Coping mechanisms toward workplace aggression in the public sector: The case study of Indonesian street-level bureaucrats

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COPING MECHANISMS TOWARD WORKPLACE AGGRESSION

IN THE PUBLIC SECTOR

The Case Study of Indonesian Street-level Bureaucrats

Master Thesis

Author: Ayu Amaliah Indira (S1888536)

Supervisor: Dr. N.J. Raaphorst

Second Reader: Dr. A.D.N. Kerkhoff

Master of Science Public Administration

Faculty of Governance and Global Affairs

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CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION

The topic of workplace aggression has attracted much attention of scholars lately as it has been considered an important concern in many organizations across countries (Howard and Wechs, 2012; Hills and Joyce, 2013; Van de Boosche et al., 2013 in Fischer et al., 2016). Especially considering some studies have found the widespread presence of aggression in the working environment (Mayhew and Chappell, 2007) and how they might negatively affect both the victims, for instance, stress and increased burnouts (Bowling and Beehr, 2006) and the organizations where victims work, such as higher absenteeism and excessive turnover among staffs (Barling, 1996).

However, most literature focus on the internal workplace aggression, which is initiated by co-workers or supervisors. While according to Barling et al. (2009), most evidence found the prevalence of external workplace aggression which is undertaken by external actors, such as clients, patients, pupils and citizens in general (Barling et al., 2009 in Fischer et al., 2016). Workplace aggression may happen in every type of organizations, including the public sector (Barling et al., 2009; Baron and Neuman, 1996). The occurrence of citizen-initiated aggression in the public sector might be caused by the monopoly position of the public organization. When they are not treated well and realizing that they do not have any alternative providers for the type of service or benefits gained from the public organization, citizens might express their frustration toward public employees by conducting aggression. It can range from verbal aggression (such as shouting), threats (threatening directly or indirectly), property damage (damaging office property, damaging the employee’s vehicle) and physical aggression (punching). (Tummers et al., 2016).

The citizen-initiated aggression brings pressures and conflict that frontline workers have to face while maintaining their daily jobs. Lipsky argues that in response to the challenges

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that they face, street-level bureaucrats often routinize or simplify their daily work as an endeavor to decrease complexity, acquire control over their work and to deal with stress. This routinization and simplification, which are parts of coping mechanisms, then become the public policies that street-level bureaucrats carry out. (Lipksy, 2010).

According to Tummers et al. (2015), there are three possible ways of coping strategies that street-level bureaucrats can develop to manage their work pressures, namely moving toward client, moving away from client and moving against client. While the first one essentially benefits the clients, the other two benefit the officers more. (Tummers et al., 2015; De Boer, 2015, p. 5). Based on their review of literature regarding coping during the delivery of public policy from 1981 to 2004, Tummers et al. (2015) assess the types of coping mostly found in different kind of professions in public sector, namely social workers, teachers, healthcare professionals and police officers. Indeed, the last two professions, namely the medical workers and police officers have become the focal points of literature that study the aggressive behavior conducted by citizens since the cases of citizen aggressions seem to be more prevalent in both professions. (Pan et al., 2015; Boafo et al., 2015; Magnavita and Heponiemi, 2012; Chapman et al., 2010; Van Reemst et al., 2015; Scalora et al., 2003).

Nevertheless, scholars have scarcely paid attention to study the aggressive behavior in the public workplace initiated by citizens toward other types of public frontline worker (Fischer et al., 2016, p. 31), for instance, regulatory inspectors such as tax officers. The number of citizen aggression cases dealt with the latter profession may seem less prevalent compared to its fellow law enforcement officers such as police officers. Yet, the risks of being exposed to aggressive behavior of non-compliant citizens are similarly embedded in the nature of their works. As a part of their audit process, tax officials have to conduct direct interactions with their citizen-clients in order to investigate the correctness of their tax returns. However, these are not routine interactions for both parties and depend on how they perceive the intrusiveness of the investigations or the impact of the investigation’s outcome (e.g., the obligations to pay,

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prosecutions), the citizens can be stressed out and unleash their exasperation toward the other party. (Dubois, 2014, p. 47). The risk of experiencing the tensions is increased outside the office, where the officers are on the inspection site since it is more difficult for them to control both their clients and the situation that they encounter. (Raaphorst, 2017, p. 10). Moreover, the level of the risks might be even higher for the tax officials in developing countries, in which the number of non-compliant taxpayers who resist the authority’s effort to make them pay their taxes accordingly is relatively high (Sarker, 2003; IMF, 2015; Morisset and Cunningham, 2015). Perhaps, the case of two tax officers in Indonesia who were murdered by a taxpayer and his accomplices upon carrying out their duties to collect taxes (Gunawan and Rika, 2016; Hermansyah, 2016) can be a manifestation of citizen aggression against frontline regulatory inspectors in a developing country in an extreme level. This might be a rare case, but it does not rule out the number of less severe cases as indicated by the spoke person for the Indonesian National Tax Office who said that although this was the first case which involves murder, there have been a number of attacks on tax officers on several occasions. (Gunawan and Rika, 2016).

1.1 Research Questions

Inspired by the case, this research aims to examine the cases of aggressive behaviors conducted by citizens towards tax auditors in their workplace and linking the empirical facts with the theory of coping strategies by Tummers et al. (2015). The purpose of this research is to get the insights of what type of coping strategies are used by the officials to deal with the citizen-initiated aggression and furthermore, what factors that can explain their preferences of coping strategies. Thus, the research question for this study is formulated as:

“What kind of coping strategies do street-level bureaucrats exercise to deal with

pressures resulting from workplace aggression initiated by citizens and how can they be explained?”

This research is structured as follows; the second chapter provides literature reviews in which the conceptual framework of street-level bureaucrats, workplace aggression in the public

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sector, typology of coping behaviors and the possible explanatory factors that drive the street-level bureaucrats in exercising the coping strategies is built. The research design which includes the selection of respondents within the case and the methodology for data collection and analysis will be explained in the following chapter. The fourth chapter presents the findings and the analysis of the empirical findings. Lastly, the final chapter provides the conclusion of the analysis as well as the limitation and contribution to existing literature.

1.2 Relevance of the study

Many literatures have incorporated the situational characteristics in workplace environment, such as technological changes, professional pressures, organizational reforms, increasing demand or decreasing resources to explain coping behaviors (Buffat, 2015; Noordegraaf, 2011; Savi and Randma-Liiv, 2015; Hupe and Buffat, 2014). The first reason is that the situational characteristics are prevalent in the public service delivery. (Winter, 2002 in De Boer, 2015). Another reason is because situational characteristics can lead to role conflicts which may arise when the policy as written is conflicted with the demand from the clients or with the professional values of the street-level bureaucrats. These conflicts affect the way the frontline workers cope. For instance, they can make use the instrumental actions to solve a chronic situation or use their personal resources to assist the clients. It confirms a finding in the psychology literature which states that specific coping behaviors are situational; it depends on how the frontline workers assess the stressful context. (Tummers et al., 2015; Folkman and Moskowitz, 2000).

Nevertheless, using situational characteristics is more helpful in determining the coping behaviors rather than to explain them. (Winter, 2002 in De Boer, 2015). Indeed, it is not easy to clearly elucidate the coping behaviors. Even Lipsky’s work (2010) focuses more on identifying the patterns instead of providing explanation or mechanisms behind the coping behaviors (De Boer, 2015). Tummers et al. (2015), whose typology is what this study built upon, also do not contribute to a comprehensive story to explain how the patterns of behavior work. (Tummers et al., 2015). Therefore, in order to generate a deeper understanding on the

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coping behaviors in the context of citizen-initiated aggression, uncovering why and how the officers cope the way they cope is necessary.

Furthermore, it is rare to find the coping literature that counts the workplace aggression initiated by citizens as a situational characteristic in the public administration field. Instead, numerous studies link the workplace aggression with coping behaviors in the organizational behavior and psychology field, where the explanatory mechanisms focus more on either how the workers and the organizations can reduce the adverse effects of the coping or what potentially cause the aggression. (See: Baron and Neuman, 1996; Prof and Yagil, 2005; Fredericksen and McCorckle, 2013; Barling et al., 2009). Accordingly, theorizing what possibly explains the coping behaviors of public frontline workers towards citizen aggression in this context is exploratory in nature.

This study aims to generate insights on how street-level bureaucrats respond by citizen-initiated aggression by proposing several theoretical mechanisms behind the coping strategies, on the ground of Tummers et al.’s (2015) theoretical review of coping families, and empirically test them. The findings are expected to bring not only additional knowledge to the street-level bureaucracy literature where the study of possible mechanisms behind the coping behaviors is negligible but also yield a more in-depth understanding of how public policy in the street-level is produced, especially in the context of citizen aggression. Moreover, considering previous studies of coping in the context of workplace aggression were mostly discussed through the lens of medical or psychology, this study seeks to be aligned with public administration scholarship by understanding how street-level bureaucrats translate the way they manage or reduce stress resulted from citizen aggression into public policy. Indeed, how the public officers cope with their stress and translate it into action toward their citizen-clients substantially affects the quality of public service delivery and the legitimacy of public agencies, both of which are the subject of concern of not only scholars but also policymakers and citizens. (May and Winter, 2009; West, 2004; Hupe and Hill, 2007 in Tummers et al., 2015).

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CHAPTER 2 LITERATURE REVIEW AND CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK

2.1 Street-level bureaucrats

Street-level bureaucrats refer to frontline workers in government agencies or public organizations such as the nurses, doctors, police officers and teachers. These people are the public policy implementers. Working in the public sector provides unique attributes to these public employees. As a group, they are characterized by their regular interactions with citizens and the power to exercise considerable leeway over the benefits, services or sanctions received by the citizens. At the same time, they also have many challenges such as inadequate resources, ever-growing demand for their services, and other work pressures, including the constraints stemmed from the workplace aggression. These pressures lead them to exercise coping strategies in order to maintain their work and manage their stress. (Lipksy, 2010).

Street-level bureaucrats do not exercise coping all the time as the workload in the public sector is dynamic. There are times when the balance between job resources and demand of services can be relatively attainable to acquire, but in other times, the frontline workers might find it difficult to manage the caseloads in under-resourced and stressful conditions. As they gain experience, their response to handle the challenges of their job might also change over time. (Lipsky, 2010, p. xviii). For instance, when frontline workers are facing citizen-clients who use threats to grant them a service which might not be eligible for them, they might know how to manage the situation as they have experienced a similar situation beforehand or because they learned from their colleagues’ experience. However, in the first-time situations, or in other conditions, such as when the caseloads are intensified or reform at the workplace, the frontline workers will likely to exercise their coping strategies. (Lipsky, 2010).

Street-level bureaucrats are able to exercise their coping mechanisms because of two particular features embedded in their position; the relatively high level of discretion and their relative autonomy from the superior’s control (Lipsky, 2010, p. 13). However, this does not

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mean that rules and directives from their superiors do not constrain the street-level bureaucrats. In contrast, these rules and norms play a significant part in shaping the policy choices of the frontline workers. (Lipsky, 2010, p. 14). This is in line with their status as the state-agents “who

act in response to rules, procedures and law” (Maynard-Moody and Musheno, 2000, p. 329).

The literature regarding citizen-initiated workplace aggression in public sector has been increasingly focused on the medical service, with mostly nurses as the victims who experience the aggression by either their patients or the family/relatives of the patients. (Pan et al., 2015; Boafo et al., 2015; Magnavita and Heponiemi, 2012; Chapman et al., 2010). Law enforcement officers, especially the police officers, are also among the focal points of the scholars in the area of workplace aggression. (Van Reemstet et al., 2015; Scalora et al., 2003). It might be due to the risk embedded in the kind of professions. In the occupational context, certain professions who provide service, care, advice, sanctions or education are at greatest increased risk for aggression (Amandus et al., 1996; LeBlanc and Kelloway, 2002 in Barling et al., 2009), especially when the clients, patients, inmates, or customers are experiencing frustration, insecurity or stress (Lamberg, 1996; Painter, 1987 in Barling et al., 2009). Moreover, it is also found that generally, most risk factors are more prevalent in law enforcement jobs than in other professions. (Lord, 1998; Piquero et al., 2013 in Fischer et al., 2016).

Far less attention has been paid to regulatory inspectors, such as tax officers. These are the other groups of public frontline workers related to law enforcement but with less degree of authority compared to the other law enforcement agents, particularly police officers. The risks of facing citizen aggression can also be found in their workplace since they conduct direct interactions with the citizens while enforcing tax laws and regulations. In making decisions regarding the tax payments that citizens ought to pay, these public frontline officers also exercise discretions. For instance, an officer might interpret the implementation of tax regulations or accounting principles differently compared with other colleagues (Johnson et al., 1998). This will result in a different assessment regarding the amount of the tax that citizens

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have to pay. However, since the literatures which focuses on the study of the coping behaviors of regulatory inspectors are still scarce (see Raaphorst, 2017; Cohen and Gershgoren, 2016; Nielsen, 2015, De Boer, 2015), it is interesting to see how tax officials cope with the pressures derived from aggressive citizens who, for instance, deny their obligations to pay their taxes accordingly.

Based on the reasoning, this study conceptualizes tax officials as street-level bureaucrats, more specifically tax auditors, whose task is to ensure that individual and corporate taxpayers pay the correct amount of tax within specified time. As regulatory inspectors, they might encounter conflicts during their interactions with their clients, especially the clients who, presumably to avoid carrying out their tax obligations, might be willing to do anything for their refusal to cooperate, including being aggressive towards the officers to intimidate them. This study aims to capture the process behind the decision-making of the officers during these situations, in terms of how they handle the conflicts and what factors that play behind their decisions.

2.2 Workplace aggression

Aggression in the workplace includes a variety of behaviors, ranging from psychological acts (e.g., shouting) to physical assault (Dupre´ and Barling, 2003 in LeBlanc and Barling, 2004). Moreover, Baron et al. (1999) proposed that aggressive workplace behaviors can be grouped into three categories, expressions of hostility (i.e., hostile verbal or symbolic behaviors, such as ‘‘the silent treatment’’), obstructionism (i.e., behaviors that are designed to hamper the target’s performance, such as refusing to provide needed resources), and overt aggression (e.g., assaults, destruction of property). (Baron et al., 1999 in LeBlanc and Barling, 2004). However, Baron and Neuman (1996) concluded that despite what has been suggested by the media, most aggression takes place in the working environment is verbal, passive, and indirect instead of physical, direct and active. Direct aggression take form when the efforts to harm others are inflicted directly towards the victims while indirect aggression

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entail the situations where the victims are harmed through the actions of other people or by attacking other persons or things valued by the victims, for instance by vandalizing the victims’ property or threatening their family. In addition, imposing harms to the victims is done by conducting certain behaviors in the active forms of aggression and by holding of some actions in the passive forms. (Baron and Neuman, 1996).

Since the clients in the tax audit mostly come from business sectors who relatively are more educated and possess certain powers such as financial, knowledge or even political (Nielsen, 2015), it is more likely that the aggressive behaviors in this context take a verbal, passive and indirect form. For instance, by threatening the tax officials indirectly using their power. However, it does not rule out the possibility that the clients might express their frustration through physical assaults. It might be the case for entrepreneurs on the verge of economic difficulties and face the likelihood of undesirable outcome of the audit. (Raaphorst, 2017). Therefore, in this study, the aggressive behaviors of the citizens are expected to be ranging from verbal, passive and indirect to physical, active and direct form of aggression.

2.3 Coping Definition

The notion of coping has been discussed widely in the literatures across disciplines, in which many definitions have been produced (Antonovsky, 1979; Lazarus, 1966). One of the most notable scholars who contribute to the study of coping is Richard Lazarus (1966), a psychologist who defines coping as “the cognitive and behavioral efforts made to master,

tolerate, or reduce external and internal demands and conflicts among them.” (Folkman and

Lazarus, 1980, p. 223). The street-level bureaucrats use the coping mechanisms to bridge the gap caused by the (ever-growing) demand and the (lack of) resources. (Hupe and Buffat, 2014, p. 551). However, the circumstances around the workloads are dynamics, creating a continuum between very stressful working conditions due to the large gap between demand and resources and the conditions in which it is manageable to balance the demand and the resources. (Lipsky, 2010, p. xviii).

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Both the coping definitions provided by Lazarus and Lipsky comprise two elements of coping; behavioral and cognitive. (De Boer, 2015). Even though there might be a fuzzy line between the behavioral and cognitive dimensions, yet the distinction is required to focus on the behavioral ways of coping during the public frontline workers and citizen interactions. Behavioral coping during the interactions between frontline workers and clients can be exemplified by certain actions such as rule-bending, rule-breaking, routinizing or finding supports from colleagues. On the other side, cognitive coping in public service delivery may take forms of cynicism/compassion towards clients or refusal to have emotional attachment to clients. (Tummers et al., 2015). The link between the cognitive dimension of coping behaviors, especially in response to the pressures stemmed from workplace aggression (such as cynicism or compassion towards clients) have been extensively studied in the literatures of occupational psychology or organizational behaviors (Fredericksen and McCorkle, 2013; Magnavita and Heponiemi, 2012; Vezyridis et al., 2014; Prof and Yagil, 2005). Whilst this study aims to focus on the behavioral aspects of coping and link them to the public administration literatures, especially on how the frontline workers convert their stress into actions toward their citizen-clients. This purpose is especially relevant to uncover the possible mechanisms behind the coping strategies. Hence this study will use the definition of coping mechanisms exercised by public sector employees during public service delivery presented by Tummers et al. (2015) as “behavioral efforts frontline workers employ when interacting with clients, in order to master,

tolerate, or reduce external and internal demands and conflicts they face on an everyday basis.” (Tummers et al., 2015, p. 1101-1102).

2.4 Typology of Coping

Several typologies of coping have been introduced in the literatures (Tummers et al., 2015; Vink et al., 2015; De Boer, 2015). In the public administration field, the most notable stratifications of coping are provided by Lipsky (2010). He argues that the public frontline workers exercise three ways of coping in dealing with the pressures in their workplace.

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The first one is “modification of the client demand”. Frontline workers deal with the stress by restricting the requests of their clients by deploying the symbols of authority. One of the examples is when clients have to wait for their turn in an overcrowded waiting room. By making use of available resources that they have, the street-level bureaucrats try to control their clients in order to gain their compliance. The second type of behavior that the street-level bureaucrats can exercise is called “modifications of the objective of the jobs”. It is when the discretion space come into play. The frontline workers can choose to either increase their discretion; for instance, by accepting to help the clients by doing things they are not required to do; or decrease their discretion, for example the workers may refuse to give in to their client’s demand because they are not allowed to do what the client asks. The last type of coping is “modification of perception of the client”. Frontline workers may reduce their stress by choosing some of their clients that they favor the most to receive their treatment or public policy. This practice is also called as “creaming”. The reason why the workers do this is because that the number of the clients that they must serve is beyond their capacity to handle in the constraints of time or other resources. Creaming can lead to worker bias, which is arisen from the sympathy of the workers towards their clients or personal perceptions of the workers when they assess the “worthiness” of their clients (Lipsky, 2010; Vink et al., 2015, De Boer, 2015).

A more comprehensive typology can be found in the clinical psychology literature. Skinner et al. (2003) proposed a hierarchical classification of coping strategy based on instances; the real responses that the frontline workers perform to deal with stressful working conditions. These instances are in the lowest level of the classification. Together they constitute recognizable types of behaviors which are also called “ways of coping”. Based on their adaptive purposes, these ways of coping are then classified into higher levels of classes, “families of

coping”. Finally, the highest level of the classification, the adaptive process, is built upon the

coping families which mediate the stress and the behavior. Skinner et al. (2003) refer to the process as a “strategy to adaptation”. (Skinner et al., 2003).

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Putting this typology in the context of public service delivery, Tummers et al. (2015) has built three coping families which public frontline workers exercise while dealing with pressures. Based on the relevancy with the purpose of this study, this typology will be used as the theoretical ground for identifying the coping behaviors in the empirical findings.

2.4.1 Moving toward client

The first coping family is moving toward client. Generally, this type of coping can be interpreted as adapting to client’s needs, or in other words, coping in client’s benefit. It is in contrast with the other coping families which cope in workers’ benefit. Modifying the rules to accommodate client’s demand is the most frequent behavior in this coping family. This type of response is known as rule-bending. In essence, officers deal with the conflict between the requirements of rules with what their clients demand by adjusting the rules in such a way that can benefit their clients. (Tummers et al., 2015, p. 1109). For instance, a teacher admits that he used and twisted the system in school to get benefit, not for him, but for the sake of his students. (Maynard-Moody and Musheno, 2003, p. 113).

The coping behavior of moving toward clients which might arise from the case of tax auditors against their aggressive clients can be illustrated as follows. Some taxpayers may use their power, be it money or political power, to intimidate tax auditors due to their reluctance to pay taxes accordingly. As the intimidations might be too severe or they do not have enough experience to handle such pressures, tax auditors are forced to resort to the intimidation by adjusting the rules and exercising more lenient discretions when assessing the taxpayers’ financial report. The outcome that corresponds with the behavior of rule-bending in this study is the tax assessment where the amount of tax is less than what the taxpayers should pay.

The outcome of both illustrations above might be similar, yet the reasons behind them are indeed contradictory. What drives the behavior of the teacher in the first case can be perceived as sympathy and tendency to help his students, while it seems that the reason behind the tax auditor’s behavior is a self-defense mechanism.

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Another behavior in the coping family of moving toward client is known as the rule-breaking. In a sense, it is similar to rule-bending in the previous illustrations, but in a more severe manner where it goes against or neglecting the rules on purpose, instead of working with the rules. This is the kind of behavior which deviates from the goals of the organization and threats the legitimacy of public institutions had this practice been acknowledged by the public.

Finally, giving priorities to specific clients over others is the last way of coping in this family. This is in line with the notion of creaming introduced by Lipksy (2010). Facing more demand that they can provide with lack of resources that they can use, the public frontline workers are forced to make decisions about which clients should be treated first. However, there is no standardization on choosing the priority. Instead, street-level bureaucrats are likely using their personal assessments, such as the readiness of the clients to receive the treatment or using the “triage” model to make a differentiation in processing their clients. (Tummers et al., 2015; Lipsky, 2010, p. 125). This behavior might be beneficial for some clients, but detrimental to other clients, as it does not give equal and fair chances for each client. (Tummers et al., 2015, p. 1109).

2.4.2 Moving away from client

There are two ways in which the frontline workers’ response is moving away from clients. The first one is routinizing, when officers deal with citizens in a standardized way and make it a matter of routine. Routinization is often associated with relatively lower quality of service as the street-level bureaucrats try to deliver the same level of services for every client in a very relatively limited time. One example is when the academics in the UK routinize their jobs to deal with the complex system by signing almost all documents that their students ask to, even though they do not fully understand them. (Tummers et al., 2015). However, unlike the officers who deliver public service in the illustration, officers in the context of this study are law enforcement agents whose function is to deliver sanctions. Therefore, providing

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treatment in a standardized way in their case is comparable with enforcing the laws by following rules and deliver sanction as citizens should receive. In the context of tax auditors facing intimidation from non-compliant taxpayers, they might choose not to submit to the intimidation and perform their duty appropriately in accordance with the rules. They can do this by processing the audit even without cooperation of taxpayers and formally stipulating tax assessments in which the result is delivering sanction as it should be. These are the standard procedures that tax auditors are expected to do under conditions when the cooperation of taxpayers cannot be achieved.

Another way of coping is rationing. It is when the public frontline employees make it more difficult for the citizens to access the public service. It mostly happens in the circumstances of overload work pressure and the public employees have considerable power over the availability of the services. For instance, a police officer can say this to a citizen, “This office is very hectic today, you can come back tomorrow” (Tummers et al., 2015). It is unlikely, however, for rationing to be associated with moving away from clients in the context of this study. Even though tax officers have substantial power over the delivery of sanction but restricting their clients’ access for receiving sanction would lead to benefit the clients, which is in contrast with what moving away from client entails.

2.4.3 Moving against client

Moving against client is the third and last coping family which is associated with

confrontation with citizens. It consists of the behavior of rigid rule following and aggression. Rigid rule following represents inflexible adherence to rules which might result in consequences which are opposed to clients’ demand. Public frontline workers usually rigidly follow the rules as their way to control or giving sanctions to their clients, especially the relatively more demanding and manipulative clients. (Tummers et al., 2015). It is, essentially, the practice of sanctioning and disciplining clients, as mentioned in the literatures on which Tummers et al. (2015) underlie their study. However, Tummer et al. (2015) redefine this

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practice with rigid rule following since the term sanctioning has quite a negative nuance and broad definition. (Tummers et al., 2015, p. 1107-1108). An example is provided by Wright (2003) where a welfare officer tells a citizen who wants to apply or a job that he misses out the opportunity because the vacancy is closed minutes earlier. This illustration depicts the restriction of submission which is created by employers and enforced by the officer. (Wright, 2003, p. 137-138 in Tummers et al., 2015).

In the context of this case, it is possible for tax auditors to rigidly follow the rules by using several means. First of all, it is unlikely for the tax officials for abusing their discretions in the audit process which may lead to higher sanctions for the taxpayers because the regulatory criteria only leave room for maneuvering to the more lenient interpretations but not otherwise. Therefore, different interpretations in the audit process can only bring equivalent or lower sanctions. Instead, they can use other means in the regulations which likely bring more detrimental effects to the aggressive clients, such as proposing a tax investigation and using sealing procedures. As tax investigation is dealing with alleged crime in the field of taxation, it carries out not only administrative sanction, such as fines, but also criminal sanction, such as sentence of imprisonment. While sealing (business) residence negatively affects the clients since it intrudes the running of their business operations which could lead to economic disruptions.

Indeed, as recognized by Tummers et al. (2015), the boundaries between coping behaviors are not clear-cut and there could be association between one another. In the context of this study, the distinction between how tax officers follow the rules in a standardized manner as suggested in moving away from client and how they rigidly follow the rules in moving against client might not be straightforward. Therefore, the author proposes to differentiate both behaviors by looking at the end result, in terms of sanction received by clients. Any following-rule behavior is indicated as routinizing when the tax assessment produce “sanction as it should be” and rigidly following rules when officers’ decisions yield more detrimental effects that can

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be seen as “additional sanction”, such as potential criminal sanction as the consequence of escalation to tax investigation or potential economic disruption as the consequence of sealing procedure.

Another way to move against client is confrontation with citizens which incorporates the behavior of standing up to clients with aggressive tone (Tummers et al., 2015). This is the most relevant response toward aggression initiated by citizen-clients in the workplace. It is also in line with the findings in the organizational behavior literature, which argue that aggression is relational. When a client initiates aggression towards a frontline worker, it is highly likely that the worker will also respond with aggression. (Hershchovis and Reich, 2013). Putting it into the context, officers who are provoked by hostile behaviors of the citizens might have the tendency to confront such offense with another aggression, either verbally or physically.

Based on the discussions above, this study is expecting to find each different type of coping family in the empirical findings. Nonetheless, due to the situational context of the case, only certain ways of coping that can be expected from the respondents’ behaviors. The frontline tax officials can either ignore their client’s aggressive behaviors and work in accordance with the standard procedures which implies the routinizing in the coping family of moving away from clients. It is also possible for them to give in to the client’s demand, due to the severity of intimidations for instance, by using some leeway in making corrections of the tax returns and lead to lower sanctions. Thus, it is compatible with rule-bending in moving toward client. Lastly, the officers might respond to the aggressive behaviors of the clients either by threatening to escalate the audit process to tax investigation which potentially bring not only administrative but also criminal sanctions (Minister of Finance Regulation No. 239, 2014) or by sealing the clients’ business residences which might interrupt the operation of their business or even by confronting in a hostile manner. These behaviors incorporate both rigid-rule following and aggression in the moving against client coping family.

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2.5 Possible explanations behind the coping strategies 2.5.1 Tendency to maintain control

In the bureaucracy context, several procedures require cooperation from citizens so that street-level bureaucrats can run their roles smoothly. The lack or absence of cooperation from citizens is likely to bring obstruction to the delivery of public policy. Hence, it is crucial to control clients to gain their compliance as well as securing the outcome. (Lipsky, 2010). Indeed, the empirical findings in Raaphorst (2017) and Dubois (2014) also suggest that public officers often experience the fear of losing their control and the tendency to get it back in frontline interactions, especially during ambiguous situations where they face uncertainty. The uncertainty which could be stemmed from either the nature of the case that does not fit within existing legal criteria or out-of-control situations might lead to unpredictable outcome. Therefore, the first step to secure the result is by keeping the situation, hence the client, under control. (Dubois, 2014; Raaphorst, 2017).

In this study, the tendency to maintain control is proposed to steer the behavior of officers to either move away from client or against client. The former is related to emotional resistance to maintain self-control. Self-control is especially required in situations where client intentionally and manipulatively launches tactics to emotionally affect officers, such as by using aggressive attitudes or strategies aims to arouse pity, to get what they want. To prevent personal bias influences their decision, officers often use legalism and formalism to curb such provocations. These resources enable them to “stay technical” (Dubois, 2014, p. 49), for instance by saying something like “Rules are rules”. By controlling themselves from being emotionally provoked, officers aim for making the situation under control which consequently, enable them to work in accordance with procedures in a standard manner.

On the other hand, the tendency to maintain control could also drive officers to move against their client demand. Public frontline workers will not easily let an offense to their authority remain indisputable, as doing so will teach the contrary wisdom, that lack of

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compliance will not be punished. (Lipsky, 2010, 62-63). It is part of teaching client role, as to show client what is expected from them and what the consequences are if they deviate from the expectations. (Lipsky, 2010, p. 61). Sometimes, to establish the expected behavior of clients, street-level bureaucrats manipulate their public image to threaten back aggressive citizens. For instance, police officers send signals to offenders that they are ready to use violence if it is required. (Lipsky, 2010). Similarly, in the context of this study, tax officials might use the procedures of tax investigation or sealing to threaten uncooperative clients. By this way, officers strive for controlling the misbehave of their clients by showing them the negative consequences that could be imposed on them if they fail to comply.

2.5.2 Self-interest

The notion that self-interest drives the exercise of discretion comes from the narratives of state-agent. Maynard-Moody and Musheno (2003) argue that the street-level working conditions can be risky, dangerous and uncomfortable. This is especially apparent in the cases of police officers or other law enforcement agencies. To make their work more manageable, more secure and relatively free from stress, frontline workers use their discretions for their convenience at work (Maynard-Moony and Musheno, 2003). Therefore, while seeking for consolation from pressures at workplace caused by aggressive clients, they might submit to the clients’ pressures by exploiting the room of maneuvers that they have. The results would be the policy that benefits the clients. For instance, in contrast with the previous illustration of moving toward client’s behavior where a teacher bends the system to help his student because of his sympathy, in the case where frontline workers are threatened by a client and they find it too severe to handle, it is likely that they conform to client demand due to their self-interest to protect their own safety.

Self-interest could also play a role in driving the behavior of moving away from clients. If the self-interest pursued by officers in moving toward client is to protect their safety, then in this coping family it is more related to preserve their future’s career by avoiding risks

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associated with external scrutiny. As a state agency, the tax audit also has external control to ensure the accountability of the officers. This control is conducted by Indonesian Audit Board (BPK). As the state’s watchdog, this institution is responsible for evaluating the accountability of all other public institutions that manage state finances by conducting annual performance audit. One of the tasks is to audit the performance of the tax auditors. (Audit Board of Indonesia, 2015). Even though BPK only conducts the audit to sampling respondents, due to the enormous numbers of the officials, the officers still encounter the risk of unnecessary complications in case of deviating from the rules. Therefore, to avoid such risk, they will be likely abiding by the rules.

2.5.3 Work experience

Another reason why street-level bureaucrat might perform coping toward the clients can be attributed to their (lack of) work experience. Indeed, experience shapes the way a worker perceives a situation and finds the solution accordingly. Lipsky argues that where the frontline workers position themselves in a continuum of work experiences where they must find the balance between the job demands and the ideal practice is changing as they gain experience. Street-level bureaucrats alter their attitudes from the time they were newly employed to the time when they start encountering work problems. (Lipsky, 2010). Maynard-Moody and Musheno (2003) provide an example of a vocational rehabilitation counselor who bends the rules to help his visual-impaired client getting equipment that she needs. When the counselor was newly employed, he acted like any other good state-agents by following rules. But in doing so, he failed to help his clients. As time goes by, he gained experience but also found more conflicts between the rules and his own views. He eventually learned how to distort rules and consequently, be a service of clients instead of the system. He became a citizen-agent. (Maynard-Moody and Musheno, 2003). This story suggests that workers who are newly employed and do not have much experience to manage pressures from workplace aggression are likely to conform to client demand since they do not really know how to handle the conflicted situations. The mechanism of experience might be generated in this study by looking

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at how the respondents perceived their (lack of) experience when their encounters with aggressive clients took place.

In contrast, the level of experience could also explain why frontline officers might be able to move away from their clients’ demand. As their working-hours increase, they encounter more cases with various situations and learn a lot from their own experiences or even their colleagues’. Thus, they become more prepared when they have to face other similar situations. For instance, a tax auditor might not be easily intimidated by the clients since they may have encountered such circumstances before and learned how to deal with the situation. Consequently, there will be relatively fewer constraints for them to do their jobs in a standard way. Moreover, experience also helps the street-level bureaucrats to build their knowledge in assessing how manageable their clients are. (Lipsky, 2010, p. 123). This knowledge can help them evaluate the level of threats in conflicted situations and serves as the basis to decide whether to gain control or to back off.

2.5.4 Asking support and advice from colleagues

The typology of coping strategy in public front service delivery offered by Tummers et al. (2015) does not accommodate the mechanism of asking for advice or support from colleagues because it is considered that in the setting of public service delivery, the public service is often directly delivered during the direct interactions between the officers and the citizens. Thus, it can be inferred that officers do not have enough time to consult or ask for advice from their colleagues in case of facing pressures from the citizens during the interactions. Instead, officers are expected to produce direct responses in that situation which, in turn, also directly shapes the policymaking or decisions that they make. (Tummers et al., 2015). However, as suggested by Raaphorst and Loyens (2018), frontline decision making is not only influenced by interaction between officials and clients, but also between officers, as the latter is bounded by professionalism network. Through this network, street-level bureaucrats grant their support and advice to their peers in need. This whole mechanism depicts

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the social dynamics in frontline decision making in which officer-client and between-officer interactions simultaneously affect case-related decisions, especially post New-Public Management reform. In the pursuit of increasing legitimacy, the new form of governance encourages responsive horizontal relationship between officials and citizens, which includes not only negotiation with clients, but also collaboration with colleagues. (Raaphorst and Loyens, 2018).

Furthermore, Rutz et al. (2017) also empirically shows how inspectorate officers, on their own initiatives, relied on their peers in order to be consistent and responsive. They involve their coworkers to help them interpreting rules by asking for advice, support or specific knowledge. (Rutz et al., 2017 in Raaphorst and Loyens, 2018). Thus, it is considered acceptable to include the mechanism of asking for advice from colleagues in this typology as one of the possible reasons behind the expected behavior of the officers.

It is also worth noting that the mechanism of seeking advice from colleagues might be closely related to the level of experience, or more precisely, the lack of it. In the discussion regarding the mechanism of lacking experience, it is argued that officers who did not have much experience in confronting aggressive clients are relatively easily intimidated by the clients and their pressures. Since this might be a new experience to them, the officers then sought solace by asking for advice from their colleagues or supervisors whom they thought might have encountered similar situations. Based on their experience, some colleagues might share their strategy to deal with the clients without having to give in to their demands. This advice might reinforce officers’ inclinations towards the rules and procedures, hence helping them out to resist their clients’ intimidations. This is in line with seeking for the so-called professional judgment in Raaphorst and Loyens (2018). They suggest that officers tend to consult with their colleagues to get a widely supported judgment, especially in ambiguous situations. (Raaphorst and Loyens, 2018, p. 15).

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Nevertheless, asking advice to colleagues could also trigger the officers to move toward clients. It does not rule out the possibility that, based on their experiences, some colleagues or supervisors might suggest avoiding direct threats from clients by “making a safe decision”. Therefore, officers who receive and follow this kind of advice are likely to make decisions which benefit their clients.

2.5.5 Referrals

In some occasions, it might not be easy for officers to gain control over clients, especially in the cases where the clients have more power, such as financial or political power. Those power strengthen the clients’ positions to dominate the officers in their interactions. Hence, as an attempt to rebalance their position, officers might transfer their decision-making responsibility to their colleagues who have more power, in terms of wider legal authority. This notion is also known as referrals. It was first introduced by Lipsky (2010) as a set of practices to ration services to the clients without explicit refusal of assistance. This practice is usually run by agencies whose under-resources relative to the demand link their clients to other agencies which seemingly have more resources. At first glance, referrals, as presented in this definition, can be perceived as a noble deed, to serve for the clients’ best interests. Indeed, it might serve the interest of clients if the resources in the receiving agencies are available. However, most practices end up in roundabout as the receiving agencies are similarly running out of resources. At the end of the day, referral is considered as a strategy to handle clients without really handling them. (Lipsky, 2010, p. 132).

Interestingly, the purpose of referrals in the context of this study is quite distinctive to the one presented by Lipsky (2010) even though it deploys the same mechanism. In this study, referral is expected to direct officers’ behavior to move against their client. Officers who are in possession of enough evidence that their clients commit an alleged crime in the field of taxation might propose to escalate the tax audit process into tax investigation as a resort to transfer their decision-making responsibility to tax investigators whose higher authority

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enables them to process more massive caseloads. Since the escalation imposes more negative consequences to the clients, referring the job to tax investigators could be only perceived as moving against client.

It seems unlikely for referrals to generate moving away behavior because tax auditors cannot deliberately transfer their decision-making responsibility to other officers, except to tax investigators through proposal of escalating their cases to tax investigations. The decision-making responsibility could also be handed over to other tax auditors in case an officer is relocated to other office before resolving a case, but since the transfer is obviously not intentional, it is not considered as a referral.

2.5.6 Professionalism

Tummers et al. (2015) also suggest bringing forward the role of professionalism in explaining coping behaviors (Tummers et al., 2015, p. 1114). Professionalism is regarded as applying technical knowledge to particular cases in a routinized and institutionalized manner. It enables workers to gain control over their work and reduce outside interference. (Noordegraaf, 2007; Friedson, 2001).

The reason how professionalism endorses the privilege to self-regulation of the professionals could be explained by the so-called “autonomy”, one of Hall’s five dimensions of professionalism. Using a Likert scale, Hall (1968) proposed a measurement of professionalism level by developing a range of attitudes which was widely used ever since. The professionalism’s scale comprises five dimensions:

1. using professional organization as a significant reference; the use of professional organization as well as the members of the profession as the primary source of ideas and judgment for the professionals;

2. belief in public service; professionals believe that their profession is essential and beneficial to the society;

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3. belief in self-regulation; professionals believe that only their colleagues, the member of the same profession, that can judge their work, given the specialized knowledge required in their profession;

4. devotion to the field; professionals are dedicated entirely to their work regardless, say, the less reward that they could earn;

5. autonomy; professionals’ preference to be free to make their own decision without pressures from external parties. (Hall, 1968 in Snizek, 1972; Bryman and Cramer, 1996).

Therefore, it could be suggested that the more the public frontline workers are adhered to their professionalism values, especially to the dimension of autonomy, the more arduous for them to be dictated from outside, including from the citizens.

Moreover, a finding in a study by Miller (1967) suggests that there is a strong negative correlation between the level of professionalism with the tendency to diverge from organizational standards and rules. (Miller, 1967 in Loyens and Maesschalck, 2010). One possible explanation behind this correlation might be due to personal virtues behind professionalism. Indeed, some scholars have proposed that professionalism is not only built upon knowledge but is also strengthened by other personal virtues, such as ethics, morality, and integrity. (Krieger, 2004; Cruess et al., 2002; Lang, 2001). Professionals’ commitment to these virtues structures the social contract between them and society. In exchange for this contract, professionals are granted “the profession autonomy in practice and the privilege of

self-regulation”. (Cruess et al., 2002, p. 208). It is the commitment to these virtues which

enables professionals to maintain their adherence to organizational standards and rules when external parties try to intervene and influence their professional judgment. This commitment is even more required by professionals whose job risk associated with pressures and intervention from external parties, such as their clients, is more visible. Hence, the frontline officials who have strong commitment to both their autonomy dimension as well their personal virtues will not be easily influenced by external actors to deviate from standard operating procedures in

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their work because their inherent professionalism reinforces their ability to take control of their work and possibly their accountability to their stakeholders, which in this case refers to the government who demands the officials’ full effort for collecting tax revenues and the other compliant taxpayers who deserve fair and equal treatments.

2.5.7 Communication skills

Communication skill is the last factor to explain why the officials might be able to move away from aggressive clients. In this study, communication skill is differentiated from the mechanism of professionalism, even though some would argue that communication skill is required to build a professional image. This distinction is required because, indeed, the nature of professionalism is context-specific. (Ginsburg et al., 2000, p. S6). Hence, what represents the notion of professionalism could also be dependent on the context of the profession. Since this research is studying the professions of tax auditors in Indonesia, it might be useful to look at how they define professionalism. As one of the organization’s values, professionalism is defined as combination of three things; integrity, which is related to moral quality, honesty, and always put the interests of the state; strictness, which refers to obedience to every laws, rules, procedures and adherence to any time frame that has been established; and competence, which denotes knowledge and proficiency in the respective field of duty. (Director General of Taxes Decree No. 443, 2000). In this definition, communication skill in not specifically mentioned as part of professionalism. Instead, professionalism in the context of tax officials weigh heavily on the knowledge, morality, and compliance of the rules. Therefore, it can be argued that an officer is considered to have a prominent level of professionalism if they score high on the three aspects, even without excellent ability in communication skill. This argument underpins the distinction between professionalism and communication skill in this study.

Communication is part of main strategies proposed by psychology scholars to reduce aggression in the workplace, especially the patient-initiated aggression toward medical workers such as nurses and doctors (Hallet and Dickens, 2017; Daffern et al., 2012; Baby et al., 2018).

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The Argumentative Skill Deficiency Model (ASDM), a model of interpersonal violence borrowed from the aggression literatures, suggests that the ability of people to reduce the tension or hostility during conflicted interactions depend on their communication skills. People who lack the capacity to create effective argument are more likely to fall back on verbal aggression. Sequentially, failure to handle verbal aggression increases the likelihood of the conflict to be escalated to physical violence. On the contrary, people who have the effective communication skill by talking over the issues and present their arguments are able to address the conflict in such a way that does not involve aggression and de-escalating the conflicted situation. (Aloia and Salomon, 2015, p. 315-316).

Tax officials might be able to work in accordance with the rules by de-escalating the conflicted situations beforehand, and the way they can do that is by building constructive communication. One of the fundamental mechanisms in constructive communication to resolve conflicts is by persuasion which is built upon formulating argumentation. Officers attempt to change their clients’ mind and attitude by exerting reasonableness into the interactions. The focus is on navigating the clients’ decisions towards the officers’ set of goals. (Morasso, 2011; Dant and Schul, 1992). Persuasion is achieved by proposing convincing claims, including proof and rationing to support the claims. (Aloia and Salomon, 2015, p. 321). Raaphorst and Loyens (2018) further show that frontline decision making is shaped, inter alia, by negotiation skill of both parties involved in official-citizen interaction. Officers, who also happen to be tax officials in the study, perceive the interaction as a game, in which the winner is the one who can convince the other by using arguments. (Raaphorst and Loyens, 2018, p. 12). By convincing the clients to be more reasonable, officers strive for reducing tensions and resolve the conflicts between them and their clients.

Another mechanism to build a constructive communication is by offering choices and alternatives to the clients. (Bernstein and Saladino, 2007; Berring et al., 2016). This is especially relevant for clients whose aggressive behaviors are triggered by their frustration due

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to the limited options that they perceive. Active listening and using humors when appropriate are also some of the recipes to build effective communication. (Hallet and Dickens, 2017). Therefore, by combining the provision of sound arguments to defend their professional judgments and the offering of regulatory options that their clients can choose in a sympathetic manner, the officers might be able to lessen the tension within the interactions, thus steering the path back to the normalcy.

2.5.8 Aggression is relational

Street-level bureaucrats who are evoked with aggressive behaviors by the citizens have the tendency to react in the similar manner (Tummers et al., 2015; Hershcovis and Reich, 2013). This is in line with Lipsky in which he argues that street-level bureaucrats treat their clients depend on the citizens’ visible moral worthiness and the respect that they show to the officers. For example, police officers scornfully treat citizens that they arrest when the citizens show signs of disrespect towards them. Vice versa, the citizens will be treated with respect as long as they are being cooperative. (Lipsky, 2010, p. 66). This study expects that officers might produce similar hostile treatment in response to aggression. It is possible for them to lose their emotional control when being provoked. For instance, they might demonstrate their resentment by scolding or treating their clients with disdainful.

Table 1: Expected Behaviors and Possible Coping Mechanisms of the Study

Coping Family Moving toward clients Moving away from clients Moving against clients Possible ways of coping Rule bending Routinizing 1. Rigid rule following

2. Aggression Possible instances

2. Confront with aggression, verbally or physically Possible outcomes Lower sanctions Sanction as it should be Not only administrative

sanctions, but also criminal sanctions and the risk of business' interruption Possible mechanisms 1. Self-interest (to protect

own safety) 1. Tendency to maintain control 1. Tendency to maintain control 3. Learning from experiences 5. Professionalism 6. Communication skill Submit to client's demand

by exercising more lenient discretions

Ignore client's demand and work in accordance of rules

1. Try to punish clients by threatening them to escalate the audit level or to seal the business location

3. Asking for advice/support from colleagues

2. Self-proclaimed lack of experience

2. Referrals (transferring job to more resourceful

colleagues)

3. Referrals (transferring job to more resourceful

colleagues) 2. Self-interest (to avoid risk

from external scrutiny) 4. Asking for advice/support from colleagues

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CHAPTER 3 RESEARCH DESIGN

This research is conducted using the qualitative research method and case study approach. The qualitative approach is selected because it can generate an in-depth explanation regarding interactions, behavior and events by comprehending people’s point of views, experiences and background. (Snape and Spencer, 2003, p.22). It is considered as an appropriate approach for the purpose of this study which aims to explore the relationship between citizen-initiated workplace aggression with the preferences of coping strategies exercised by the street-level bureaucrats. The single-case design is also beneficial to uncover the mechanisms behind the relationship of the variables, especially under the circumstances where the theories behind it are relatively limited. Case study provides the ability to zoom in a case at much greater depth, so that not only the relationship behind the variables are visible, but also the causal mechanisms that connect them. (Toshkov, 2016).

3.1 Selection of Cases Criteria

This thesis examines the case of tax officials of the Indonesian Republic. Indonesia is chosen in this study partly due to the personal interest of the author as it is the native country of the author. As regulatory inspectors, tax officials are mandated with the function of law enforcement, specifically tax law. They also share similar characteristics with their fellow street-level bureaucrats, such as they have direct encounters with citizens, they are equipped with ample room for interpretations while assessing the tax returns and their work is restrained by insufficient resources and ever-growing demand. (Raaphorst, 2017; Cohen and Gershgoren, 2016). Therefore, to manage the pressures from their work constraints, they are compelled to practice coping behaviors. On the other hand, there are also some features that distinguish them from the other street-level bureaucrats. First, as regulatory inspectors, they administer obligations instead of service. In fact, they also possess the power to give sanctions. (Nielsen,

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2015). Second, they are the party who generally start the interactions since they have to conduct the inspections to certain taxpayers, while the latter party cannot easily withdraw from the interactions even though their compliance is also needed by the officials to ease their work process. Nevertheless, these features make them a relatively powerful type of public frontline workers. (Raaphorst, 2017).

Since this study only focuses on the work pressures stemmed from citizen-initiated workplace aggression, a specific position of tax officials, namely tax auditor, is selected. The officers in this position relatively encounter more intimidations and other aggressive behaviors from the non-compliant taxpayers due to risk embedded in their tax law enforcement function, compared to their fellow tax officials who run the functions of tax administration service and tax supervision. (Directorate General of Taxation, 2013). Their primary job is to “test the

compliance fulfillment of tax obligations and/ or for other purposes in order to implement the provisions of the law and regulation of taxation” (Minister of Finance Regulation No. 17, 2013,

Art. 1(3)) by assessing the compatibility of tax returns and bookkeeping records of taxpayers assigned to them.

There are two types of tax audits; field audits and office audits. The first type is conducted at the taxpayers’ residence or business locations, while the latter is conducted at the tax offices. (Minister of Finance Regulation No. 17, 2013, Art 1(3) and 1(4)). The risk of facing aggressive citizens comes in the process of tax audit where the officers are mandated to conduct direct interactions with the taxpayers in order to provide explanations to the taxpayers regarding the purpose of the audit, rights and obligations of the taxpayers during the process of audit, and the obligations of the taxpayers to comply with the demand of providing any documents required for the basis of accounting or the bookkeeping. (Minister of Finance Regulation No. 17, 2013, Art. 11(d)). The risk increases when they have to conduct home visits in the field audits. As suggested by Lipsky (2010), the physical and psychological risk embedded in the workers’ job is increasing once they leave their workplace of headquarters

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where they are relatively more protected. This is because they are less able to control the context of their interactions with the citizens, hence cannot anticipate any unexpected behaviors from the citizens. (Lipsky, 2010).

By focusing on the tax officials as regulatory inspectors, this study concentrates on a group of street-level bureaucrats that deal with relatively heterogeneous and powerful group of citizen-clients. In opposition to other street-level bureaucracy literature which focuses on the coping behaviors of public workers that provide public service, this study’s concern is to find out how the frontline workers that deliver sanctions deal with clients that are comparatively resourceful with regards to knowledge, economic or political. Indeed, as Nielsen (2015) suggests, it is the combination of discretions, interdependence encounters and the relatively powerful group of clients that might intensify the chance of client’s ability in affecting the behaviors of the officials. (Nielsen, 2015).

In this study, fifteen tax auditors are selected to participate in the interviews. To select participants, the author uses the purposive method, where only tax auditors that have experienced the aggressive behaviors of their clients are chosen. Furthermore, the number of interview participants are added using the snowball sampling method by asking for referrals from the earlier tax auditors that have been willing to participate in this study. It is more convenient since they have more information regarding the similar cases that happen to their colleagues.

This study aims to include both male and female officers, along with beginner and old-timer officers, in order to capture a variety of experiences. However, as presented in table 2 which consists of the profile of respondents below, most of the participants are men, while women are only represented by two participants. The gender minority could be explained by the fact that men dominated the position of tax auditors in Indonesian tax authority. In terms of tenure, four respondents have been working as tax auditors for more than twenty years, seven

Coping mechanisms toward workplace aggression in the public sector: The case study of Indonesian street-level bureaucrats