Debating Gender, Woman, and Islam: Indonesia's Marriage Law of 1974 revisited

The relationship between gender, woman and Islam has long been debated in Meslim countries, including Indonesia. Questions are raised concerning the role played by religion and legal institutions in defining the male and female relationship. and their rights and obligations when bound together in a marriage contract. Less than one year after her independence, Indonesia issued the Law No. 22 of 1946 requiring Muslims register their marriage, divorce and reconciliation. This law was issued to control arbitrary marriages and divorces among Muslims. After Suharto came to power as the replacement of Sukarno in 1966, more laws on Muslim. personal status were enacted. In the early 1970s Suharto's rnoment proposed a marriage law requiring civil registration of marriages and court approval for divorce and polygamy. This bill was proposed as part of the state project of modernizing the practice of Islamic law within the framework of the Indonesian legal system - in response to an increasing awareness among Indonesian women of gender and their equal status with men before the la