The Ambivalence of Acceptance: Nrimo, Governmentality, and the Hidden Transcripts of Workplace Power
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.62033/iasjol.v3i2.219Keywords:
Nrimo, Coping mechanism, Workplace power relationsAbstract
Studies on power relations in the workplace are often dominated by Western perspectives that view phenomena such as quiet quitting or boundary setting solely as economic transactional calculations. This study challenges this view by arguing that in the Indonesian context, particularly Javanese culture, these phenomena are modern manifestations of nrimo. Contrary to the common understanding that equates nrimo with passive resignation, this study reconceptualizes it through Scott's Hidden Transcript analytical framework, an infrapolitical strategy for negotiating power imbalances without disrupting the social order. This study synthesizes Scott's Infrapolitics (hidden Transcript), Indigenous Psychology, and Foucauldian discourse analysis (discipline, normalization, governmentality) to examine how workers reinterpret global media discourse on labor resistance. Through an interpretive qualitative approach to a corpus of online news, the findings reveal three main mechanisms: (1) Selective Compliance as a form of strategic acceptance, where formal compliance is maintained for the sake of harmony (rukun) while energy is withdrawn to protect oneself; (2) Boundary Protection as a technology of the self to maintain inner sanity (r) from exploitation that is often wrapped in familial rhetoric; and (3) Exit as Negotiation as a silent protest when the space for voice is suppressed.
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