DISTRIBUTIVE JUSTICE IN FISCAL POLICY: ZAKAT, TAXATION, AND THE CONSTITUTIONAL MANDATE OF SOCIAL WELFARE

Abstract

Zakat and taxation coexist in Indonesian fiscal law without a coherent account of how they relate to one another or to the constitutional duty of the state to care for the poor. This study aims to determine the normative position of zakat within the constitutional fiscal order, to compare models of zakat and tax integration across jurisdictions, and to formulate criteria for a distributively just arrangement. The research applies normative juridical research with statutory, conceptual and comparative approaches, supported by a maqāṣid reading of zakat as a determined entitlement, drawing on Indonesian constitutional and fiscal legislation, Malaysian and Pakistani instruments, classical works on public finance and contemporary scholarship. The findings show that zakat and tax rest on structurally different normative logics: tax is a contribution assessed on capacity and spent at budgetary discretion, whereas zakat is an earmarked right belonging to specified categories of recipients. Indonesian law treats zakat as a deduction from taxable income rather than as a credit, which limits its fiscal significance, while the centralisation of zakat administration has raised constitutional questions about the freedom of civil society institutions. The gravest risk is substitution, in which religious philanthropy is invoked to relieve the state of a duty the Constitution assigns to it. The study recommends criteria of fiscal neutrality, non-substitution, audited transparency, integration with national poverty data, and protection of institutional pluralism.