(Assignment 2) Vishali Sairam

In the following two examples, I will focus on essays that deal with the concept of institutional distrust(case of Denmark) and social distrust (case of Indonesia). I based the third essay on Indonesia again because I believe it offers a contrasting perspective to the issue of corruption with regards to the second essay. As opposed to a social perspective endorsed by Ms. Angitha,Mr.  Avienassh’s essay looks at the issue from an economic point of view.

AN ANALYSIS OF DENMARK BY  ANAND SREEKUMAR

Mr. Sreekumar’s essay looks at the complex case of corruption in Denmark. Corruption does not manifest itself as something that can be distinguished and acted upon and becomes very intricately tied to the state machinery. He talks about two prominent means of corruption-  financing of political parties and foreign bribery and shows how this relates to the case of influence markets, where networks of influence hold power over the institutional machinery so much so that it becomes impossible to differentiate between what is legal and what is not. As Mr. Sreekumar puts it -”the key is in the details and the minor loophole in the law which make a difference.”

The main argument of this essay is how Aristotle’s idea of subjectivity becomes important in such contexts. The use of a given neo liberal scenario to measure corruption in different countries without taking into account the structural differences that exist is problematic. This is also the crux of what Michael Johnston argues in his paper called Reflection and Reassessment -that there is a need for research that understands varying types of corruption between countries and that the current manner of grouping of corrupt countries is ineffective.

The essay brings out this issue. Using Aristotle as a reference point, it tries to engage in an argument about how subjectivity matters and that it is not always a law breaking activity.

INDONESIA : A SOCIAL PERSPECTIVE OF CORRUPTION BY ANGITHA.S

Ms. Angitha’s essay on Suharto’s regime in Indonesia brings into picture the work of Francis Fukuyama and analyzes corruption in Suharto’s regime as a problem of lack of social trust. The presence of social trust is linked to the environment that a society is a part of. In the case of Indonesia, formation of associations with family members and lack of trust with others become the main reason for corruption scandals. She equates lack of trust to particularised trust in the case of families and lack of ‘shared fate’

The essay gives two examples of corruption, Suharto corruption case and the Hambalang corruption case. At first sight, we associate both examples with nepotism and not with social trust. 

Though the author does not use the term anywhere, the main crux of this essay is to correlate nepotism, or the practice of favouring relatives and friends to a wider concept of lack of social trust in the context of Indonesia. I believe the essay could have more compelling had it dwelt more on this line of thought in the conclusion.

INDONESIA:CORRUPTION IN SUHARTO’S REGIME BY AVIENAASH

Mr. Avienaash’s essay on corruption argues for a completely different way of looking at the corruption in Indonesia. It talks about how corruption was infact a reason for economic progress. The lax environmental and labor laws and prevalence of high rent seeking by government officials led to an increase in foreign investment.

Unlike Ms. Angitha’s essay which looks at corruption in Indonesia as a problem of lack of social trust and lack of a sense of ‘shared fate’ in the society, this essay looks at corruption as the result of tight networks that are formed across private and public sectors which are beneficial to both the parties.

As opposed to lack of trust being the  key cause of corruption thereby emphasising the social aspect in the precious essay, this essay looks at rational behaviour and its emphasis is on careful calculation and weighing of incentives.

The key point of this essay is that every stakeholder involved (including the society in general) had strong incentives not to do anything about the widespread corruption.

Though this article presents its arguments in a very concise manner, I believe using a single example to explain his theory would have furthered the author’s agenda significantly.