Re-conceptualizing Organizational Research in Indonesia ........

34 Re-conceptualizing Organizational Research in Indonesia ........

and Rowan 1977). Widely practiced within the government bureaucracies and

intensified by the bureaucratic-authoritarian regime of the government, the process of institutionalization of the systems and structures had been widely accepted by the organizations and Indonesian society.

Decoupling/loosely

coupling, therefore, becomes a significant issue and justified because formal structures,

not necessarily adopted for efficiency but primarily for legitimacy. Private institutions had been widely imitating the way the New Order government managed the state.

The modeling could be explained from two points of view. First, the New Order government's cultures, value:

and practices

had achieved institutional status and become powerful myths, thereby those

institutions needed

view, causally initiated

to conform to obtain legitimacy. Within this

accounting practices are used to

i m p r o v e p e r c e i v e d o r g a n i z a t i o n a l l e g i t i m a c y * . T h e u s e a c c o r d i n g l y is s y m b o l i c . Second, as a process, the institutionalization of the myths into the institutions was overwhelmingly political and reflected the interests and relative power of the institutions' power holders over other stakeholders.

The process of institutionalization at the organizational level can be associated with what Hardy (1996) called the mobilization of power over resources, decision-making and meanings. Those hold the power intentionally exercised the organization's resources to modify staff behaviour by using “carrot

a n d s t i c k ” a p p r o a c h e s a n d c o n c e n t r a t i n g d e c i s i o n m a k i n g p r o c e s s e s in t h e i r hands. Exploiting language of the organizational development - a terminology that widely exercised by government officials to deter those who opposed government policies and actions, for instance, can influence staff perception, cognitions and preferences to accept existing power - to legitimize and "rationalize” domination of power holder.

Concepts of class, status groups and party of Weber can be used to enrich the analysis of the political struggle to exclude certain groups of ethnic and religion from organizations and the motives of the institutionalization process. It can be explained, for instance, when by design, those in power appointed staff members from his religious or ethnic group to dominate managerial positions in order to maintain and strengthen their position. At the end, the practices support the power holder.

The following figure 3 shows the proposed organizational research framework

intend to analyze the institutionalization

that can

be used

Order cultural

and

political values n o

+ T h i s v a l u e h a d b e e n t a k i n g p l a c e a n d w i d e l y a c c e p t i n g b y I n d o n e s i a n s o c ie t> >na.

he New Order era of president Suharto.

Vol. 14, AY>. / , August 2006 © Centre fo r Indonesian Accounting and Management Research Postgraduate Program, P rv"-ihr\u />//' rrsitv

The International Journal o f Accounting and Business Society 35

organizations. The institutionalized processes that lead to organizational success may be considered “remote from the effect of efficient technical processes” (Roggerkamp and White, 2001,

1058). This framework provides incentives o t h e r t h a n e f f i c i e n c y a n d e f f e c t i v e n e s s t h a t d r i v e o r g a n i z a t i o n a l b e h a v i o u r in which hypothetico-deductive research methodology that relies on statitistical data analysis is seldom to catch the phenomena.

p.

Vol. 14, No. I, A ugust 2006

Centre fo r Indonesian Accounting and M anagement Research Postgraduate Program, Brawijaya University