I Dwell in [ Im ] possibility: Legitimating the Informal Economy around the Bus Terminal in Kampung Melayu, Jakarta

This article challenges the dominant paradigm of legitimation as conceived through formal social structures. It argues that society is never mono-dimensional, and that in developing countries, especially, it is more typically characterized by duality. It has been widely observed by sociologists that each society has its own structure (as defined by Anthony Giddens), in which systems are organized according to sets of practices. Legitimation, as a process of making activities acceptable and normative, thus also can only be conceived as applying within each particular society. In this context, the possibility, or impossibility, of the informal economy to dwell in public urban space must be seen as subject to processes of informal legitimation according to communicative action. The article examines these issues with regard to the activities of ambulant traders around the bus terminal in Kampung Melayu, Jakarta.