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Leadership for public sector reforms in Indonesia involves both national level efforts and leadership from local levels that have been empowered by prior decentralization. This chapter focuses on reforms made by the national government, which has been guided by the values of serving public, increasing efficiency and becoming corruption-free. Although the National Development Agency and the Ministry for Administrative Reform provided central impetus and coordination, reforms were seen as quite fragmented across ministries with uneven results. The authors are concerned about reform effectiveness and sustainability. Reform leadership is challenged by human capital and legally mandated but inefficient bureaucratic processes and structures as well as challenges of public distrust and disobedient civil servants. The latter is sometimes dealt with by using patronage to insert allies for reform, and they take note of leaders gaining leverage from working across boundaries and jurisdictions, and by improving their authorizing environment. The chapter describes a strategy of leaders-led efforts that are cascaded through ministries through institutionalization (e.g., of policies) and obtaining support from successive reform champions at different levels and locations. The authors argue for increasing the number of ‘champion leaders’ who pragmatically, transactionally and successfully get subordinates to commit to reform efforts.

Reforms in corporate governance in selected Asian countries were introduced after the financial crisis of 1997–1998. After the financial collapse, several crisis-affected economies overhauled their corporate governance, strengthening market forces, implementing tougher regulations and focusing on transparency in decision-making and accountability. Since then, a commitment to improving corporate governance has grown as governments recognised the need to protect investors’ interests, reduce systemic market risks, maintain financial stability and enhance investors’ confidence to encourage the return of capital to the region through better accountability and transparency. The incentive for corporations to follow best practice is to boost their corporate performance and attract investment. Effective corporate governance is also recognised as essential for economic growth. Governments are realising that good governance of corporations is a source of competitive advantage and critical to economic and social progress.

Since the financial crisis, corporate governance has become a key policy issue in most of Asia. Progress in reforming corporate governance, however, has been uneven across Asia. This paper documents that progress.

Post-crisis policy measures in Asia have focussed on banking sector and market reform. The paper argues that in order to propel growth, banking and market reform in Asia must be undertaken with the view that they are not mutually exclusive competitive tradeoffs. Rather banks and markets must be viewed as complementary supportive pillars in a financial system. Additionally, legal and functional reform must be undertaken simultaneously. The paper proposes that a likely consequence of doing so will enable creating a four-pillared multi-dimensional growth paradigm in the region to help restore and promote growth.

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to understand the roles of corporate governance reforms in Malaysia following the 1997/1998 Asian crisis from the perspectives of corporate managers.

Design/methodology/approach – The primary evidence used is drawn from a series of in-depth semi-structured interviews with Malaysian corporate managers involved in the overseeing of the governance structures within their companies.

Findings – This study shows that most interviewees believed that an appropriate corporate governance system could play a role in resolving the problems associated with the interlocking and concentrated corporate ownership structure in Malaysia. However, the effectiveness of the corporate governance reforms in dealing with this issue is questionable. It also reveals that Malaysian companies ‘changed’ their corporate governance practices predominantly to recover (foreign) investor confidence lost during the crisis and to fulfil the legal requirements enforced by the government, where the latter was under pressure from the international community (especially, the World Bank and IMF) to ‘improve’ the Malaysian corporate governance practices after the crisis.

Originality/value of paper – This paper adds to the literature on corporate governance, especially in the context of developing countries. Prior research investigating corporate governance issues in developing countries has been limited, particularly the lack of in-depth examination of corporate governance practices from the perspectives of corporate managers. This paper will be of great value to researchers and practitioners seeking to gain a better understanding of the roles of corporate governance in Malaysia.

Why reform government? The answer to this question varies relative to context and timing. Sometimes reform is stimulated by a shortage of financial resources. Sometimes it is brought on by a change in political power. At other times it may be forced by citizen demand. And, at times it results as a response to corruption and scandal. Moreover, in many cases, more than one of these aspects work together to push forward government reform. This is also why reformers adopt various strategies ranging from institutional reorganization, rationalization of administrative procedures, introduction of new managerial techniques, and more recently, implementation of e-government.

Willard A. Hanna's astute observation above about the institutionalization of corruption in Indonesia was published in August 1971, five years after President Soeharto assumed power. The origins of corruption in Indonesia can be traced to the Dutch colonial period as bribery was rife among the lowly paid personnel of the Dutch East India Company (Day, 1966, pp. 100–103). However, corruption became institutionalized during President Soeharto's 32-year reign as his cronies and family “made an art form of creaming off many of Indonesia's most profitable ventures … while being protected by monopoly regulations and their relationship to the president” (Kingsbury, 1998, p. 202). Raymond Bonner (1988, p. 80) has used the euphemism “the family business” to describe “the corruption surrounding members of the Suharto family,” which was “a public secret” in 1988.

The most crucial challenge facing Islamic Financial Institutions (IFIs) is the full compliance of their activities with shari'ah principles. The complexity of IFIs requires Otoritas Jasa Keuangan (OJK, Indonesian Financial Services Authority) to adopt a good shari'ah governance framework to address shari'ah risks of Islamic banking and financial institutions (IBFIs). However, the current shari'ah governance structure in Indonesia is far from ideal compared to the international best practice. This chapter proposes a new shari'ah governance framework by involving shari'ah supervisory board authority (Otoritas Dewan Pengawas Syariah) under the commissioners of OJK to oversight, regulate, and supervise the shari'ah matters for IBFIs in Indonesia. The chapter discusses the challenges in adopting this new framework. The chapter concludes that the current shortcomings of the proper shari'ah governance framework for shari'ah supervision and regulation requires a new shari'ah board authority under the commissioners of OJK who has full authority over shari'ah matters.

An important agency of the government is its civil service or bureaucracy. The civil service has the potential to empower a government to achieve a country's goals, that is, to improve its citizens’ standard of living. The ability of a civil service to successfully support the government depends heavily on the characteristics of the civil service. In the case of Indonesia, the civil service is slow; lacks transparency, accountability, initiative; and is sometimes corrupt. Therefore Indonesia's civil service is badly in need of reform, both in relation to its institutional aspects as well as in relation to moral issues.

This chapter reports the progress of corporate governance reforms in nine East Asian economies as disclosed through two independent studies. The first study is a stock-taking exercise to take note of on-going reforms in corporate governance rules and regulations through a scorecard on corporate governance conducted by experts among the regional economies. The second study covers perceptions of the implementation and enforcement of corporate governance rules as seen by fund managers and analysts. The two studies yield different results, indicating a divergence between the regulatory environment and market perceptions of corporate governance practices in the nine economies.