Corruption as role distortion<\/p>\n
By Ignas Kleden<\/p>\n
JAKARTA (JP): Corruption in Indonesia should always be a
\nquestion and an issue, never to be taken for granted because
\nalmost everybody is tempted to practice it.<\/p>\n
If one looks at corruption in terms of class differentiation,
\nit becomes obvious that the motives behind it can be very
\ndifferent.<\/p>\n
Corruption, for lower-level government employees, is a means
\nto supplant the deficit in their income, while assuming the role
\nof an informal and illegal incentive-system for the workings of
\nbureaucracy. Conversely, high-ranking officials earn enough from
\ntheir positions. For them corruption is not a means to cover the
\nlack of income, but a means of saving in the face of uncertain
\nfuture.<\/p>\n
In a time of crisis what matters is the present. The past is
\nutilized as a political scapegoat whereas the future is
\nindefinite and unpredictable because the course of events goes
\nnot according to the established order but according to
\noccasional needs and drives.<\/p>\n
However, the objective crisis aside, the vagueness and the
\nunpredictability of the political future in Indonesia has long
\nbeen brought about by a very ambiguous relationship between state
\nand society, the lack of equal opportunity in economy, as well as
\nextremely weak and inconsistent law enforcement.<\/p>\n
So far there have been no serious problems to enforce the law
\namong the people, but there are many difficulties applying the
\nsame standards to the powers-that-be.<\/p>\n
Needless to say, corruption is a very complex social
\nphenomenon, which cannot be attributed to one single factor. An
\neffective fight against this bad habit, however, needs to take in
\naccount all factors that have swayed people to corruption.<\/p>\n
This essay discusses one factor which might play a decisive
\nrole in the widening acceptance of corruption, namely the
\ninterchange of the role of a middleman and an agent which takes
\nplace within the bureaucracy.<\/p>\n
Sociologically speaking, an agent is somebody who acts not on
\nhis or her own behalf but rather on behalf of the one from whom
\nhe or she has got an assignment. Accordingly they get paid on the
\nbasis of their assignment, and are not allowed to receive any
\nother payment from other sources. This is important as a means to
\nsecure and to guarantee the loyalty and the commitment of the
\nagent towards the one on whose behalf the agent acts.<\/p>\n
By contrast, a middleman is someone who acts on his own behalf
\nto mediate between two parties involved in a business or
\npolitical transaction, and is therefore in a position to get paid
\nfrom both sides.<\/p>\n
Whereas an agent is supposed to be loyal to his employer and
\ncommitted to his employer's interest, a middleman is usually
\nloyal to himself and committed to his own interest.<\/p>\n
The members of state bureaucracy are agents par excellence,
\nbecause they are never allowed to act on their own behalf, but
\nonly on behalf of their bosses, who represent a particular aspect
\nof state power and authority.<\/p>\n
In that sense they are entitled to a corresponding payment by
\nthe state for their service, while they are not allowed to
\nreceive any other payment from other sources.<\/p>\n
They are supposed to represent and to serve the interest of
\nthe state, and thereby serve the interest of the people, while
\nbeing strictly forbidden to serve their own interests in doing
\ntheir job. The essence of this responsibility is coined in the
\nterm \"civil servants\".<\/p>\n
The distortion which takes place within the bureaucracy
\nusually occurs in two related ways. First, the government
\nemployees do not see themselves as state agents anymore, but
\nrather as free persons who can play the role of middlemen. They
\nidentify their private interest with that of the state.<\/p>\n
There is no difference between carrying out an assignment for
\nthe state and acting on their own behalf and serving their own
\ninterest. This makes them feel free to receive payments not only
\nfrom the state but also from other parties involved in
\ntransactions with the state.<\/p>\n
According to this concept, corruption is nothing but an
\nofficial action which benefits the perpetrator in contrast to the
\nassignment of his boss and against the rules and regulations
\naccording to which he is supposed to act.<\/p>\n
Conversely, if the act is committed with official approval of
\nthe boss, then there is no corruption anymore, because the agent
\nis still acting according to the assignment of his boss.<\/p>\n
If it turns out that in so doing he is transgressing against
\nthe law, it is not he but his boss who is responsible, because it
\nis the boss who has given the assignment.<\/p>\n
In reality, this is not the case in Indonesia, because there
\nis no explicit assignment from the boss permitting employees to
\nact against the rules and regulations.<\/p>\n
What happens is that every transgression takes place tacitly
\nin a silent agreement between everyone involved, but in which
\nno one can be held responsible. In that way the employees make
\nuse of their position to make a deal with those who are looking
\nfor the service of bureaucracy and get paid from these people
\nillegally.<\/p>\n
The next step is to bring a major part of this deal to the
\nboss in order to keep him silent and to make him behave as if
\nnothing illegal had taken place.<\/p>\n
Everyone gets a bit from the illegal payment, consequently,
\neveryone is supposed to protect the one involved in the illegal
\nactivity, with the understanding that he or she is expected to do
\nthe same thing to protect his or her colleagues who are involved
\nin other illegal activities.<\/p>\n
In collusive relationship, corruption is a silent conspiracy
\nagainst the state and the people, which undermines the efficiency
\nof state bureaucracy, though it might encourage to certain extent
\nthe effectiveness of the workings of bureaucracy.<\/p>\n
In the second situation, the bureaucrats no longer see
\nthemselves as civil servants, whose main job is to serve the
\nstate and the people, but as participants of state power on the
\none hand and as rulers of people on the other.<\/p>\n
Bureaucracy as a state apparatus treats itself as a part of
\ngovernment, whereas it is by definition only a tool, indeed, a
\nmachine, which should facilitate the functions of government and
\nserve the interests of the people.<\/p>\n
In modern states with efficient bureaucracies, people are
\nentitled to certain services from the bureaucracy without any
\npayment required.<\/p>\n
In the case of Indonesia there used to be no explicit refusal
\nfrom the bureaucrats to provide the required services. What
\nhappened time and time again was a silent reluctance by means of
\ndelaying the completion of the procedure until the people
\nunderstood by themselves that they had to pay something to get
\nthat service.<\/p>\n
In that situation people have to choose between the costs of
\nbringing a bureaucrat to court and a transaction cost which might
\nbe much lower in order to get a service without much delay.<\/p>\n
In this context corruption is rather a conspiracy with the
\nstate against the people which benefits neither the state nor the
\npeople, but solely the corrupted bureaucrats.<\/p>\n
The third way cannot be attributed to the corruptors within
\nthe bureaucracy but rather to the government, which treats
\nbureaucracy not as state apparatus which should be ready to work
\nfor any legitimate government, but rather as its own apparatus
\nwhich is subject to all the programs and political agenda of the
\nincumbent government.<\/p>\n
This was obviously the case with the New Order regime, in
\nwhich all government employees were obliged to become members of
\nthe ruling Golkar party. President Soeharto at that time was the
\nchairman of the board of trustees for the party, endowed with
\ncomplete power to approve or veto the party chairman elected.<\/p>\n
There was an interchange of roles between government and
\nbureaucracy, which made no differentiation between those who give
\nassignments, and those who must carry out the assignments without
\nhaving to be responsible for the making such decisions.<\/p>\n
Political decision-making became identical with bureaucratic
\nprocedures, resulting in the so-called over-bureaucratization of
\nIndonesian politics.<\/p>\n
In such a situation a politician cannot be made accountable
\nfor his decision, because everything is attributed to the
\nbureaucratic procedure. Everybody can then justify himself only
\nas an executor of instructions which have been made somewhere
\nwithin the bureaucracy.<\/p>\n
Corruption takes place because political decision-making is
\nimmune to accountability, by making such a decision totally
\nimpersonal and purely procedural.<\/p>\n
Keeping those conditions in mind some proposals can be brought
\nup to eliminate those tendencies which originate in role
\ndistortion.<\/p>\n
First of all, government employees should be forbidden to play
\nthe role of middleman by eliminating all situations leading to
\nthis role distortion.<\/p>\n
If the income of a middleman is much better and much more
\nsecure than that of an agent, people will be tempted to change
\ntheir role while maintaining their status as agents of state
\nbureaucracy.<\/p>\n
In the same vein, the temptation of high-ranking people to
\ncommit corruption as a means of saving should be eliminated by
\nproviding them with a perspective of their career. It should be
\nmade very clear which high positions are political in nature, in
\nwhich political power can interfere, and which positions are
\npurely bureaucratic and should be judged on the basis of
\nbureaucratic and professional criteria.<\/p>\n
Secondly, bureaucracy as a state apparatus should be
\ndifferentiated clearly from the incumbent government, so that
\ncorruption within the bureaucracy is not protected politically by
\npolitical power, and bureaucracy as such is not treated and used
\nas a tool to serve the interests of the ruling party.<\/p>\n
The election and promotion of officials within the bureaucracy
\nshould not be done on the basis of political considerations of
\nthe ruling party, but on the basis of professional experience,
\ntechnical expertise and moral commitment to one's job.<\/p>\n
In that connection it is proposed that there should be a
\nvertical division of labor within bureaucracy. This means that an
\nofficial assuming a certain position is allowed to promote and to
\npunish only people of three levels below his position and not
\nmore.<\/p>\n
A director general of a department is not allowed to promote
\nor to punish an office boy because the latter is too far away
\nfrom the position of the first.<\/p>\n
In so doing, each level of bureaucracy can be provided with a
\ncertain amount of real responsibility for which they can be
\nrequired to give accountability.<\/p>\n
Otherwise any requirement for responsibility can never be met
\nbecause the official of the lower level will push the
\nresponsibility upward until we do not know who is responsible for
\nwhat.<\/p>\n
Third, if corruption is to be eliminated radically, it is
\nnecessary that the state should find an alternative incentive-
\nsystem to replace corruption which has long made the workings of
\nIndonesian bureaucracy effective though far from efficient.<\/p>\n
If there is no alternative incentive-system it is possible
\nthat we might finally have a clean bureaucracy which, however, is
\nnot effective because the people working within it are not
\nsufficiently motivated to do their job.<\/p>\n
Besides that, bureaucrats must not be made insecure in the
\nface of political decision-making, because political power turned
\nout to be able to eliminate ministries or departments without
\nmuch preparation.<\/p>\n
This situation of insecurity might lead to a sort of
\nbureaucratic entropy where no one is motivated to work and
\neveryone is prepared to do anything to secure his or her future
\nin the face of political volatility and decisional arbitrariness.<\/p>\n
The writer is sociologist, Director of The Go-East Institute
\n(Institute for East-Indonesian Affairs), Jakarta, national
\nconsultant to the preparation of Anti-Corruption Commission,
\nIndonesia.<\/p>",
"url": "https:\/\/jawawa.id\/newsitem\/corruption-as-role-distortion-1447893297",
"image": ""
},
"sponsor": "Okusi Associates",
"sponsor_url": "https:\/\/okusiassociates.com"
}