The
Merdeka Center for Opinion Research has recently released a survey of Muslim youth in Indonesia and Malaysia. The study,
Values, Dreams, Ideals: Muslim Youth In Southeast Asia, reports on surveys conducted in October and November 2010 among young people age 15 to 25. A portion of the report deals with attitudes of those surveyed toward religion and government. Here is a portion of the report's conclusions:
While many of the respondents come from religious households and about half of them pursued an education in religious schools not all of them always observe their religious obligations like praying five times a day, fasting during the holy month of Ramadan and reciting prayers from the al-Qur’an. Muslim youth in Indonesia and Malaysia are not very different in this regard....
When it comes to polygamy, the majority of Muslim youths in Malaysia and Indonesia disagree with the act. In this regard, more women than men disagree with polygamy. More Indonesian youth disagree with polygamy (86.5%) compared with their Malaysian counterparts (72.7%).... Polygamy is a legal practice in Malaysia and Indonesia, but in Indonesia the overall public opinion towards it is highly negative, a notion reflected in the findings of this study....
The use of the headscarf has become a lot more widespread in recent years, especially in Malaysia, where the dressing habits of Muslim women have changed profoundly.... The wearing of the headscarf in Indonesia and Malaysia first became popular in the 1980s, a development some experts believe was an impact from the Iranian Revolution in 1979. However, the wearing of the headscarf over the past two and a half decades has become increasingly widespread. In Indonesia, the wearing of the headscarf particularly increased following the Reformation era.
... The headscarf has become the symbol of a woman’s Islamic identity. Even so, there are still many Muslim women in Indonesia and Malaysia who hold prominent positions but do not wear the headscarf. The same thing is true for many wives of senior officials and powerful businessmen.... Surprisingly, Malaysian respondents with a secondary school education are more liberal over the headscarf issue than university graduates or those with a diploma.
Malaysian Muslim youths are very clear in their preference for Shariah and Hudud law, despite their laxity in carrying out their religious obligations. Over 70% would rather follow Shariah law than the Federal Constitution. However, only 50% of Eastern Malaysian Muslim youth would condone such a choice....
A surprising finding is that the majority of Muslim youths in Malaysia and Indonesia agree to the imposition of Hudud punishments.... 71% of Malaysians and 50% of Indonesians urge the punishment of cutting off the hand of anyone found guilty as a thief; 92% of Malaysians and 68% of Indonesians support the punishment of whipping of alcohol offenders, while 92.5% of Malaysians and 66% of Indonesians agree on the death penalty for murderers....
The rather conservative outlook of Muslim youth in Indonesia and Malaysia on religion and social life does not appear to be conducive to building modern democratic, pluralist and humanistic societies. Religious conservatism can be potentially incompatible with democratic principles, such as the freedom of opinion, freedom of speech, freedom of worship and freedom from discrimination. Indonesia’s history created a specific relationship between religious and state or public values that is different from the one in Malaysia. Although the majority of Indonesians are Muslim, the nation’s founders acknowledged Pancasila ["five principles"] as their ideological basis..... The nation’s founders clearly refused to ground their nation on religion. Religion was only used as an ethical basis, not as an ideological one.
In Malaysia, however, it appears that during the last few decades the idea of an “Islamic state” has gained much ground. This was not always so. Whilst the first and third prime ministers... openly declared that Malaysia was a secular state with Islam as the official religion – the fourth prime minister ... declared that Malaysia was an Islamic state.
On Islam reports on the survey.
