Purpose

This paper aims to problematize existing conceptualization of corruption by presenting alternative perspectives on corruption in Indonesia through the lens of national/cultural identity, amidst claims of the pervasiveness of corruption in the country. In so doing, the paper also sheds light on the micro-processes of interactions between global and local discourses in postcolonial settings.

Design/methodology/approach

The study applies discourse analysis, involving in-depth interviews with 40 informants from the business sector, government institutions and anti-corruption agencies.

Findings

The findings suggest that corruption helps government function, preserves livelihoods of the marginalized segments of societies and maintains social obligations/relations. These alternative meanings of corruption persist despite often seen as less legitimate due to effects of colonial powers.

Research limitations/implications

The snowballing method of recruiting informants is one of the limitations of this paper, which may decrease the potential diversity and lead to the silencing of different stories (Schwartz-Shea and Yanow, 2013). Researchers need to contextualize corruption and study its varied meanings to reveal its social, historical and political dimensions.

Practical implications

This paper strongly suggests that we need to move beyond rationalist accounts to capture the varied meanings of corruption which may be useful to explain the limited results of existing anti-corruption efforts.

Social implications

This study calls for a greater use of qualitative methods to study broad social change programs such as anti-corruption from the perspective of the insiders.

Originality/value

This paper contributes to the discussion of agency at the interplay between the dominant and alternative discourses in postcolonial settings. Moreover, the alternative meanings of corruption embedded in constructions of national identity and care ethics discussed in this paper offer as a starting point for decolonizing (Westwood, 2006) anti-corruption theory and practice.

中文翻译：

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“我们关心他人”：在印度尼西亚的企业与政府关系中，相对于国家/文化认同的腐败话语建构

目的

本文旨在通过国家/文化认同的视角提出关于印度尼西亚腐败的替代观点，以解决现有的腐败概念化问题，同时声称该国腐败普遍存在。通过这样做，本文还阐明了后殖民背景下全球话语与地方话语之间相互作用的微观过程。

设计/方法/方法

该研究采用语篇分析，对来自商界、政府机构和反腐败机构的 40 名线人进行了深入访谈。

发现

调查结果表明，腐败有助于政府运作，维护社会边缘群体的生计并维持社会义务/关系。尽管由于殖民大国的影响，这些腐败的替代含义经常被认为不那么合法。

研究限制/影响

招募线人的滚雪球式方法是本文的局限性之一，这可能会降低潜在的多样性并导致不同故事的沉默（Schwartz-Shea and Yanow，2013）。研究人员需要将腐败置于情境中并研究其不同的含义，以揭示其社会、历史和政治层面。

实际影响

本文强烈建议我们需要超越理性主义的解释，以捕捉腐败的不同含义，这可能有助于解释现有反腐败努力的有限结果。

社会影响

本研究呼吁更多地使用定性方法从内部人士的角度研究广泛的社会变革计划，例如反腐败。

原创性/价值

本文有助于讨论后殖民环境中主导话语与替代话语之间相互作用的能动性。此外，本文讨论的国家认同和关怀伦理建构中嵌入的腐败的替代含义为反殖民化（Westwood，2006）反腐败理论和实践提供了一个起点。