A translation of a piece of the article:
Don't feel like writing a thesis? In Indonesia then you rent a joki
In Indonesia, there is plenty of fraud at universities. Status is more important than knowledge. Ghostwriters write theses and dissertations. „Nobody here reads a book.”
An Australian English teacher received about 5,000 to 10,000 US dollars when he delivered a ready-made thesis. For years he earned a large sum of money from wealthy children, civil servants and politicians who do want the social benefits that an academic title in Indonesia brings, but are not able or willing to do the work for it.
The Australian, who does not want his name in the newspaper, talks about his experiences as a joki in a coffee shop in Jakarta, as the Indonesian term for academic ghostwriters goes. „The amount of payment depends on the amount of work. Sometimes the research material has already been collected.” In other cases, there is only an idea, he explains. „And sometimes the person has already made a plan and he or she got stuck.”
Such fraud is punishable in Indonesia, but still widespread. In July, Tempo Magazine described how a network of eleven professors at the Lambung Mangkurat University in South Kalimantan published fake articles in dubious scientific journals. They did so to meet the requirements of their appointments.
Government officials were also involved in the fraud, including bribery. A true 'professor's mafia', writes the magazine. The revelation followed the suspension of dean Kumba Digdowiseiso of the Technical Institute PLN in Jakarta, after scientist Ilias Alami, affiliated with the University of Cambridge, suddenly saw his own articles appear under the name Digdowiseiso. The dean is said to have written no less than 160 scientific publications in 2024 alone. That work has now come in a different light.
Alarming observation
It is not only professors and civil servants who are guilty of publication fraud. The Jakarta Post newspaper recently came up with the alarming observation that it is fully accepted for many students to use a ghostwriter for a thesis. "As long as you understand the matter, hiring a joki is okay," a student explains to the newspaper. On special websites, jokis offer their services for rates between 30 and 130 dollars per hour – an article, thesis or thesis can be ordered in no time. Looking at the supply, it is a large industry.
Research figures support this impression. Indonesia is number two in the world in the field of academic deception, after Kazakhstan, according to two Prague researchers in the journal Quantitative Science Studies in 2022. It concerns three types of fraud: dubious publications in fake magazines (no quality requirements as long as you pay); plagiarism and hiring a joki, a ghostwriter.
The fraud culture is a legacy of the autocratic Suharto period, says the Australian. Under his reign, Soeharto ruled from 1967 to 1998, there was plenty of corruption, nepotism and self-enrichment. „Everyone with power bought his or her academic title from a 'title mill', a fraudulent academic institute. It wasn't even illegal.” He himself first came into contact with the fraud in 1996, two years before the fall of Suharto. "I worked in the Sudirman building, here in the heart of Jakarta," he continues. "Every now and then two foreigners came by. I knew who they were. Expired alcoholics, pricked in a business suit, so that they looked acceptable. They sold academic titles to people from business and politics. For five thousand US dollars each, if I remember correctly.”
Many Indonesians attach a title to their name, says Tristam Moeliono (58), research leader in legal philosophy at the Faculty of Law of the Catholic Parahyangan University of Bandung. „I think it's still a remnant of feudal culture.” Students and their parents are also mainly concerned with the title. They hope to climb the social ladder faster. „Students get angry when I ask difficult questions in exams. Don’t you want us to succeed, they say.”
Knowledge gathering is subordinate to many students, says Moeliono, who received his doctorate from Leiden University in 2011. „In Leiden, study life is concentrated around the library. No one here reads a book.” Partly because few students speak English, he says. Most students get to know each other through lectures and limit themselves to the teaching materials provided to them. „They do not venture into international literature.”
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