Mustafa Akyol
In February 2026, the Cato Institute launched a volume I edited, bringing together a team of prominent Islamic scholars: No Compulsion in Religion—No Exceptions: Islamic Arguments for Religious Freedom. Just months later, this summer, its first international edition came out in Indonesia, in the Bahasa Indonesia language:
Tidak Ada Paksaan dalam Agama (Tanpa Kecuali): Argumen-Argumen Mendalam Islam tentang Kebebasan Beragama
The publisher is Diva Press, based in Yogyakarta, specializing in religion, social thought, and literature. Special thanks go to Adi Abdul Rohman for taking the initiative and making this publication possible.
Indonesia is the world’s largest Muslim-majority nation and a bright spot in the Islamic world, with a functioning democracy and tolerant Islamic movements. But it does struggle with some of the issues covered in No Compulsion in Religion—No Exceptions, such as blasphemy laws. A small part of it — the Aceh Province — also has the very institution criticized in the book: religious police.
So, I hope the ideas in the book can contribute to Islamic thought in Indonesia and help inspire further steps toward more freedom and tolerance.
