Child Marriage in a Village in West Java (Indonesia): Compromises between Legal Obligations and Religious Concerns

Abstract

This article addresses the dilemmas and compromises in legal practice around the issue of child marriage in Indonesia. Although the government set development goals that include ending child marriage and complying with human rights standard, it is facing considerable resistance. We researched the state legal system and law in practice to understand this resistance, finding that: (1) law-making in family law involves conflict between progressive and conservative ideas; (2) consequently there is friction within current family law and laws regarding human rights; (3) judges use their discretion to achieve compromises between state laws and local norms; and (4) state law is creatively interpreted and applied at village level. The resistance at all these levels, arising from the religious concerns of conservative Muslims in a rapidly modernizing Indonesian society, is a formidable obstacle for the government to achieve its development goals. Adolescent sexuality is at the heart of these tensions.

Are Indonesian Girls Okay? An Examination of The Discourse of Child Marriage, Victimization, and Humanitarian Visuality of Global South Girls

“…Moving forward, future empirical research on child marriage needs to investigate the contextualized realities of this practice, including to put the focus on investigating young people's sexualities and the agency of young people in determining with whom, when, and how marriage occurs (see Colquhoun and Nilan 2020 in this edition). Through this, as informed by previous research in Indonesia (see Horii 2019Horii , 2020Grijns and Horii 2018), future social policies can offer a range of alternatives in addressing the harmful impacts of child marriage beyond regulating the minimum age as envisaged by the dominant discourse. By focusing on banning child marriage, social policies obscure the diverse social realities, tend to drive the practices underground (see Boyden et.…”

Walking a thin line: Taking children’s decision to marry seriously?

“…The conditions are strict and unrealistic to be met in the majority of cases of child marriage: for instance, in most of the child marriage cases in Indonesia, people have limited access and motivation to go to court (Grijns and Horii, 2018).…”

“…The case studies have proved that the strong social pressure does exist, especially in the context of premarital pregnancy. Like Swasti’s case, 90% of the cases of child marriage were caused by unplanned pregnancies, and when teenagers experience pregnancy, in Indonesia there is no real alternative to marriage: abortion is basically illegal, and being an unwed mother has critical consequences in their social life (see also Grijns and Horii, 2018). In other words, a lack of access to reproductive health tools and social structures severely limit the possibilities.…”

A blind spot in international human rights framework: a space between tradition and modernity within the child marriage discourse

“…Child marriage can be motivated by pregnancy occurring outside of marriage. 49 This alternative scenario indicates the generalising tendency of the international discourse, which does not consider the diversity of forms, motivations, and consequences of child marriage.…”