Seeing Through the Lens of Atheism: Plural Societies, Religion, and Harmony Ideology in Southeast Asia

Introduction

Atheism and secularism have been studied worldwide. The focus often lies on Western contexts. However, contemporary scholars (e.g., Kleine & Wohlrab-Saab 2020) have observed the persistence and transformation of religious beliefs, resulting in diverse expressions of secularism and non-religiosity across different regions. More recently, scholars have argued that religion will exhibit a stratified and articulated presence, following different paths in a highly globalized and differentiated context. Eisenstadt (2000) referred to this phenomenon as multiple modernities, asserting that the interaction of social, cultural, economic, and structural forces in society will yield varied outcomes. Similarly, the concept of multiple secularities (Burchardt and Wohlrab-Sahr 2013) highlights the coexistence of different forms of secularism and secularity, including atheism, in various societies. This concept recognizes that secularity manifests differently across different contexts and that there is no one-size-fits-all approach deriving from Western modernization (e.g, Inglehart & Baker 2000).

Southeast Asia has often been described as an area shaped by religions and plural societies. According to Furnivall (1939: 446), who coined the term during the late colonial order, plural societies are comprised of distinct groups, each with their own socio-cultural characteristics such as language, religion, or customary law. In a plural society, these groups live under a political unit side by side, yet without intermingling. These social segments lack of a common ‘social will’. However, independence movements and nation-building processes eventually forged national identities and narratives of a common social will. In many of these nation-building processes, religion—both in the form of a specific religion or in a general sense of religiosity or ‘the religious’—has played a role. While these societies have managed to overcome their fragmented, plural nature, the question is thus what nonreligion in these post-plural societies can tell us about the role religion and the religious play in these societies regarding social cohesion. In this article, we trace the function of the religious in three different Southeast Asian plural societies, namely Indonesia, Malaysia, and the Philippines. By doing so, we focus on maritime Southeast Asia which differs from mainland Southeast Asia in terms of religion: Whereas mainland Southeast Asia is dominated by the non-theistic religion of Buddhism, insular Southeast Asia is mostly dominated by the monotheistic religions of Islam and Christianity. Atheism thus becomes especially relevant in these contexts where it directly negates the dominant religious views.

In order to investigate the meaning of the religious for these post-plural societies, we analyze how these societies deal with the issue of atheism. While in practice atheism is present in these societies, it is nonetheless often seen as an alien phenomenon as it challenges not only specific religions but also the religious as a crucial foundation of these societies. Having analyzed the discourses on atheism in these countries, we argue that they all reject atheism, but they do it in different ways and to different degrees. While in Indonesia atheism is perceived as a risk when it is voiced publicly in a way that actively attacks religion, in Malaysia the mere presence of atheism can become a scandal, especially when ethnic Malays are involved and the issue is politicized by state authorities. In the Philippines, atheism can be met with resistance and skepticism, especially when its views go against the teachings of the dominant Catholic Church on conservative issues. However, as we show, organized atheism has a much longer tradition in the Philippines and it is easier for atheists to express their atheism in public. Drawing on the phenomenon of atheism, we analyze how these post-plural societies use the religious as their benchmark for social harmony.

In our analysis, we take the notion of the religious harmony state where religion and limited religious pluralism are the benchmarks for the harmony ideology (Duile 2020: 455). Contrary to Western notions of conflictual democracies in which different parties and ideologies compete in elections, the harmonious state may have competing parties but emphasizes ideological consensus among them as the socio-political frame. This is where religion or, more generally, the religious is crucial. Where Chantal Mouffe (2013: 8) argues that democracy needs a conflictual consensus, harmony states stress the consensual side and thus narrow down to a high degree the discursive frame on certain issues that are regarded as crucial, such as religion.

While Indonesia can be described as a religious harmony state, we argue that Malaysia is an Islamic-religious harmony state as Islam holds a special position in relation to inter-ethnic harmony. The Philippines, in contrast, is a pseudo-secular or religious-tolerance harmony state relying on a “covenantal pluralism” (Cornelio & Aldama 2020). The state and religion are formally separated, but in political and social practice—and for the notion of Filipino identity—Christianity plays a crucial role. Atheism thus challenges these harmony states in different ways and to different degrees and the societies provide different degrees of freedom for non-believers.

Shedding light on atheism in several non-Western contexts and comparing them raises some general questions about the nature of atheism. In the following, we suggest analyzing atheism as a part of non-religion which is not simply ontologically independent of theism and beliefs but relates to them, as Johannes Quack (2014: 448) has argued. Drawing on Bourdieu’s field theory, this approach can help us to understand atheism in different cultural and social contexts and in relation to the religious as they are part of a religious field that reaches as far as its effects (Quack 2014: 450).

Plural Societies in Southeast Asia

Many Southeast Asian nations are diverse in terms of ethnicity, religion, and customs and must incorporate this diversity into the framework of their national identities. The notion of plural societies comes from the late colonial era when British Malaya and the Dutch East Indies, among others, were regarded as the locus classicus for the concept of the plural society (Hefner 2001: 4). The notions of social elements or social orders refer here to groups distinct in terms of religion, customary law, ethnic identity, or language. John Furnivall thus argued that the plural society structurally lacks a common will which thus finds its expression in the absence of common social demands (Furnivall 1939: 447–449).

John Furnivall’s concept of the plural society has received some criticism from both Western and Southeast Asian scholars. Some critiques concern historical accuracy, arguing that these societies were much more mixed than Furnivall suggested (e.g., Coppel 1997). Another source of critique targets Furnivall’s engagement in colonialism and the blind spots deriving from it. As Robert Hefner (2001: 6) argued, John Furnivall’s analysis provided important insights into the nature of locally embedded capitalism and its effects on these societies. Contrary to Furnivall’s concept, some classical literature on Southeast Asia also suggests other ways that religions interact and even intermingle. For instance, Benedict Anderson’s (1972) account of the Javanese idea of power points to a subtle agglomeration of Southeast Asian animism with Islamic, Buddhist, and Hindu concepts. The work of Clifford Geertz is another well-known example. Whereas abangan Muslims practiced syncretic forms of Islam and were rather concerned with rituals, santri Muslims were described as Muslims who paid more attention to religious purity—and thus better fit the concept of religions as in the plural societies (Geertz 1960: 121–130). It has to be stressed, therefore, that the concept of religious groups as distinct social units is not the default stance in maritime Southeast Asia. Religious groups are, in and of themselves, neither distinct and separated, nor porous and blending. Rather, the degree of their distinctness or porosity depends on the political-social context. However, there are some continuities as the idea of distinct social-religious units has played a role in Southeast Asia at least from the late colonial order onwards, and it has become more relevant in the wake of Islamic conservativism and revivalism, especially since the 1980s.

Our argument in the following, which will focus on Indonesia, Malaysia, and the Philippines, is that colonial plural societies were dialectically sublated in the decolonization process: On the one hand, the plural societies were abolished as the postcolonial nation-states found common social wills through their struggles for independence or in references to traditional orders and social contracts expressed in state ideologies. On the other hand, the plural societies have been preserved as a matter of social practice, as in some regards fragmentation still prevails. The post-colonial societies in states like Indonesia, Malaysia, or the Philippines are diverse and show clear signs of fragmentation, but the overarching political units of the nation-states provide a remarkable degree of social cohesion—at least if one compares modern reality with Furnivall’s skeptical outlook on Asian nationalism (Hefner 2001: 6). The question is thus: Through what means do these societies ensure their common social will and why do they continue to be sectional in some regards? There is no simple answer, but we argue that the abstract notion of religiosity or the religious is crucial here: the religious provides a base for a common inter-sectional identification with modern states. At the same time, this also implies concrete religions and religious sections which contribute to the fragmentation of post-plural societies. This especially becomes clear when the post-plural religious societies are seen through the lens of its other, atheism. The modes of how these societies deal with atheism reveal the way religiosity functions as a means for social cohesion.

Indonesia, Malaysia, and the Philippines as Religious Post-Plural Societies

While religion had played different roles in Indonesian politics, it was often marginalized but it was nonetheless a constitutive part of what it meant to be Indonesian. During the Indonesian Revolution and under Sukarno, it was often interpreted as an anti-colonial force in line with the aim of creating a socially equal society, while under Suharto the religious features of Indonesian society were interpreted as the cornerstone of anti-communism. Indonesia thus was and is neither a secular state nor an Islamic state, despite the fact that 87% of the population are Muslims. The Indonesian state is institutionally linked to recognized religions, for example through the Ministry of Religion (Assyaukanie 2009: 151–158). Relying on the abstract notion of religiosity, the country has found a unifying concept that allows for a certain degree of pluralism. This is actualized in the state ideology of Pancasila (five pillars), where the first pillar reads Ketuhanan yang Maha Esa. In practice, this has often been translated as “belief in one almighty God” or “monotheism,” but the abstract noun ketuhanan could more accurately be translated as “the divine” (Damshäuser 2022). This conception emerged from religious-political controversies in the course of independence efforts and was eventually also supported by many Islamic politicians and scholars (Mechnik 2016: 68–123). Ketuhanan yang Maha Esa has been described by the Constitutional Court as the Staatsfundamentalnorm (the fundamental state norm), as the very existence of the Indonesian nation and the Indonesian people depends on it (Sinn 2014: 231). In recent years, however, political Islam has become more influential as part of a “conservative turn” (van Bruinessen 2013) and Indonesian nationalism appears to be increasingly Islamic, even though Catholicism, Protestantism, Hinduism, Buddhism and Confucianism are equally recognized, at least in formal terms (Hadiz 2015; Bourchier 2019). Increasing violence by radical and reactionary Islamic groups, but also by Christian militias after the downfall of Suharto, has challenged the image of a tolerant Muslim-majority society. In 2005, a legal opinion (fatwah) by the Council of Islamic Legal Scholars in Indonesia (MUI, Majelis Ulama Indonesia) caused a controversy, as it declared pluralism, secularism, and liberalism haram (Ichwan 2013: 80–84).

The religious, as expressed in the first pillar of the Pancasila, for instance, has become an important unifying force in the sublation of the plural society, while society remains sectionalized through concrete religions. For instance, in 2010 only 0.5% of married couples had different religions, and Muslims, as the biggest religious group, have especially low odds of being in inter-religious marriages (Aini, Utomo & McDonald 2019). The “conservative turn” in Indonesian Islam is, therefore, something that does not simply negate the religious pluralism and the religious foundation of the country, but at the same time derives from it.

Malaysia can also be considered a classic example of a plural society in Southeast Asia (Ryan 1967: 112–118; Milner 2003; Ramli & Jamaludin 2012), as under British colonialism many Chinese and Indians were brought to Malaya. In terms of religious affiliation, Malaysia is quite diverse, as about 63% of the population adheres to Islam, 19%—mostly the Chinese minority—are Buddhists, 9% are Christians, and a large part of the Indian population subscribe to Hinduism (about 6%). In the first years, the independent nation experienced severe ethnic riots until the emergency government in 1969/70 found a formula for reconciliation. Crucial here was the Rukun Negara (national principles) and the new economic policy which aimed to eradicate the economic disparity between the different ethnic groups. As ethnic Malays were the native majority, they were often backward in terms of economic development, especially compared to the Chinese, and the government introduced affirmative action policies in favor of Malays (Andaya & Andaya 1982).

In a similar fashion to the Pancasila in Indonesia, the Rukun Negara has as its first principle the belief in God (Kepercayaan kepada Tuhan). Yet it does not refer to an abstract divine principle (Ketuhanan) but to a God (Tuhan). Islam is not only mentioned in the Constitution as an official religion in Malaysia. In the 1970s, partly as a response to ethnic riots, Malaysia saw an Islamic resurgence which made Islam a crucial marker of difference between Malays and other parts of Malaysia’s polyglot and multi-ethnic society (Seyyed 2001: 82). This policy continued in the 1980s when Islam came under government control and protection (Ramli et al. 2022: 2).

Compared to Indonesia, in Malaysia, Islam has a stronger position in the state and society as a quasi-state religion and a compulsory religion for all ethnic Malays. As the new economic policy and the traditional political systems of the Malay sultanates attributed a special position to the Malays and as Malays are defined as Muslims, Islam has, through that architecture of the Malaysian nation, a de facto outstanding position. While the pluralistic character of the state was emphasized predominantly until 1970, since the Hussein Onn government from 1976 to 1981, Islam has become increasingly important as a political tool (Kheng 2002). Like Indonesia, Malaysia is a state in which Islamic bureaucratic regimes have developed that reach far beyond the state and into society (cf. Müller & Steiner 2018). In Malaysian politics, religion therefore plays a crucial role not only in the law-making process but also for those who want to enter and persist in the political arena. For instance, Anwar Ibrahim, who is now known for his moderate religious stance, faced accusations of homosexual misconduct and was sent to jail before he eventually became the prime minister in 2022. Ibrahim, who once advocated for state-led Islamization, now promotes post-Islamism as a way of balancing the ambitions of political Islam with secular and multiculturalist approaches (Musa 2023). Since 2001 there has been a debate on secularism in Malaysia in which politicians have repeatedly emphasized and defended the privileged position of Islam in the nation as a tool to seek support from conservative actors from the majority religion. Non-Islamic segments of society have countered this discourse, emphasizing the secular aspects of the Malaysian state (Ahmad 2013).

The Philippines can also be characterized as a society that bears clear characteristics of a plural society (e.g. Steinberg 1994: 28–39). Unlike Indonesia and Malaysia, however, Islam is a minority religion. While 87% in Indonesia and around 61% in Malaysia officially adhere to Islam, this figure is only around 5% in the Philippines. Here, Christians make up the majority, at over 92%. In the Philippines, too, religion was constitutive for the formation of a national consciousness that transcended the individual segments of society (Christ 2013: 452). Unlike in Indonesia and Malaysia, the Philippine Constitution provides for a clear separation of state and religion. However, this separation does not prevent the Catholic Church from influencing legislative processes, since religion is often seen as political capital in the Philippines (e.g. Bautista 2010). Moreover, the presence of the official organization of the Catholic episcopacy in the country, known as the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP), has extended the function of the Catholic Church beyond that of ensuring the pastoral care of its flock. Since its establishment in 1968, bishops and clergy have often been vocal about political issues such as the moral legitimacy of government policies and moral fitness of political leaders. For instance, in 1986 and 2001, church leaders played a significant role in mobilizing portions of their congregation during the ‘People Power’ revolutions. The relationship between the church and state was renegotiated again under the authoritarian Duterte presidency, but can still be considered relatively stable (Batella & Baring 2019).

The religious mix in the Philippines is predominantly Christian as evangelical, independent, and even Nontrinitarian churches continue to rise. Given this diversity, Filipino Christians have, in general, different attitudes toward religion and amicable coexistence. Aldama and Cornelio (2020) stressed that there are opportunities for the fostering of a mutual pledge to engage, respect, and protect each other amid diversity in the Philippines. This is the notion of ‘covenantal pluralism,’ a specific pluralism that calls for a faithful patriotism pride in the country that is non-xenophobic and welcomes ethnic minorities and other and faiths. The concept does not call for the abandonment of claims to truth but is rather a call to engage people to aspire for a common good.

A striking continuity in all these societies and in all different periods of their history as nation-states is an emphasis on social harmony. Conflict-free, harmonious societies are often seen as the aim of nation-building processes and social cohesion. From this, it is clear how harmony and harmony ideology became important regarding religion: the notion of harmony and the ideology of social harmony is articulated through religion. In all cases, the harmony ideologies connect nationalism to the religious (or to a specific religion) to different degrees and it set the frame for religious discourses: while they must recognize a certain pluralism, they must not challenge the religious in general. Atheism appears as the outside of what articulates the harmony ideologies. Ultimately, we can see here the contours of the religious field which does not only contain religious rules and institutions. It rather affects the fundamental ways in which societies and their social cohesion are imagined. The question is thus: In what way is atheism related to the respective religious field which is crucial for social cohesion?

Atheism and Religious Harmony Ideologies

Contrary to the proponents of Asian values (see on this debate: Junning 2001), where politicians like Lee Kwan Yew in Singapore and Mahathir Mohammed in Malaysia, suggested that human rights were less important to Asian societies than stability and harmony, we suggest here that the notion of harmony and the harmonious state derives not from primordial cultural patterns but was developed within certain political and discursive settings, and puts a strong emphasis on social cohesion.

In order to understand the function of the religious as a means to maintain social cohesion in post-plural societies, it is useful to analyze discourses on the religious’ other, namely non-belief as atheism. As the three religious post-plural societies deal differently with this issue, it allows us to elaborate on the different functions the religious can have.

Atheism came to Indonesia in the wake of Marxism, a political ideology influential in the struggle for independence and during the presidency of Sukarno until the Communist Party was eradicated in 1965–67. However, Indonesian Marxism downplayed or ignored the atheism in Marxist or Leninist philosophy for simple reasons: first, the Communists acknowledged that religion was common among peasants and laborers, and second, they were aware that Islam and communism shared an anticolonial agenda (Hiorth 1998; Duile 2018: 164–165). However, after the Sukarno era, the term atheism became inseparably linked with communism in public discourse and they often even appear to be semantically congruent (Assyaukanie 2009: 165). Suharto’s so-called New Order (orde baru) turned Indonesia into an anti-communist state and for the sake of its stigmatization, communism was portrayed as atheist and aggressive against religion (and thus against the religious foundation of the state as depicted in the Pancasila). When, after the downfall of Suharto, President Abdurraham Wahid argued for an end to the ban on communism, he was confronted with fierce critiques from Muslims who argued that communism and Islam are incompatible (Suhelmi 2006: 18).

Though the specter of communism as atheism is still present in Indonesia, atheism in post-authoritarian Indonesia is not simply a term for communism. In the wake of Islamic revitalization and a “conservative turn” in Indonesian Islam (van Bruinessen 2013), atheism is contrasted with Islam and, not less importantly, with religious social harmony. According to a survey by the Pew Research Center conducted in 2010, 30% of Indonesians were in favor of the death sentence for people who abandon Islam (Brown 2015). However, even though atheism is present in social media, it seldom becomes an issue of public debate, and so far, it has only become one when combined with offensive critiques against religion, in particular against Islam. This became clear in the case of Alexander Aan, a civil servant from West Sumatra who was sentenced to prison for two and a half years for blasphemous remarks. He was a member of the Facebook group Minang Atheist. In that group, he not only declared that he did not believe in God but also posted at least two comments which were seen as highly offensive. One suggested that Prophet Muhammed was his own in-law, and another picture stated that the prophet had sex with his wife’s maid. Thus Alexander Aan was attacked by a mob and brought to the police. He was charged with three offences: The first charge was the spreading of information that incited hostility and hatred of ethnic, racial, or religious groups as punishable in Law No. 11 of 2008 on Electronic Information and Transaction. Additionally, he was accused of violating Article 156a of the Criminal Code in two ways: first, because he performed a hostile act towards a recognized religion in Indonesia, and second because his act was performed with the intention of drawing other citizens away from belief in God. Eventually, Alexander Aan was found not guilty under the Criminal Code but under Law No. 11 of 2008, and sentenced to two and a half years in prison and a fine of around 8,000 US-Dollar because his statements had offended the religious (Kovacs 2012: 4; Saputra et al. 2013: 110–137; Hasani 2016: 197–198). In other words, even though the case was framed as a case of atheism in international media coverage, for the court the main issue was not atheism itself but the way atheism threatened the notion of social harmony, in this case, between the Islamic majority and non-believers. This idea is also present in state institutions: as long as atheists do not enter the public realm in a way that causes unrest, the existence of atheism is not perceived as a problem (Duile 2018: 167; Duile 2020: 455). What is at stake here is not atheism as a private belief in the forum internum but as an expression to the public, that is, in the forum externum. As Mahfud MD, a former Chief Justice of the Indonesian Constitutional Court, argued, anything concerning the forum internum cannot be on trial. Hasani (2016:201) thus argued that Alexander Aan’s prosecution was actually about freedom of expression rather than freedom of belief. However, freedom of expression always needs an issue that is expressed, and in this case, it was motivated by atheism. Therefore, we argue here that this case centered on freedom of expressed atheism, as only this formation of freedom concerns the harmony ideology of the post-plural society in Indonesia. The problem was that atheism in the form expressed by Alexander Aan, as anti-theism, not only attacked Islam, but simultaneously attacked the ideology of social harmony.

In the course of increasing social media usage, atheism has become an issue in online media as it allows atheists to find like-minded persons, to discuss atheism, and yet maintain a certain degree of anonymity. Online atheism is not simply an expression of already present disbelief, but something that is intersubjectively produced in online interaction (Copeman & Schulz 2022: 29). Southeast Asian atheism is no exception here.

Saskia Schäfer (2016) has argued that online media not only allows atheists to organize and find like-minded people but also to present atheism positively in public. However, many atheists’ online groups only accept other atheists and therefore they are inward-oriented. These groups serve as spaces where atheists’ identities can develop, which is a new phenomenon and thus atheism in Indonesia is a “newly forming identity” (Schäfer 2016: 255). Indeed, atheism in the online sphere is, in most cases, not connected to communism but rather to global atheist discourses as well as the local experiences of the members in these groups, experiences that often involve contradictions between the promises of religion and high moral standards on the one hand and social reality on the other. In some cases, however, atheists engage with believers online, for instance in the Facebook Group Anda bertanya atheis menjawab (You ask, atheists answer) (Valbiant 2020). This indicates that atheism is not generally forbidden or unacceptable in Indonesia, nor is a public discussion on atheism impossible at all. Although there is occasionally media coverage, the issue is most of the time rather ignored. This ignoring stands in contrast with other controversial identities such as LGBTIQ (Wieringa 2019). As the latter emerge in heteronormative-religious discourses as the constitutive outside, that is, an explicit enemy of the religious post-plural society in Indonesia, atheism is, at least so far, rather an explicit outside which reinforces the religious precisely through the fact that it is seldom mentioned, except when atheism attacks religious sentiments.

Similar to Indonesia, atheism probably came to Malaysia (which at that time was British Malaya) in the wake of communism during the late colonial order. In 1930, the Communist Party of Malaysia was clandestinely founded under the authority of Ho Chi Minh, who was the Southeast Asian agent of the Communist International with strong ties to the Soviet Union (Kheng 2009: 132). Soviet Marxism came with the baggage of a scientific–materialist worldview, but many ordinary communists in Malaysia were probably believers as well. Like in Indonesia, communism does not play a role in today’s politics as an actual political force, but it is still present in political speeches by politicians who portray communism as a threat.

Atheism was not considered a social issue in Malaysia until the emergence of the internet and atheist blogs from 2013 onwards. Atheism as an online phenomenon is thus younger than in Indonesia where social media groups were founded at least from 2008 onwards. In Malaysia, a transition from private blogs to social media has occurred in recent years and, similar to Indonesia, there are private groups as well as groups reaching out to the public (Ramli et al. 2022: 4). But unlike in Indonesia, one social media group caused a fierce national debate in 2017, even though Islam was not attacked. In that case, it was the mere presence of an atheist gathering in Kuala Lumpur that was brought to the public. The online group Atheist Republic Consulate of Kuala Lumpur held an annual in-person gathering. A posting by one member which also contained photos of the gathering, read:

Although there was, in contrast to the Indonesian case of Alexander Aan, no insult against Islam, this event triggered harsh public reactions in Malaysia. A team of researchers from Sultan Idris Education University called the mere fact that a gathering of atheists came to the public’s attention a “provocative action” (Ramli et al. 2022: 1). The deputy minister who was at that time in charge of religious affairs, Asyaf Wajdi Dusuki, said that atheism contradicts the believe-in-God principle in the Rukun Negara and therefore has no place in Malaysia. The government must take action against atheism as it opposes the Islamic creed. If Muslims took part in atheist activities, the Federal Territory Islamic Religious departments could take action. (Ramli et al. 2022: 1).

Malaysia’s cabinet minister, Shahidan Kassim, argued that the atheists must be hunted down by the authorities of the federal state as there is no place for them in Malaysia. In parliamentary debates, the appearance of the atheists was said to be a problem especially because of the “Malay faces” in the photos of the atheist gathering. Government institutions thus demanded that Facebook shut down the atheist Facebook page. However, as the atheists had not violated Facebook’s community standards, the request was denied (Atheist Republic 2017). Shahidan Kassim suggested forced education for atheists. However, civil law in Malaysia does not criminalize atheism (Higginbottom 2022). This incident demonstrates that critique or questioning of religion, even only in the mere appearance of non-believing people, aims directly at the norms that are constitutive for the Malaysian state.

While considered a secular state, the Catholic Church’s influence is deeply rooted in Philippine history and culture. This is a result of the Spanish colonial rule in the country which lasted for over 300 years. Aside from culture and history, Catholicism—and religion in general—became foundational in framing the identity of Filipinos. As such, the Filipino identity always begins with and is framed within the co-construction between Catholic identity and national identity or what Natividad (2012) calls “religio-nationalism.” As the Simone Christ (2013) says, it is almost unthinkable for a Filipino not to believe in God. Whether Catholic or non-Catholic, having and/or practicing a religion connects a Filipino to the larger community. These communities are often tightly knit, with a strong sense of interconnectedness framed within a religious background.

In the Philippines, the concept of social harmony can be understood by looking at the notion of two virtue ethics: loob and kapwa. Loob is often misunderstood when literally translated into English as “inside” (Reyes 2015). But as a virtue ethic, it means “relational will.” Kapwa, according to Virgilio Enriquez, is the “unity of the ‘self’ and ‘others’ … a recognition of shared identity, an inner self shared with others” (1992: 52). In a more recent articulation of kapwa, Katrina de Guia, one of Enriquez’s students, writes, kapwa “bridges the deepest individual recess of a person with anyone outside him or herself, even total strangers” (2005: 28). In other words, everyone outside of one’s self is considered a kapwa. Reyes’ (2015: 99) description of this connection is as follows:

The virtue ethics of loob and kapwa serve as foundations for other virtues which all point to the preservation and strengthening of human relationships, unlike the individualistic, cardinal virtues of the West (Reyes 2015). These relationships with kapwa culminates in the Filipino term pagkakaisa (root word isa, which means “one”). Pagkakaisa is the highest level of personal interaction where we can find total trust and identification among the parties involved (Enriquez 1992). Despite individual differences, pagkakaisa shows that the important thing for Filipinos is to have the same goal. Thus it can mean unity or oneness of holistic and relational wills. This shows that Filipino culture is grounded in a mentality that stresses the notion of social harmony. With the concepts of kapwa and pagkakaisa in place, we can see that social harmony is established not in individualistic terms within relational flourishing. These virtues coincide with the Christian value of loving one’s neighbor regardless of race or ethnicity. The Catholic faith teaches principles of love, compassion, and solidarity, which align with the values of kapwa. The teachings of the Church promote the idea of treating others with respect, fairness, and dignity. These values are often reflected in Filipino society’s emphasis on harmonious relationships, collective decision-making, and community-oriented practices. The concept of kapwa is also concerned with familism which is concerned with the well-being of family members and kinsmen (Jocano 1997: 64–65, c.f. family state ideologies in Indonesia: Bourchier 2015). This family-centeredness has been carried to modern organizations like the government and private corporations. As a result, nepotism, cronyism, injustice, and corruption have plagued Philippine politics for decades (Bulatao 1992; Reyes 2015).

As in Indonesia and Malaysia, atheists in the Philippines are increasingly networking and organizing. However, in the Philippines organized atheism has a much longer history than in Indonesia and Malaysia, and even public appearances, for instance in rallies, are possible without causing a broad public debate. In his study on secular movements in the Philippines, the anthropologist Alexander Blechschmidt (2018: 52–53) found the roots of atheism and secular movements in individuals who have promoted secular ideas, humanism, and free-thinking ever since the 1960s. The efforts and approaches of these people to promote atheism are undertaken individually and in small, less formal groups as no formal organizations or secular movements have yet been established. They conduct meetings at coffee shops, talk about political issues, and, in some cases, engage in debates and discussions with people at the famous Luneta Park (Blechschmidt 2018: 54–57).

At the turn of the new millennium, active atheist organizations and secular movements were established in the Philippines. As Blechschmidt (2018: 14) described, these organizations have thrived in recent years due to the internet’s new forms of interactive media and communication. A common theme among these organizations is the promotion of the understanding of secular ideas. Founded in 2009, the Filipino Freethinkers aim to promote reason, science, and secularism. PATAS, which was created in 2011, serves to educate society and eliminate misconceptions about atheism and agnosticism. Two years later, one of the founders of PATAS formed a new organization called the Humanist Alliance Philippines International (HAPI) with the goal of spreading humanism in the country through new and better avenues. Other like-minded organizations have also existed in academic institutions but have been short-lived, like the Tiger Freethinkers at the Catholic-run University of Santo Tomas and the UP Atheist Circle at the University of the Philippines, which is a secular university.

The involvement of freethinkers and PATAS in socio-political discussions like freedom of speech, divorce, LGBTIQ rights, and reproductive health often takes the form of criticism of the influence of the church on state policies. With a dominant Catholic Church in the picture, decisions about these issues are often framed within a “hegemonic narrative of a Catholic moral order providing cohesion for a God-fearing nation” (Natividad 2012: 77). For instance, the Reproductive Health Law took several years to pass into law as the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) expressed its opposition. While there is an obvious separation of church and state, the influence of the Catholic Church has been historically embedded into the national identity. To counter the church’s influence in these issues, the freethinkers and PATAS joined rallies and public protests organized by other groups. Aside from visibility in the public domain, members of these organizations and individual atheists (LeDrew 2013) also have a virtual presence. Like in Malaysia and Indonesia, atheists in the Philippines have utilized the internet by making use of online groups and forums, writing articles and blogs, and posting videos and podcasts about atheism.

Despite their differences, there is a tendency for the public to conflate the terms freethinkers, secularist, and atheism. While members of these organizations have a common understanding that these terms have different meanings, in the public context, they seem to be the same: atheists. An example of this is the case of the opinion piece by the Filipino Freethinkers founder Red Tani entitled “Why I don’t like Pope Francis” (2015) published in the newspaper Philippine Daily Inquirer (PDI). The article received a written reply in the same newspaper from a “faithful reader” of the PDI, expressing his dissatisfaction with Tani’s opinion. He even called Filipino Freethinkers a “small group of atheists” who should not have space to express minority views.

Conclusion: Southeast Asia’s Post-Plural Societies and Their Discontent

The study of atheism as part of the non-religious is part of the study of the religious field: it is only within this field that one can detect the entanglement between atheism and the religious. As we have seen, the plural societies of Indonesia, Malaysia, and the Philippines might appear as religious throughout, but their debates on atheism reveal some of the crucial features, that is, the way the idea of the religious functions as a means of social cohesion and how debates on atheism reveal these mechanisms. Therefore, this article took religious–non-religious dynamics into account for a more comprehensive description of religious–non-religious entanglements as well as for distinctions between “religion” and “its others” (cf. Quack 2014: 457).

As we demonstrated in the first part of this article, the religious as abstract religiosity plays an important role in post-plural societies as it functions as a unifying force: The religious serves as a base for a common social will, but at the same time, it preserves the plural character of these societies as it emphasizes the role of particular religions as well. As John Furnivall noted in his description of plural societies during the late colonial order, “in a plural society there is no common will, except, possibly, in matters of supreme importance, such as resistance to aggression from outside” (Furnivall 1939: 447). Atheism, in a sense, can emerge as such an “aggression from outside” in post-plural societies as it reinforces a common will based on the religious. However, it does not necessarily emerge as aggression or provocation. The benchmark, we argue, is the degree to which atheism can challenge the harmony ideology based upon the notion of the religious. This degree is different in all three countries, even though religiosity as an abstract notion is crucial in all of these cases.

In Indonesia, the religious harmony state formally recognizes six religions equally and the notion of Ketuhanan yang Maha Esa is quite abstract. Atheism can challenge this notion of ‘the divine,’ but in order to be able to challenge the harmony ideology it must actively attack religion. In Malaysia, the case of the Atheist Republic gathering demonstrates that the mere existence of atheism is seen as an offence. In contrast to the case of Alexander Aan, wherein politicians refrained from comment, the case in Malaysia made the news precisely because indignation was orchestrated by politicians. While Alexander Aan’s remarks specifically attacked Islam, the case in Kuala Lumpur did not attack a particular religion, but was framed as a provocation, especially against Islam (and, thus, Malayness).

If Indonesia can be described as a religious harmony state, Malaysia can be called an inter-ethnic harmony state with structural dominance by Islam, that is, a harmony state where not only the religious as an abstract principle is crucial (as mentioned in the Rukun Negara), but also the correspondence of Islam and Malay identity. The harmony ideologies are challenged not simply by any form of atheism, but by atheism that gains a voice in public—in this, a striking similarity with historic debates on atheism in Western contexts becomes visible (Richter 2018: 10–11). Another similarity with Western discourses is the idea that atheists lack moral values and therefore threaten the cohesion of the religious moral society. Even if religious tolerance extends to numerous denominations, therefore, atheism is still at the limit of what is acceptable (see Blanes/Oustinova-Stjepanovic 2017: 14). The formal division of the state and church provides a better base for atheist acknowledgment in the Philippines but as we have argued, the notion of social harmony which has, without doubt, a religious dimension, suggests to many people in the Philippines that atheists are not really part of that society. Even though public expressions are possible and organized atheism is not a new thing in the Philippines, atheism represents a certain limit to pluralism. Atheism is for all these plural societies both an inherent limit as well as an integral part. It is a limit in the sense that it defines its outside in regard to the religious as a common notion, but in practice, atheism exists as both social and everyday practices as well as discourses. Being in this contradictive position, atheism points to discontent in these plural societies and their very plural character: as a means to express uneasiness with politics and society and as a way to establish secular enclaves that both challenge and enhance the plural character of these societies.

Funding Information

This research was funded by the German Research Foundation (Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, DFG), project number 491339839.

Competing Interests

The authors have no competing interests to declare.