KARSA Journal of Social and Islamic Culture

Unraveling Green Extractivism: The Case of Nickel Downstreaming in the Indonesia Morowali Industrial Park

2026-05-31T12:52:36+07:00

The global energy transition has increased demand for critical minerals used in electric vehicle batteries, positioning nickel as a strategic resource. In Indonesia, this demand is linked to a state-led downstreaming agenda centered on the Indonesia Morowali Industrial Park (IMIP), a major hub for nickel processing. This article examines how sustainability narratives are used to drive extractive expansion in IMIP. It adopts a qualitative single-case study design and uses a desk review of policy documents, corporate reports, gray literature, media sources, and academic studies from 2013 to 2025. The analysis is guided by Dunlap’s framework of green extractivism. The findings show that IMIP reflects four interrelated features of green extractivism. Climate crisis and energy transition narratives are used to justify rapid industrial expansion. Extractive activities are legitimized through sustainability claims such as green development, ESG, and decarbonization. Downstreaming remains dependent on conventional extractivism, including upstream mining, land conversion, and coal-based energy systems. Sustainability is framed as a manageable technical issue, while socioecological impacts continue to accumulate, including environmental degradation, health risks, and livelihood disruption. This article contributes by extending the analysis of green extractivism beyond Latin America and by showing how it operates through a state-led downstreaming and industrial park model. It demonstrates that sustainability narratives can function as a justification for extractive expansion, raising concern about the conditions under which green industrialization can be aligned with meaningful environmental and social outcomes.

Negotiating Religious Authority in a Masculine Space: Gender Regime and Female Leadership in an NU Pesantren

2026-06-16T10:47:22+07:00

This article examines the leadership of Nyai Hj. Masriyah Amva at Pesantren Kebon Jambu Al-Islamy as a negotiated reconstruction of religious authority within the patriarchal structure of traditional Nahdlatul Ulama pesantren. Drawing on Raewyn Connell’s gender regime theory, the study conceptualizes pesantren not as rigid institutions but as social spaces in which gendered authority is continuously produced and contested. Based on a qualitative case study involving in-depth interviews, participant observation, and document analysis, this article shows that sufi spirituality, religious poetry, and symbolic practices function as key sources of legitimacy that enable Nyai Masriyah to exercise leadership without directly confronting established institutional norms. Her spiritual experience and ethical authority gradually reconfigure male-dominated leadership arrange-ments by opening space for women’s participation within accepted religious frameworks. This study contributes to gender and Islamic studies by demonstrating how spiritual authority operates as a context-specific resource for institutional transformation, positioning pesantren as sites of negotiated gender change within traditional Muslim communities.

Decolonizing Parenting Typologies: Bedengah and Mentanak as Cultural and Religious Systems among Sasak Muslim Families

2026-06-24T00:34:17+07:00

This study examines Bedengah and Mentanak — traditional parenting systems practiced by Sasak Muslims in Lombok, Indonesia — proposing them as culturally-regulated and religiously-regulated frameworks that extend beyond Western developmental typologies. Through ethnographic research conducted across three traditional villages over nine months, involving 30 informants and utilizing participant observation, in-depth interviews, and documentation analysis, the study reveals how these parenting systems incorporate age-specific practices, ritual ceremonies, intergenerational skill transmission, and extended family involvement deeply rooted in Sasak cultural values and Islamic teachings. The findings expose three critical dimensions inadequately captured in Baumrind's (1971) conventional framework: (1) cultural tradition as a self-sustaining regulatory system governing child behavior across developmental stages; (2) religion as a structural architecture rather than mere value content shaping parenting; and (3) parenting as a collective community responsibility extending far beyond the parent-child dyad. While Bedengah and Mentanak provide robust cultural identity formation and moral scaffolding, they also confront contemporary pressures stemming from higher educational aspirations among youth, debates over Islamic orthodoxy regarding local ritual legitimacy, and household economic constraints. This study contributes theoretically to cross-cultural parenting scholarship by proposing an indigenous conceptual framework that recognizes cultural and religious structure — not merely content — as the organizing logic of child-rearing, with direct implications for designing culturally adaptive child-protection policies, family-welfare programs, and parenting education curricula in rural Muslim-majority communities in Indonesia.

The Bejeleng Tradition: Integrating Indigenous Spirituality into Lombok’s Cultural Tourism Strategy

2026-07-08T21:51:45+07:00

The growth of cultural tourism has intensified debates on authenticity, sustainability, and the ethical integration of indigenous practices into tourism development. In East Lombok, the Bejeleng tradition—a sacred Sasak ritual associated with the production of traditional coconut oil (Minyak Jeleng)—embodies these tensions because it is governed by strict spiritual regulations, collective participation, and ritual purity. This study examines how Bejeleng can be strategically integrated into Lombok’s cultural tourism development without compromising its spiritual integrity. Grounded in Greg Richards’ cultural tourism framework, the study employs a qualitative phenomenological approach to understand indigenous spirituality as a collective social experience. Data were collected through participant observation, in-depth interviews with religious leaders and ritual participants, and documentary analysis, and were analyzed through a two-stage thematic procedure combining inductive, participant-driven open coding with theoretically informed deductive interpretation based on Richards’ cultural tourism framework. The findings show that integrating Bejeleng into cultural tourism must be selective, value-based, and community-led. Indigenous spirituality functions as a non-negotiable boundary against ritual commodification, while community leadership regulates external engagement. Tourist involvement is limited to non-ritual domains, including observation and the use of ritual-derived products, whereas economic benefits remain controlled secondary outcomes that do not alter ritual practices. This study contributes to cultural tourism scholarship by extending Richards’ framework to sacred ritual production processes and demonstrating that meaningful cultural experiences can be constructed through symbolic proximity rather than direct participation.

Halal Culture from an Ecotheological Perspective: An Ethnographic Study of the Madurese Community

2026-07-10T16:20:38+07:00

This research is a field study using an ethnographic approach that examines halal cultural practices from the perspective of Islamic eco-theology within Madurese society. The research focuses on two communities: Karang Penang Sampang Village and Lenteng Village in Sumenep Regency, Madura, which maintain traditional religious practices and resource management based on Sharia values and local wisdom. Data were collected through participatory observation, field documentation, and in-depth interviews with key informants, including religious leaders, traditional elders, women involved in cultural activities, local farmers, and young people active in the preservation of traditions. Research findings indicate that halal culture is understood not only as adherence to fiqh norms, but also as a form of ecological ethics that governs the relationship between humans and nature. For example, in the tradition “Mèngghulè,” in the lead-up to the Prophet’s Birthday or Ramadan, communities engage in communal cooking rituals, using pesticide-free local ingredients, slaughtering animals in accordance with Islamic law, and serving food on natural containers such as banana leaves. Meanwhile, within the settlement system “Tanean Lanjhang”, a pattern of collective life was discovered that reflects ecological and spiritual harmony through the management of water, land, and food based on family values. Values such as barokah (blessing), sakkena (peace), and the principle of al-halal bi thayyib serve as guidelines for the community’s social and ecological practices. This study shows that the halal culture in Madura is a manifestation of Islamic eco-theology that is contextual, sustainable, and rooted in local culture.

Modernization and Cultural Shift in Indigenous Communities: Evidence from the Pado’e under Mining Expansion

2026-07-11T11:31:47+07:00

This study examines how mining-led modernization has reconfigured the cultural and socio-economic life of the Pado’e indigenous community in East Luwu and evaluates the extent to which PT Vale’s corporate social responsibility (CSR) programs respond to the resulting problems. The study uses a qualitative case-study design with an ethnographic orientation, drawing on fieldwork conducted from June 2021 to January 2022 through semi-structured interviews, direct observation, and documentary analysis. The analysis identifies four interrelated shifts: livelihoods have moved from predominantly subsistence activities toward commercial agriculture, wage labor, entrepreneurship, and greater market dependence; formal education has become a central household aspiration; family authority, gendered mobility, domestic roles, and spouse selection have become more negotiable; and mutual cooperation remains morally important but is less dominant in organizing everyday life. PT Vale’s education, health, agriculture, enterprise, socio-cultural, sports, and infrastructure programs have expanded access to services. However, corporate aggregate data do not show how benefits are distributed among Pado’e households or whether supported livelihoods remain viable without company assistance. The findings, therefore, interpret modernization as a selective reconfiguration of cultural institutions rather than a complete disappearance of tradition, while treating CSR as a partial response that has not resolved historical land grievances, unequal participation, or dependence on the mining economy.