesian Muslim diaspora in Sydney only consider Australia as the land for making money. Therefore, their inclusion to Australian community is just being Indonesian Muslim in Australia and it seems hard for them to be Australian Muslim, especially in the case of those who already changed to be Australian citizens. This kind of diaspora attitude differs from Muslims Diasporas from the Middle East and South Asia countries who are mostly ready to be fully Australian Muslim.Naturally, most Indonesian Muslim communities put their emphasis to develop their community based on social needs and try to avoid political idea of Islamism. In this case, the Indonesian government, through the Indonesian Consulate in Sydney, has great resources to promote moderate and tolerant views of Indonesian Islam to other Muslim communities, as well as to Western media. In optimizing resources of Indonesian Muslim communities in Sydney to envoy Indonesian cultures and policies, it is necessary for Indonesian government to have a person with integrated knowledge on Islamic Studies who are working officially under the Indonesian consulate in Sydney. It is based on the fact that most Indonesian Muslim communities needs a patron from the government to manage and soften some differences among them, especially related to problems of identities, as well as to link them with the wider Australian communities.

Highlights

Islam in Australia has a long historical pro‐ cess
Unlike Indonesian Muslim commu‐ nities those are the representation of Mus‐ lim organization in Indonesia and those are based on ethnicity, profession or hobby which are all still fond of promoting Indone‐ sia values and ideology, the group affiliated to the trans-national Islamic movement, the Hizbut Tahrir (HT) for example, tend to avoid their Indone‐ sian identity and prefer promoting new kind of Islamism based on Caliphate system
Indonesian Muslims who live in Australia are relatively small if we consider that we are the closer neighbor of Australia and have the biggest Muslim populations in the world

Summary

Introduction

Islam in Australia has a long historical pro‐ cess. Islam had been known before the Wes‐ tern people settled in Australia. 170 Ahmad Muttaqin, Problems, Challenges and Prospects of Indonesian Muslim Community in Sydney major theme for the second generation of Muslims in the West, including in Australia In this case, the issue of ethnicity seems to be more attractive for Australian researchers in discussing Islam. Farooqi(2006) demonstrates how the‐ se two aspects, developing social connection and transmitting values and norms, can be used to explore factors which drive network formation in relation to Muslim communi‐ ty development He further asserts that ‘Is‐ lamic social capital is the networking that helps to create the linkages,which in turn motivate people to follow up the Islamic conventions and norms’ such as the ideas of ‘social well-being,’ ‘brotherhood,’ ‘socioeconomic justice,’and the ‘continued deve‐ lopment of human potential’ (2006 p.114). To some extent, are common‐ ly seen by the White Australian as exclusive groups (Akbarzadeh & Saeed 2001; Saeed 2003)

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Findings

Conclusion