Urban Anthropology
Fieldwork in the Corporate Offices of Jakarta, Indonesia
This chapter raises important issues about the efficiency of traditional ethnographic fieldwork techniques in transnational corporate settings. William Leggette conducted his fieldwork in Jakarta, Indonesia. He depicts this culture as a “multi-ethnic, multi-cultural landscape [that] promotes a constant sense of dislocation-for both resident and visitor alike”(75). There are noticeable contrasts between the class systems in this city, as skyscrapers overshadow the decrepit and numerous tin-roof shanties. Leggette started his ethnography when he got hired as a “consultant” for a transnational corporate office. According to him, “The ethics of ethnography are deeply enmeshed in an ideology of providing a voice for the world’s most marginal populations”(78) Leggette’s ethnography became compromised the second he was hired by this corporation. The corporate setting conflicted with the anthropological ethics defined above. As he became an instrument for corporate profit, he noticed the dog-eat-dog corporate culture. Particularly, when he realized that the corporation never intended to uphold a national law that consisted of training local employees for a potential future as executives. Instead, these local employees were kept at mid-level management and never anything above that. He admits that employees that were lower in hierarchy were “ethnographic failures”. Upon his termination (and many other employees due to the economic crisis) lead to insightful relationships with those who were once considered “ethnographic failures”. Moreover, he argues that although his ethnography was one-sided while he worked in the corporation, if it weren’t for his employment there he would not have had these relationships. His research argued the traditional ethnographic notion of a long-term engagement in a particular place. Furthermore, the ‘place’ of urban research shifts as people shift. He also notes that his position
This chapter raises important issues about the efficiency of traditional ethnographic fieldwork techniques in transnational corporate settings. William Leggette conducted his fieldwork in Jakarta, Indonesia. He depicts this culture as a “multi-ethnic, multi-cultural landscape [that] promotes a constant sense of dislocation-for both resident and visitor alike”(75). There are noticeable contrasts between the class systems in this city, as skyscrapers overshadow the decrepit and numerous tin-roof shanties. Leggette started his ethnography when he got hired as a “consultant” for a transnational corporate office. According to him, “The ethics of ethnography are deeply enmeshed in an ideology of providing a voice for the world’s most marginal populations”(78) Leggette’s ethnography became compromised the second he was hired by this corporation. The corporate setting conflicted with the anthropological ethics defined above. As he became an instrument for corporate profit, he noticed the dog-eat-dog corporate culture. Particularly, when he realized that the corporation never intended to uphold a national law that consisted of training local employees for a potential future as executives. Instead, these local employees were kept at mid-level management and never anything above that. He admits that employees that were lower in hierarchy were “ethnographic failures”. Upon his termination (and many other employees due to the economic crisis) lead to insightful relationships with those who were once considered “ethnographic failures”. Moreover, he argues that although his ethnography was one-sided while he worked in the corporation, if it weren’t for his employment there he would not have had these relationships. His research argued the traditional ethnographic notion of a long-term engagement in a particular place. Furthermore, the ‘place’ of urban research shifts as people shift. He also notes that his position