Skip to the content | Change text size

Professor Greg Barton

Professor Greg Barton

Brief Biodata

Dr Greg Barton joined at Monash University as the Herb Feith Research Professor for the Study of Indonesia in January 2007, based in the school of Political and Social Inquiry (PSI) in the Faculty of Arts. Prior to that he had worked for a year as an Associate Professor at the Asia Pacific Center for Security Studies (APCSS) in Honolulu, Hawaii.  Before that he was an Associate Professor at Deakin University where had worked since 1993.  He developed and taught courses in the Politics stream on Political Leadership, Global Islamic Politics, and Society and Culture in Contemporary Asia, and earlier, in the Religious Studies stream, on Islam and Christianity.

At Monash Greg is Acting Director of the Centre for Islam and the Modern World and Deputy UNESCO Chair in Interreligious and Intercultural Relations – Asia Pacific.

Greg has internationally recognized expertise in Indonesian social movements, politics and religion. His knowledge of Indonesia politics and society, especially of the role of Islam as both a constructive and a disruptive force, is internationally recognized. In particular his work on progressive Islamic thought and its contribution to civil society and politics, together with his writing about Jemaah Islamiyah and other radical Islamist groups in Indonesia, is regarded as being on the cutting edge of his field. He has long studied the politics of reform, democratization and regime-change in Indonesia.  Researching his biography of Abdurrahman Wahid through the years of Reformasi, post-Soeharto election campaigning, and the rise and fall of the Wahid presidency, and subsequent research through the Yudhoyono presidency, afforded him a unique perspective from which to observe and analyse Indonesia's political culture. This has contributed to him becoming one of Australia's leading analysts and commentators on Indonesian politics and current affairs. His opinions have been sought from a wide range of officials within departments of the government of Australia and its allies and he is frequently advised to address small groups analysts and larger meetings in business, media, civil society and government circles in Australia, Indonesia, Singapore and America.

Greg's PhD thesis examined the emergence of liberal Islamic thought in the 1970s and 80s in the political context of the Suharto regime; and the social and political consequences of the civil society activism that it gave rise to. In particular it examined the thought and activism of Abdurrahman Wahid, Nurcholish Madjid and Djohan Effendi and anticipated their contribution to democratic transition. This laid the foundations for his later studies of the Wahid presidency and of Islam and civil society. The complete dissertation was published in Indonesian with the assistance of the Ford Foundation (Gagasan Islam Liberal…: [Liberal Islamic Thought: A study of the writing of Nurcholish Madjid, Djohan Effendi, Ahmad Wahid and Abdurrahman Wahid], 1999, 609 pp - and a new edition is currently being prepared for publication). The book demonstrated a link between progressive, neo-modernist Islamic thought and political liberalism in Indonesia, and its typology of 'Islamic liberalism' has proven broadly influential. For example, Indonesia's well-known progressive Islamic NGO Jaringan Islamic Liberal adopted the term 'Islamic liberalism' from this book as a direct result of this publication and Greg's work in this area has been very influential amongst both Indonesian scholars and activists and amongst foreign observers.

His research has been funded by three Australian Research Council Large Grants (two three-year grants and one four one-year grant) and a series of one-year grants.  This work has involved dozens of visits to Indonesia were he has worked extensively with researchers from Australia the USA, France and Indonesia. He has developed internationally recognized expertise in Islam, Islamic social movements, civil society, politics and Islamist radicalism in Southeast Asia.

Greg has written or edited five books and published dozens of refereed articles and book chapters in this field, together with numerous essays in publications such as The Age, The Sydney Morning Herald, The Australian, The Australian Financial Review, The Herald Sun, Asia Week, Dissent, Eureka Street, The Diplomat, The Jakarta Post, and Jawa Pos. He is a frequently interviewed by the Australian and international electronic and print media on Islam and on Indonesia politics (including ABC TV, ABC RN & RA, SBS TV, SBS Radio, BBC, CNN, 2GB, 2UL, 3LO, 3AW, 3AK, Channel 10, Channel 9, Channel 7, Deutsche Vella, Radio Nederland, Singapore News Radio, Metro TV, TVRI).

His biography of Abdurrahman Wahid (2002, Abdurrahman Wahid, Muslim Democrat, Indonesian President: a view from the inside, Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press) was published in 2002 (and translated and published in Indonesian in 2003). His book: Indonesia's Struggle: Jemaah Islamiyah and the Soul of Islam, was published in 2004 by UNSW Press (and by Singapore University Press in 2005).

He is currently working on two other book projects: Progressive Islamic thought and social movements in Indonesia and Turkey (which returns to some of the themes and material he first addressed in his published PhD thesis Gagasan Islam Liberal); and: Islam's Other Nation: a fresh look at Indonesia.

Postgraduate Supervision

PhD Candidates currently being supervised

PhD
Student Topic Supervisor/s

Iftikhar Arman

"Radical Islamist movements and the terrorist threat in Bangladesh"

Prof Marika Vicziany/ Prof Greg Barton

Derya Dilara Akguner

"Academic migration to Australia and Canada: East European professional elite in focus"

Prof Greg Barton

Jan Fermelis

"A qualitative investigation of evolving intercultural hybridism: Business communication strategies and adaptations by Australian expatriates in Shanghai"

Prof Marika Vicziany/ Prof Greg Barton

Jonathan Samuel Lyons

"War without End? A Social Historiography of 1000 Years of Anti-Islam Discourse"

Prof.Emeritus Gary Bouma /Prof Greg Barton

Joshua Roose

"Australian born Muslims challenging a dominant negative discourse"

Prof Greg Barton/ Dr Dharma Arunachalam/ Dr Peter Lentini

Sven Alexander Schottmann

"The 'Islamic State' and the 'New Malays': Islam in the politics of Mahathir Mohamad "

Dr Julian Millie/ Prof Marika Vicziany/ Prof Greg Barton

David Tittensor

"New Islamic philanthropy and the vision of social development through self-development: a study of the Gülen Movement's program of schools and colleges in Turkey and Central Asia."

Prof Greg Barton/ Dr Peter Lentini

Rachel Woodlock

"New Islamic philanthropy and the vision of social development through self-development: a study of the Gülen Movement's program of schools and colleges in Turkey and Central Asia."

Prof.Emeritus Gary Bouma /Prof Greg Barton

Mokhammad Yahya

"Islamic Revivalism/Fundamentalism and Political Islam in Indonesia"

Prof Greg Barton/ Dr Julian Millie

MA Candidates currently being supervised

MA
Student Topic Supervisor/s

Linda Hindasyah

"Syariat Islam, Conflict, and Religious Violence in Indonesia."

Dr Julian Millie/ Prof Greg Barton

Honours Candidates currently being supervised

Honours
Student Topic

Dara Conduit

"Hizbullah and the Mahdi army – transformations from militant groups to political entities."

Aruvin Karunakaran

"The recent transformation of US military thinking about civil-military relations"

Ed Russell

"Unwanted, unconstitutional and symptomatic of a broader problem: the prohibition on apostasy in Islamic Aceh"

Tony Williams

"Global Jihad and the development of the far enemy"

Refereed Publications

Sole-authored Academic Books

Edited Academic Books

Chapters in edited books

Academic articles in refereed journals

Essays and other articles

Research Grants

Recent seminars and public speaking

Politics Home