PDF hosted at the Radboud Repository of the Radboud University Nijmegen The following full text is a publisher's version. For additional information about this publication click this link. http://hdl.handle.net/2066/19550 Please be advised that this information was generated on 2021-09-30 and may be subject to change. Politieke communicatie en communicatiepolitiek in Indonesië: een studie over media, verantwoordelijkheid en verantwoording Een wetenschappelijke proeve op het gebied van de Sociale Wetenschappen Proefschrift ter verkrijging van de graad van doctor aan de Radboud Universiteit Nijmegen op gezag van de Rector Magnificus prof. dr. C.W.P.M. Blom, volgens besluit van het College van Decanen in het openbaar te verdedigen op donderdag 9 december 2004 des voormiddags om 10:30 uur precies door Effendi Gazali geboren op 5 december 1965 te Padang, Indonesië Promotor(es) : Prof. Dr. K. Renckstorf Dr. L. d'Haenens Dr. E. Hollander Manuscriptcommissie : Prof. Dr. F. Hüsken Prof. Dr. C. Hamelink (Universiteit van Amsterdam) Prof. Dr. R. Colle (Cornell University) Communication of Politics and Politics of Communication in Indonesia: A Study on Media Performance, Responsibility and Accountability A scientific essay in social sciences Doctoral Thesis to obtain the degree of doctor from Radboud University Nijmegen on the authority of the Rector, Prof. C.W.P.M. Blom, according to the decision of the Council of Deans to be defended in public on Thursday, 9 December 2004 at 10:30 pm precisely by Effendi Gazali born in Padang, Indonesia on 5 December 1965 i Table of Contents Table of Contents i List of Tables iv List of Figures v List of Publications vi Introduction 1 1. Background and Theoretical Framework 2 2. Political Communication as a Field of Study 2 3. Indonesian History and Contexts for Political Communication 4 4 Media Performance, Pressures and Interplay 5 5. Relations among Media Performance, Media (Social) Responsibility and Accountability 7 6. Media Accountability Practices and Struggles 10 7. Community Level and Community Media 12 8. Recapitulation of Research Line 15 a. Research Questions 16 b. Goals 16 c. Limitations of the Study 17 d. Added Value 17 First Chapter Political Communication in Indonesia : Revisiting the Media Performance in Three Eras 19 1. Introduction 19 2. Indonesia under the Soeharto Regime 21 3. The Shape of the Media Industry During the Soeharto Era 22 4. Press Freedom 24 5. Research Interests During the Soeharto Era 25 6. The May 1998 Revolution 32 7. Indonesia During the Reform Era 36 8. Research Interests During the Reform Era 38 9. The 2004 Election 43 10. Concluding Remarks 48 Second Chapter In Search of Quality Measures for News Programming on Indonesian Television 51 1. Introduction 51 2. Historical Background 51 2.1. Geographical Context 51 2.2. The Social/Cultural Context: Unity in Diversity 52 2.3. The Political Context: Applied “Pancasila Democracy” 53 2.4. Governmental Media Control 53 2.5. The Indonesian Broadcasting Act of 1997 55 ii 3. Indonesia’s Television Landscape 58 3.1 Televisi Republik Indonesia (TVRI) 58 3.2 RCTI: The Pioneer of Indonesian Commercial Television 60 3.3 SCTV: RCTI’s Little Brother 61 3.4 TPI: The Educational Commercial Station 61 3.5 ANteve: The Fourth Commercial Station 62 3.6 Indosiar Visual Mandiri (IVM): The Latest Newcomer 63 4. In-depth Interviews with Indonesian Newsmakers and Policymakers 64 4.1 Creativity and Freedom 65 4.2 Station Strategy 66 4.3 Importance of Viewing Figures and Program Research 66 4.4 The Relationship with the Audience 68 4.5 Station Policy and Obstacles for Policy Making 68 4.6 Politics and Political Control 69 4.7 Professionalism 71 4.8 Quality Measures for News and Newsworthiness 72 5. Conclusions 72 Third Chapter The Soeharto Regime and Its Fall: Seen by the Local Media 75 1. Statement of the Problem 75 2. Theoretical Section 76 3. Research Questions 80 4. Methodology 80 4.1. Sampling: Cities and Procedures 80 5. Results & Discussion 82 5.1. New Order Means False Freedom 82 5.2. Local Strategies 84 5.3. Internal Interaction 86 5.4. Reporters and Audience 87 5.5. Freedom as a New Commodity 88 5.6. Future Challenges 89 5.7. Locality and Capital Movement 91 6. Concluding Remarks 92 Fourth Chapter Negotiating Public and Community Media in Post-Soeharto Indonesia 95 Abstract 95 1. Background: Indonesian Media in Transition 95 2. Research Questions 100 3. Methodology: Stages and Procedures 101 4. Findings and Thematisation of the Data 102 5. Conclusions 106 iii Concluding Remarks 111 1. The Model of Political Communication Field 111 2. The Media Performance Model 115 3. Media Responsibility & Accountability 115 3.a. During the Soeharto Era 116 3.b. The May 1998 Revolution 119 3.c. The Reform Era 120 4. Community Media 123 5. Closing Paragraph 125 Endnotes 126 References 128 Samenvatting 141 Summary 145 Curriculum Vitae 149 Appendices 151 iv List of Tables Table 1 Elaboration of Media Responsibility and Accountability 8 Table 2 Political Communication Research in Indonesia 27 Table 3 Indonesian Population by Educational Level 52 Table 4 Profile of Indonesian TV Viewers (based on sex and age, in millions) 55 Table 5 News and Information Programs on All Indonesian Television Stations (Broadcasting Hours and Minutes) 55 Table 6 News Content on the Basis of Origin 56 Table 7 Categories of News Items (%) 56 Table 8 Total Program Output per Channel (%) 58 Table 9 Market Shares of Commercial TV Stations, 1997 66 Table 10 Audience Segmentation by Age, Sex, Education Level 67 v List of Figures Figure 1 Media Performance Model 20 Figure 2 Media Performance Model: Visualising Tendencies in the Power Relations in Three Eras 31 Figure 3 Interactions of Elements in Social Transition 99 Figure 4 Media Organizational Performance Model 100 Figure 5 Media Organizational Performance Model Adapted to the Indonesian Case and Applied to Public and Community Broadcasting 108 Figure 6 Model of the Political Communication Field 113 vi List of Publications 1. The first article/chapter “Political Communication in Indonesia,” written in conjunction with Dedy N. Hidayat & Victor Menayang, will be published in Lars Willnat & Annete Aw (eds.) (2005, in print). “Political Communication in Asia,” Washington DC: McGraw Hill. 2. The second article/chapter “In Search of Quality Measures for Indonesian Television News,” written in conjunction with Leen d’Haenens & Chantal Verelst, was published in French & M. Richards (eds.) (2000), “Television in Contemporary Asia,” 197–232. New Delhi-Thousand Oaks-London: Sage Publications 3. The third article/chapter “The Suharto regime and its fall through the eyes of the local media”, was published in Gazette, the International Journal for Communication Studies [64], 2, (2002), 121–140 4. The fourth article/chapter “Negotiating public and community media in post- Suharto Indonesia,” was published in Javnost – the Public, Journal of the European Institute for Communication and Culture Vol. X (2003): 85–100. Introduction: Communication of Politics and Politics of Communication in Indonesia: A Study on Media Performance, Responsibility and Accountability Abstract Political communication scholars have long explored the communication of politics, what could be called “the first face of the coin.” It is interesting, however, to observe that in Indonesian history, the second face of political communication, i.e., the politics of communication, has been the predominant force driving the country’s politics. Against this background, the present research attempts to address the theoretical shortage in the development of the political communication field in Indonesia by providing a comprehensive Model of the Political Communication Field embracing the two faces of political communication. The breeding ground for this model was found in a simpler model that is still capable of representing the larger map of the political communication field in its essence. The Media Performance Model describes a continuous interplay among four power entities, also called factors, i.e. Government, Market, Civil Society and the Media. The result of the internal interplay within each factor will inevitably impact the external interplay among these four factors. Therefore, the outcomes (at a given period in time) are visualized in what the media do, referred to by the so-called “media performance.” In turn, the impact of the external interplay is further brought into the internal media environment as input for the internal interplay of each factor in the media organization, and so forth. The present research illustrates the necessity to connect media performance to the concepts of Media Responsibility and Accountability. Media Responsibility (assigned, contracted, self-designed and denied responsibility) will show the directions the media are taking in meeting the public’s expectations, while Media Accountability (political, market, public, and professional accountability) will show the directions citizens can take to actively compel the media to meet their expectations, so as to render politics of communication beneficial to all elements in society. Equipped with a comprehensive map of political communication, the present research examines concrete operationalizations of Media Performance, Responsibility and Accountability taking place during the past twenty years of political communication in Indonesia in general (Chapter 1), in the television sector (Chapter 2), in the local newspapers and radio stations (Chapter 3) and in the negotiations between the public and the community media (Chapter 4). The performance of the media was examined during the three subsequent eras that have colored Indonesia during the past twenty years – the Soeharto Era (better known as the New Order Era), the May 1998 Revolution, and the Reform Era (after the downfall of Soeharto on May 21, 1998). Introduction 2 1. Background and Theoretical Framework If Indonesian democracy –restored in 1998 after the fall of Soeharto— were a website, visitors would only read this line on it: This site is still under construction! (Basorie, 2001).