Despite Huntington's view on the failure of the democratic experiment in Islamic countries, Indonesia turned out to be the contradiction that successfully demonstrated the compatibility of Islam with democracy. Since the fall of Suharto, moderate Muslims have contributed substantially to the progress of democratic consolidation over the past decade through the rise of cultural Islam. Furthermore, having failed to obtain a majority of votes in three periods of regular elections in Indonesia (i.e., elections in 1999, 2004 and 2009), it has become clear that there has been a decrease in preference for political Islam and a strengthening of support for a secular state. Therefore, in order to explain the compatibility of Indonesian Islam with democratization, this article will analyze the levels of democratic consolidation in Indonesia influenced by Islam, the rise of cultural Islam in response to the restrictive nature of political Islam, and finally , the regression of political Islam which led moderate Muslims to take power and a democratic model to take shape. However, before democracy became compatible with Islam in Indonesia, democratic consolidation, or the process by which democracy matures, needed to take place. According to Juan Linz and Alfred Stefan, there are five interconnected arenas that enable this process: civil society, political society, the rule of law, the state apparatus and economic society. Without one the others would fail. Therefore, these arenas began to form in Indonesia with the end of the New Order in 1998. It is now clear that democratic consolidation was taking place. Using classroom-assessed Freedom House data as the primary source for assessing a state's standard of democracy, it is clear that the fal... middle of paper... political divisions have led to a multi-party system, thus effectively weakening the power of political Islam and ceding power to moderate Muslims. Combined with a unique colonial history, the development of cultural Islam and strong political divisions have led Indonesia to form a de facto democracy compatible with Islam. Works Cited "Indonesia". House of Freedom. Np, nd Web. March 22, 2014. Linz, Juan J., and Alfred Stepan. "Towards consolidated democracies". Muse.jhu.edu. Journal of Democracy, 1996. Web. 23 March 2014. .Mietzner, Marcus. Military Politics, Islam and the State in Indonesia: From Turbulent Transition to Democratic Consolidation. Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 2009. Print.