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Corruption in Indonesia: Is it
cultural?
By Gary LaMoshi
DENPASAR, Bali - My friend David Hill grew up in
Florence, Alabama, in the heart the US Deep South and in
the wake of its legacy of racism. Hill couldn't believe
what he had read in his home-town paper.
In an
article about teenagers gathering to show off their car
stereos on the fringes of a residential neighborhood,
Florence City Council President Sam Pendleton called the
situation particularly dangerous, since gatherings of
black youths were known to be more likely to breed
problems such as gangs and violence. Given a chance to
clarify his statement - ie, to retract it - Pendleton
said he wasn't going to say what was popular, just what
was true: black kids were more trouble than young people
of other races.
"I immediately fired off a
letter to the editor about how I can't believe that an
area that had done so much to distance itself from its
horribly racist past could have a city council president
espousing such idiocy," Hill, editor of Outside Pitch, a
baseball newspaper in Baltimore, recalled. "If Sam
Pendleton doesn't resign, I wrote, I would hope the good
voters of Florence would oust him from office at their
earliest opportunity."
Black act
In
addition to sending his letter to the newspaper, Hill
circulated it among friends and family, and one relative
replied with startling news: Council President Pendleton
was black. Furthermore, he was a senior official in the
local chapter of the leading civil-rights group, the
National Association for the Advancement of Colored
People (NAACP).
"I really wasn't sure what this
revelation meant," Hill admitted. When the local
newspaper called about printing his letter, Hill
withdrew it. After some reflection he concluded,
"Alabama is so racist even blacks are prejudiced against
blacks."
Remarkably similar comments emerged
from a conference in Indonesia last month. Citing the
nation's dismal performance in the annual global
corruption rankings (see Corruption, human rights, and the usual
suspects, October 17) that costs the economy
billions and arrests development, longtime activist Emmy
Hafild accused fellow Indonesians of cherishing cultural
values that encourage dishonesty.
Among
government officeholders, Hafild observed, "Obligations
to give charity and the expectations of their villages
and relatives are all real and difficult obligations to
refuse. How can an official rely solely on his salary
when society's expectations of him are so high?"
Vulture culture
Moreover, according to
Hafild, who heads Transparency International's
Indonesian branch, officials become subjects of scorn
and ridicule if they don't own fancy houses, expensive
cars or large plots of land, send their children to
study overseas, or support freeloading relatives.
"I look around me and find that the values we
live by are not in favor of someone who lives free from
corruption," Hafild lamented. "My experience tells me
that far from stopping corruption, these values nurture
it."
Hafild may have been politically incorrect,
but she's right about some parts of the social equation.
I learned about hospitality expectations first-hand when
I invited in-laws to Bali for a family gathering. I
agreed to pay airfares plus hotel bills for three
nights. My in-laws joyfully announced they'd be staying
five nights, so please extend their reservations. Under
duress, my wife explained they were welcome to stay as
long as they liked, but we'd only pay for three nights.
Suddenly, they all discovered pressing obligations that
would limit their stays to three nights only.
But is there anything really cultural about
people trying to live beyond their means by whatever
methods available? Freeloading relatives are known in
all groups and nationalities throughout history. The
global popularity of consumer credit indicates that only
one race - the human one - is susceptible to the
temptations of living large.
Blame
game
Blaming social problems on race or class or
culture doesn't get to the heart of the problem. It's
just a shortcut to poisonous, defeatist attitudes such
as Council President Pendleton voiced. Even if you don't
condone music measured on the Richter Scale or official
corruption, stereotyping marks those behaviors as a norm
rather than an unfortunate exception. A shrug of the
shoulders - because, after all, they're blacks or
Indonesians or stupid tourists or whatever - is the
wrong way to begin the search for solutions.
To
her credit, Hafild did more than shrug. She suggested
public shaming as a method to discourage corrupt
behavior. If Hafild is right about the cultural factor,
though, shaming probably won't work very well in the
Indonesian context: the choices become shaming for
taking too much or shaming for giving too little.
You can find the germ of a solution in Hafild's
cultural observations. Behind broad public acceptance of
corruption is the widespread belief that everyone
expects their turn to benefit from it. From vote buying
to jobs for the boys to phony procurement contracts,
politics and government are all about spreading wealth
among friends and family. President Suharto and his
children (see Indonesia's first family of
corruption, October 31) extended the family
tradition to new levels, but they didn't invent the
practice.
Ahead of this week's Lebaran holidays
in Indonesia marking the end of Ramadan, dozens of
journalists turned up at city halls across the
archipelago to ask for a holiday gratuity, as did
thousands of people impersonating journalists. During
the holiday, it's a tradition for groups of neighborhood
children to come to your doorstep and shout holiday
greetings to receive a few coins. Many adults have
switched to offering sweets because children too often
turned up repeatedly.
At Lebaran, people who
work in the cities return to their ancestral family
homes and are expected to bear gifts. No one asks where
the presents come from or how they were paid for.
Moreover, it's not necessarily considered wrong to steal
if that plunder winds up as gifts or charity.
Until those attitudes change, Indonesians don't
have the luxury of taking offense at politically
incorrect comments like Hafild's. Alabama had to reverse
its racist past to let a black man like Sam Pendleton
become an elected official and insult fellow blacks.
Indonesia still hasn't gotten to the stage where honest
people can make an impact in public life.
(Copyright 2003 Asia Times Online Co, Ltd. All
rights reserved. Please contact content@atimes.com for
information on our sales and syndication policies.)
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