This paper is a presentation of Professor Abdullahi Ahmed An-Na’im when he was invited to deliver a keynote speech at the conference “Promoting Pluralism through Civic Reason: Rethinking Secularism” in Utrecht, The Netherlands on the 25th and 26th of May 2009. The conference was initiated by the Kosmopolis Institute of the University for Humanistics and organized in cooperation with Hivos. In his presentation, An-Na’im discussed the highlights of the first chapter of his noteworthy book, “Islam and the Secular State” (2008). In his presentation, An-Na’im presented his key ideas on the secular and offered valuable insights for the Promoting Pluralism Knowledge Programme. The regional coordinators from the Indonesia program, Dr. Zainal Abidin Bagir, and the coordinator from the India program, Prof Sitharamam Kakarala, both responded to An-Na’im at the conference. All three contributions are included in this paper.

This paper is written by Henk Manschot & Caroline Suransky. They indicate that, “There is a special relationship between modernity and humanism, particularly since the Enlightenment.” They share many basic values such as autonomy, civil equality before the law and democracy. They both defend the separation of church and state and advocate the existence of a secular public sphere and of public morality as solid foundations of society. However, in the past decennia, the project of modernity has increasingly come under siege internationally and its key values are challenged from many perspectives. There are philosophical and theological critiques, as well as challenges from the field of political theory. Throughout the globe, fundamental questions have been raised about the meaning and impact of modernity from within diverging political and religious movements, particularly from non-western locations. With modernity heavily in dispute, modern humanism too seems challenged to rethink its own relationship with modernity. The authors argue that this is particularly so in terms of the separation of church and state and with regard to the incongruity of the secular and the religious, something that modern mainstream humanism so far has considered to be fundamental for modern societies.

This study looks at the practice and discourse of pluralism in contemporary Indonesia. The time period covered here is from 1998 until end of 2007, which is marked by, among other things, two significant events: the Reformasi of May 1998 in the specifically Indonesian context, and the 9/11 attacks in the US as the main global context. The main issues of the study are practice and discourse of pluralism. The practice is covered by two components: a portrait of Indonesian Muslims in terms of their views and attitude toward the others, by reviewing empirical surveys; and a review of governmental policies with regard to religion, especially freedom of religion. The discourse component is shown in the features exhibited in the discourse by the supporters and opponents of the idea, based on their writings in newspapers, magazines, journals, and books. The practice and discourse of pluralism is translated here as about views and attitudes of a religious community (or persons) toward the religious others. The focus is here is on Muslims.

This Report is made based on the result of research on the mapping of pro-pluralism movement in Indonesia with the focused issue on pattern of transformation and the use of knowledge. The research used combined method between the review of literature, field research and focused group discussion (FGD). The field research was carried out during the period of February to March 2008. The research interviewed on average 5 organizations and 4 individual informants for each region. Those selected are in general advocacy-based organizations or grass-root organizations by having to consider the representation proportion between secular, religious and women’s groups. This research focused more to the effort in mapping the type and pattern of knowledge developed by the pro-pluralism groups during the post New Order era, as well as the transformation process of that knowledge into their program or activities. This report contains two basic essences. First is the context of the emergence of pro-pluralism movement as well as the challenges. This means this research should be able to present a more complete context on various factors affecting the emergence and development of this particular movement as well as the actual challenges faced nowadays. Secondly is that it is related to various findings. In this part there are six primary themes presented, which are the responses and roles of pro-pluralism actors; endeavored issues; the use of knowledge; the knot of knowledge among the academics and pro-pluralism activists; typology of the knowledge; and the method of knowledge transfer. The last two issues are the important ones that bundled into the recommendations of this research.