Legal Feminism in Indonesia: Identity, Text, and Minor Sketches

Identitas Feminisme Hukum Di Indonesia (Telaah teks & Sketsa Minor)

Abstract

Feminism is a women’s movement that seeks emancipation, equality, and justice in rights. As both a philosophy and social movement, feminism is historically associated with the European Enlightenment and the French Revolution of 1792. Over time, feminism has evolved extensively as a movement and school of thought, giving rise to diverse and differentiated strands. Its development across regions—Asia, Europe, the Americas, Africa, and beyond—has been deeply shaped by the cultural values and prevailing ideologies within each society. Accordingly, the naming and categorization of feminist movements reflect the specific social and cultural contexts in which they have emerged. The plurality of feminisms manifests in various forms, including liberal, radical, cultural, Marxist–socialist, psychoanalytic, existentialist, postmodern, multicultural, global, and ecological (ecofeminist) feminism. This diversity may generate moral dilemmas when different perspectives intersect or stand in tension with one another. In the Indonesian legal context, feminism has permeated nearly all areas of legal studies, including legal substance, culture, behavior, and structure. This study employs a textual or discourse analysis approach, complemented by legal hermeneutics as a method of interpretation. Legal hermeneutics examines the relationship between legal texts and the contexts of their formulation, enactment, and interpretation, revealing the foundational ideas underlying those texts. Based on this analysis, this study concludes that the emergence of legal feminist thought, schools, and movements in Indonesia fundamentally represents a response to discrimination and injustice rooted in patriarchal social structures. The identity of legal feminism in Indonesia includes issues of marginalization, subordination, stereotyping, double workloads, historical marginality, gender equality and awareness, injustice against women within the legal system, the integration of gender perspectives in policymaking, the strengthening of legal protection for women, the empowerment of women in legislative and law enforcement processes, public education on gender equality, and persistent gaps in legal protection for women.