The state and illegality in Indonesia

In July 2007, at the height of a government military operation against separatist rebels in the Indonesian province of Aceh, a short but curious article appeared in the local newspaper. It quoted the Aceh military commander, Major General Endang Suwarya, warning members of the public not to be hoodwinked if they received a telephone call from someone claiming to be him and asking for money. Apparently, a group of swindlers had been telephoning rich people in the province, with one first pretending to be Endang’s adjutant. After ascertaining the identity of the person being called, the ‘adjutant’ would hand over the telephone to ‘the commander’ who would then ask for hundreds of millions of rupiah in order to help pay for the military operation. A number of local officials and businesspeople had apparently already fallen for the trick, and transferred large sums to the bank accounts in Jakarta nominated by the swindlers. Endang was angry: ‘For as long as I’ve been serving here, I have never telephoned anyone to borrow or ask for money.’ Yet this was not the first time, nor the last, that confidence tricksters had pretended to be members of the security forces in order to extort money from people in Aceh; on the contrary, there have been repeated reports of individuals pretending to be police officers, army soldiers or agents of the State Intelligence Agency (Badan Intelijen Negara, BIN) for this purpose. [Extract from introduction

The state and illegality in Indonesia

The popular 1998 reformasi movement that brought down President Suharto’s regime demanded an end to illegal practices by state officials, from human rights abuse to nepotistic investments. Yet today, such practices have proven more resistant to reform than people had hoped. Many have said corruption in Indonesia is “entrenched”. We argue it is precisely this entrenched character that requires attention. What is state illegality entrenched in and how does it become entrenched? This involves The state and illegality in Indonesia studying actual cases. Our observations led us to rethink fundamental ideas about the nature of the state in Indonesia, especially regarding its socially embedded character. We conclude that illegal practices by state officials are not just aberrations to the state, they are the state. Almost invariably, illegality occurs as part of collective, patterned, organized and collaborative acts, linked to the competition for political power and access to state resources. While obviously excluding many without connections, corrupt behaviour also plays integrative and stabilizing functions. Especially at the lower end of the social ladder, it gets a lot of things done and is often considered legitimate. This book may be read as a defence of area studies approaches. Without the insights that grew from applying our area studies skills, we would still be constrained by highly stylised notions of the state, which bear little resemblance to the state’s actual workings. The struggle against corruption is a long-term political process. Instead of trying to depoliticize it, we believe the key to progress is greater popular participation. With contributions from Simon Butt, Robert Cribb, Howard Dick, Michele Ford, Jun Honna, Tim Lindsey, Lenore Lyons, John McCarthy, Ross McLeod, Marcus Mietzner, Jeremy Mulholland, Gerben Nooteboom, J Danang Widoyoko and Ian Wilson. This book is the result of a series of workshops supported, among others, by the Australian-Netherlands Research Collaboration (ANRC). “An intriguing [...] and thought-provoking volume on the nexus between the state and illegality. It treats illegality not as an abnormality, but as an integral aspect of statecraft and social life. The book advances theoretical discussions, embedding them in rich empirical material that sheds light on the ways in which people in different localities and sectors in Indonesia use, make sense of, and negotiate illegality. It will benefit students and scholars from various disciplines, seeking to explore the social meanings and functions of illegality in the everyday life of the nation.” Barak Kalir, University of Amsterda

Renegotiating boundaries

For decades almost the only social scientists who visited Indonesia’s provinces were anthropologists. Anybody interested in politics or economics spent most of their time in Jakarta, where the action was. Our view of the world’s fourth largest country threatened to become simplistic, lacking that essential graininess. Then, in 1998, Indonesia was plunged into a crisis that could not be understood with simplistic tools. After 32 years of enforced stability, the New Order was at an end. Things began to happen in - the provinces that no one was prepared for. Democratization was one, decentralization another. Ethnic and religious identities emerged that had lain buried under the blanket of the New Order’s modernizing ideology. Unfamiliar, sometimes violent forms of political competition and of rentseeking came to light. Decentralization was often connected with the neo-liberal desire to reduce state powers and make room for free trade and democracy. To what extent were the goals of good governance and a stronger civil society achieved? How much of the process was ‘captured’ by regional elites to increase their own powers? Amidst the new identity politics, what has happened to citizenship? These are among the central questions addressed in this book. This volume is the result of a two-year research project at KITLV. It brings together an international group of 24 scholars – mainly from Indonesia and the Netherlands but also from the United States, Australia, Germany, Canada and Portugal

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Colonizing Borneo: State-building and ethnicity in Central Kalimantan

Page range: 23-50The formation of Central Kalimantan province in 1957 was not, as is often thought, a successful revolt by local ethnic Dayaks against a centralistic Jakarta. It was part of a state-building process driven from Jakarta. In order to establish its authority in remote areas at a time of instability, Jakarta sought out loyalist partners in the regions. This was a form of indirect rule, whose ethnic idiom contradicted Indonesia's ideology of modernity