Colonial Normativity

moves to Indonesia’s period of dictatorship under Suharto (1967-1998), with a focus on the International Governmental Group on Indonesia (IGGI). With no freedom of press, dominance of the army in political and economic spheres and Golkar (Indonesia’s ruling party), as well as related institutions having a firm grip on civil society, corruption was discussed at international fora, but could hardly be addressed within Indonesia. This inter/national interaction will be investigated with a focus on the IGGI, which was established after Suharto’s rise to power in 1967. It was chaired by the Netherlands and its policy backed by the Asian Development Bank’s (ADB), International Monetary Fund (IMF), World Bank (WB) and United Nations Development Program (UNDP). IGGI decided on multilateral aid (mostly loans) to Indonesia, including the conditions. Indonesia’s IGGI 5-year programmes were constantly discussed alongside political human rights and corruption/good governance debates (Posthumus, 2000). By 1992 Suharto no longer accepted Dutch criticism; the Dutch left the consortium. Thus, these IGGI-negotiations, their impact on Indonesia’s economic and political power dynamics, and their relationship to the growing international sphere of global justice invoke the question of whether and how previous mutual (Dutch and Indonesian) experiences with corruption and corruption critique (i.e. Dutch ethical policy and Indonesian anti-colonial nationalist critique), informed these good governance and developmental projects. The research is embedded in the broader context of political and economic models for promoting and guiding development in former colonies, that were based on high-trust in modernisation schemes (Fakih 2014), famously summarised by the US sociologist Samuel Huntington in 1968: ‘[t]he differences in the level of corruption which may exist between modernized and the politically developed societies of the Atlantic World and those of Latin America, Africa and Asia in large part reflect their differences in political modernization and political development,’ (Huntington, 1968). Although maybe less outspoken, Dutch actors subscribed to the link between serious corruption and modernisation, with a conception of successful Dutch modernisation in mind (Brasz & Wertheim, 1961; Kroeze, 2016). The project also fills a lacuna in Indonesian historiography, which did not systematically analyse how postcolonial Indonesian elites and the public made use of ‘colonial norms’ for individual or group benefitting (Purwanto, 2009, 2015). Clearly, the aim of development aid was to bring prosperity and end corruption, but it also led to activities associated with KKN (Korupsi, Kolusi, Nepotisme) (Noor, 2015; Purwanto, 2015; Pranoto, 2008; Nekkers & Malcontent, 2000). Besides the overall questions (see above), specific questions include: what ideas and models can be distinguished from the debates within the IGGI-group? In the IGGI discourse, what are the causes and consequences of corruption? How did these debates impact policy proposals, including norm-setting? The case will be internationally compared (with Singapore and others). Sources include IGGI’s archives, the military and relevant ministries in Netherlands and Indonesia. Moreover, academic, political and media debates about corruption and development are analysed (including Ontwikkelingshulp dossier).