Islamic institutional accommodation and peace stability : a comparative study of Aceh and Bangsamoro

Abstract

Why do some peace agreements in Muslim-majority separatist conflicts endure while others repeatedly fail? This question serves as the starting point for this study, which is addressed through a structured comparison of the peace processes in Aceh (Indonesia) and Bangsamoro (the Philippines). This study argues that the truly decisive variable is the form of the state's institutional accommodation of Islamic political demands. When institutional accommodation of Islam is substantive and implemented credibly, peace tends to endure. Conversely, if such accommodation is merely symbolic or not fully realized, the legitimacy of the moderate elite will weaken, opening the door to the emergence of ideology-based outbidding politics and the fragmentation of rebel groups. The study is grounded in historical institutionalism, combining a narrowly defined critical juncture with the mechanisms of gradual institutional change and policy feedback. It employs a qualitative comparative design and within-case process tracing, drawing on peace agreements, databases (UCDP and ACLED), Hasan Tiro's diaries, and four elite interviews. The analysis found that in Aceh the 2005 Helsinki settlement functioned as the juncture at which the state's mode of incorporating Islamic political demands became credible rather than unilateral; the qanun, the Sharia courts (Mahkamah Syar'iyah), and the Ulama Consultative Assembly (MPU) that followed were the product of a subsequent process of institutional layering and conversion that locked in this choice, channelling former combatants into electoral and institutional competition; no organized armed conflict has occurred since 2006. In contrast, the 1976, 1996, and 2014 Bangsamoro agreements were each a genuine juncture, yet each settled only for a personal and administrative form of recognition, leaving the governance dimension unfulfilled and producing a reactive rather than self-reinforcing sequence of splintering. The study concludes that the durability of peace depends less on where boundaries are drawn than on whether the state credibly and substantively recognizes institutional Islam.