Peace Journalism vs Provocative Journalism:
Reading the Political Identity Models of Mass Media in Indonesia
Ibrahim
1
, Sandy Pratama
1
, Rendy
1
,Bustami Rahman
2
, Sujadmi
2
and Dini Wulansari
3
1
Department of Political Science, Bangka Belitung University, Indonesia
2
Department of Sociology, Bangka Belitung University, Indonesias
3
Department of English Literature, Bangka Belitung University, Indonesia
Keywords: Journalism, peaceful, provocative, mass media, identity politics
Abstract: Since the era of press freedom in Indonesia, mass media has emerged as a stunning civil society arena in its
role to proclaim any news to the public. The highest risk, however, arises as the phenomenon of identity
appears beyond the religious and daily life affairs, in spite, they are alternately utilized concerning
ideological interests and in turn to politic. This paper argued that the mass media in Indonesia had been
recently trapped in crossing interests; between peaceful and provocative journalism. Various identity-based
press play a role, in contrast, media identity is constructed under the shadow of interest, and this is called
the political identity of mass media. This paper analysed that there are several models of media identity
politics, i.e., via news construction, re-framing news, characterizations, and online distribution. The authors
offered three opportunities to overcome this: strengthening the Press Council, collective deconstruction,
public education, and journalistic professionalism. The public, in general, expects to create media
objectivity in the middle of political and identity interests if it is collectively aware of the role as well as the
risk of their development without provocative journalism phenomenon control.
1 INTRODUCTION
Mass media is primarily a means of accurately and
evenly distributing information to the public. It has
been widely known that mass media is one of the
critical democracy pillars in which its basic order is
a civil society. Well, the idea of it then delivered to
what was called as civil journalism emphasizing that
mass media played a role in contributing to the
democratic principle in socio-political issues
(Cangara, 2009), (Syahputra, 2006). Mass media has
recently played an important role to improve the
quality of community life in civilization.
Indeed, besides being trapped in a political
economy dilemma, mass media is also faced with a
big responsibility, that is how to become an
important agent for strengthening the quality of life
in the midst of society. Mass media tends to be
accepted as a new locus of power that has a vital
role. Amid the debate over the seizure of power in
mass media, there is an important issue that cannot
be ignored, namely the central character in creating
social construction apart from the shadow of
disunity. Mass media then emerges as a new agent
that must be good in swinging its role in the midst of
immature situations, either its social culture or its
internal level. If it is successful, thus mass media
will become one of the most critical pillars in
guarding the reform transition in the country.
Simply put, it could be said that mass media has
been the front face of civilization. The issue
complexity is mixed in such a way in the forefront
by mass media. Therefore, it does not only become a
medium of information, but mass media has also
contributed to promote development. Of course, it
does not just stop here. There is another important
role waiting, i.e., its penetration in creating peace in
society. Although mass media has its laws, the
chances of agency integration in the quest for
democracy have been the professional responsibility
that cannot be ignored. The point is that mass media
must participate in the effort to create principles of
publicity that depart from the bases of
egalitarianism, honesty, justice, and peace.
Mass media has currently appeared in various
forms. Amid the debate about identity attraction in
multiple facets of life, mass media is linearly
1482
Ibrahim, ., Pratama, S., Rendy, ., Rahman, B., Sujadmi, . and Wulansari, D.
Peace Journalism vs Provocative Journalism: Reading the Political Identity Models of Mass Media in Indonesia.
DOI: 10.5220/0009930514821488
In Proceedings of the 1st International Conference on Recent Innovations (ICRI 2018), pages 1482-1488
ISBN: 978-989-758-458-9
Copyright
c
 2020 by SCITEPRESS – Science and Technology Publications, Lda. All rights reserved

growing along with the growth of identity-faced
politics. Mass media is less convincing to be
positioned as an agent of peace as many press even
play a provocative role. Instead of being a
peacemaker, media then partially appear in a dark
face named identity production. This paper departed
from the significant anxiety that mass media
currently have various faces. By applying
observation method on several journalism product
examples and supported by relevant kinds of
literature, this paper read the political identity
models of media so vulgarly displayed as this
country is dealing with the issues of radicalism,
religious sentiment, and potential disintegration.
2 BETWEEN HAPPINESS AND
HATRED SOURCES
Since escaping from the New Order confines, mass
media dynamics in Indonesia have tended to form a
new power axis. It is no longer limited regarding
news, as well as access to information sources. The
openness that was born by the mass media has given
birth to the one in the middle of the force of the
power vortex formation. Mass media has become so
powerful, even Sudibyo (2004) stated that it
functions as a tool to subdue the class and becomes a
vital institution in modern society (Sudibyo, 2004).
Therefore, it’s not a few new issues arising. Mass
media has shifted from an information medium to a
contention that has tremendous charm. Some of
them, for example, is about the growing mass media
industry and not all of them are sterile from negative
things (see Suranto et al., 2005) (Suranto, Haryanto,
& Lasmina, 2005). Another one is the ownership
issue tended to be no longer exempt from elements
of political interest. The political economy of the
mass media then becomes an exciting thing to
discuss.
Mass media deregulation has spawned euphoria,
in which there is a dynamic that cannot be regarded
as pure. Some mass media grew as a new industry
that gave birth to privatization (Ibrahim, 2013), and
some other grew as the power mouthpieces, as well
as power instrumentation. The positive side of all
this is however the accessibility to information
becoming almost limitless. In fact, we understand
that the appearance of variation media alternative
also has positive potential in stimulating the
presence of discursive public debate. For the
community, especially at the level of media literacy
society, mass media has helped to brighten the view
and update the accuracy of public information in
general. However, the content of press reflects the
context of the society (Fuchs, 2010). And that open
discussion is the core of democracy (Turnšek &
Jankowski, 2008), (Michaelsen, 2011).
At the same time, the question of mass media
ideology that often departs from the ideological base
of its journalists is another problem that is no less
problematic. The mass media are prone to
hegemony, domination, and intervention by certain
forces. Not surprisingly, the mass media appear
diverse with such complex news content and
complicated to be objective (Kalvø, 2015).
Mass media condition has been more
problematic as the online media industry well
develops and easier to be produced and distributed
in cheap ways. The information is crossing each
other and thus the opportunity to penetrate the
information will be more easily. Setting agenda
provocation and the image construction have been
faster and massive. Many interests are easier to meet
each other and difficult to be sorted. In this context,
propaganda, provocation, and discrimination in mass
media will be easier to be performed. Mass media
grows as a very powerfull agent then.
Indeed, mass media in Indonesia grow along
with the emergence of identity frictions that are not
easily reconciled. In the midst of such situations, the
media is present in two faces side by side, one as the
mediator and another as the press of a herald. The
authors did not need to describe how the mass media
was then instrumented in such conditions, but it
needed to be emphasized as how important the mass
media becomes one of the important agents in
creating peace. The media should not only be seen
as a mirror of reality; however, it should also be seen
as the framing used and the construction chosen.
The concept of peaceful journalism (peace
journalism) is referred to an effort to proclaim
something by minimizing the gap between the
opposing parties in order not to repeat the 'facts'.
Peace journalism is ways of framing broader,
balance, and accurate news by encouraging efforts to
prevent widening the conflict (Syahputra, 2006).
Peaceful journalism keeps focusing on the facts, but
attention is more focused on facts that emerge of
human and cultural values (Siregar, 2008). In the
centre, peaceful journalism should be carried out in a
more optimal early detection to potentially emerging
potentials to be anticipated. Journalists are required
to framing the news responsibly, not searching for
its medium-read order called by as trivialization
(Putra, 2004). Peace journalism requires social
responsibility that is born internally in journalists.
Peace Journalism vs Provocative Journalism: Reading the Political Identity Models of Mass Media in Indonesia
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The word responsibility here is a daunting task in the
preparation of an insensitive report on the
importance of public integration.
These days, the concept of peaceful journalism is
directly opposed to the ideology of mass media in
identity framing. There have emerged various
media, either printed or online, audio or visual, or a
combination of everything, which deliberately take a
different position. Many media are controlled for the
benefit of propaganda wrapped on behalf of both
proclamation and press freedom, without concerning
mass media profit and loss. Mass media serve as a
tool for disseminating a radical ideology, building
arguments on sentence logic, and it is even
consciously or unconsciously used as the arena of
identity struggle.
The concept of provocative journalism, of
course, in this case, is not built as an identity by the
media journalists having such orientation; however,
it is constructed as a media proclaiming the truth of
the media correctness. The authors called this as
hijacking the mass media innocence as a means to
deliver the news to the community in general.
3 IDENTITY CONSTRUCTION
MODEL
How does the mass media construct its identity?
Various ways have been conducted; however, it is
generally shown in the media innocence as an
information tool for the community. The authors
identified the following models:
3.1 News Construction
Since the era of press freedom has begun, it emerged
various mass media taking positions as information
media based on religious ideology or certain
identity. This sort of mass media deliberately
emerges to produce news directed as a tool of
ideological and identity propaganda, more often as a
religious identity.
Media established for the benefit of this identity
propaganda will build news of its construction for
the promotion of an identity. This identity will be
widely reproduced when news tends to target certain
personalities. Religion, for example, many mass
media wrapped their news for the importance of the
construction of religious news with the arguments
that supported it. Furthermore, the media represent
religious identity, and ultimately the public loses the
opportunity to get balanced news.
Interestingly, the growth of mass media based on
the certain religious identity is not only happening in
new media but also on the one which is also known
as national media but with a smoother wrap. When
the era of press freedom opened the space in 1998,
mass media was initially shy as the one with a
bundle of religious identities, and it increasingly
found its place. Many national mass media
industries have firmly established their media as
propaganda agents of ideology.

(Mabruroh &. R., 2018)
3.2 Re-framing News
When an issue is busy targeting an event related to
particular religious ideology, and thus the crowds of
such media will build new construction. Re-framing
news following the interests of the media becomes
easy to find in a news issue. It is clear how certain
mass media do not 'sincerely' release the battle over
their identity. It is not surprising that many news
stories are constructed with different frames from
each other. An ideological point of view ultimately
plays in a realm of news that causes the public to
lose space to obtain accurate and balanced
information.
Re-framing news is usually aimed to counter
mass media news that is considered cornering. There
has been a struggle for public space amongst the
mass media. In this condition, the intermittent,
informative and counter-informative hemispheres
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are inevitable. It is found that the mass media lost its
sacred duty as a 5W1H reporter, but transformed
into partisan, non-neutral, and political media.
(Mursid & Ramadhan, 2018)
3.3 Characterization
Different models are chosen by the mass media to
construct ideological constructions and/or
justifications for information. Mass media usually
wrapped with identity interests does not hesitate to
personify someone openly. The model is by using
certain characters to be the main reference. The
contents of references will be very tendentious and
tend to be directed to justify the coverage presented
by the mass media. In this case, the media utilizes
certain characters to influence the reader's mind.
That is why; the selection of news sources will
greatly influence the direction of media writing. This
condition is certainly related to the fact that many
figures are popular in the media, born because of
media packaging and its presence as a mouthpiece.
Newsperson selection can affect media construction.
The public, in general, will be certainly affected
much by the character framing used by the mass
media in presenting the news.

(MNC Media, 2017)




(Okezone, 2017)
(TSaqofah, 2017)
Peace Journalism vs Provocative Journalism: Reading the Political Identity Models of Mass Media in Indonesia
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3.4 Online Distribution
The interesting thing at the moment is the
phenomenon of digitizing the news. Technology has
changed the face of mass media. Although the print
media has not lost its position as an informative one
that is physically read, many mass media are
beginning to combine online news as an efficient
option. Some print media has even been fully
transformed into online media. At the same time, the
growth of online media is also not less much. Social
media has helped to accelerate the expansion of
online news. This is also the key issue for politician
in making use social media variation so tendentious
for the sake of their groups’ profit and political
interest. Social media is a public sphere in widely
connecting their followers and public as a political
communication arena.
The authors sees that in many cases, social media
such as Facebook, Twitter, and Whatsapp served as
an effective means to connect readers in cyberspace
with the news already controlled from the news
production side. Online news links rotation currently
mushrooming has been as an option to strengthen
the penetration of mass media based on a particular
religious identity. In social media, it is easy to find
such vulgar news links proclaiming the provocation
or construction news in unbalanced way and far
from the rules of journalism.
(Moslem Community, 2018)
(Al-Islam, 2012)
(Era Muslim, 2018)
4 AVAILABLE CHOICES
4.1 Strengthening the Role of Press
Board
Mass media monitoring has been held within the
Press Council authority; an institution established to
control both content and dispute concerning the
press. The overly high growth of mass media as well
as its variation, however, has resulted in Press
Council as not being so optimal in carrying out its
duties. Nevertheless, there has been a wide range of
opportunities to encourage the tightening of the
provocative and destructive media existence.
The impression that has been captured is that the
country is still so weak when facing with the identity
aggression wrapped and developed by the mass
media. Unfortunately, the public in Indonesia has
not been so news literate that it tends to
incompletely catch all information reaching the
reader. The state provides an overwhelmingly wide
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space of permeability, and its impact is the
inevitable provocative and partial media growth.
The Press Council as an official institution must
be able to reach a more substantive dimension
regarding the news designed to bring a specific
ideological identity. The identity attachment to mass
media will be very destructive for the nationalism
building since the fact that mass media is very
quickly accepted by the public, especially among the
middle to lower class.
4.2 Collective Deconstruction
A provocative media tending to raise the identity
issue as a selling item in which its motive is very
diverse must be opposed collectively.
Deconstruction of partisan news can be overcome by
building a collective awareness among media actors
themselves. This deconstruction can be conducted
by counter model over the news considered as not
neutral and free from the principles of journalism.
The authors assumed that neutral media should be
able to expand the news neutrality movement in
common ways. Building commitment among media
leaders is one of the rational choices, beyond which
journalists' crew can do so together by
communicating and coordinating between neutral
and objective media to narrow the partisan journalist
movement.
4.3 Public Education
Educating the public to be more news and media
literate is a more substantive and long-term vision.
Mass media is in charge as one of the democracy
pillars demanded by its objective ability; this
becomes the fundamental principle that must be
known by the public in general. Therefore, a joint
movement is needed to encourage public awareness
in reviewing any information reported by the media.
It’s meant that there is a need to be selective
towards the mass media. A high rating media is a
form of success. Resistance can begin by reducing
the volume of mass media legibility. The public in
general, particularly the lower-middle class needs to
be advocated leading to critical awareness and
conducting it as being the shared need.
4.4 Journalist Professionalization
There is a tendency that so far the news presented by
a journalist in the provocative media tends to reflect
his ideology. It cannot be denied that the writing in a
mass media consumed, its news has been much set
by how framing owned by the journalists. Therefore,
encouraging journalist professionalism is a challenge
in the midst of increasingly worrying partisan
journalists.
A journalist is required to get out of his
psychological condition and personal emotionality
so that the news he presents remains informative, not
subjective or personal opinion. A journalist must be
able to avoid continuously producing nation
anomalies and negative attachments regarding this
nation. Journalist professionalization can be
performed through intensive coordination and
communication. Of course, firstly, the government
and the Press Council must have an important record
of which figures play a role in reproducing hatred
and identity propaganda.
5 CONCLUSIONS
Several cases sticking out in mass media have
repeatedly proclaimed conflicts having some nuance
of SARA (tribe, religion, race and among groups)
and certain religious identities. If journalists are not
smart in objectively and interventively placing news
framing; therefore, it is very likely that the news will
even exacerbate the potential of further conflict.
News construction thus plays an important role in
editorial spaces so that the emerging news can be
constructed without the potential for discriminatory
bias.
Another thing to note is to avoid the birth of
mass media as a new power locus. We are concerned
that journalism tending to be economically and
politically politicized will undermine the principles
of peaceful journalism in this country. We suspected
that mass media managed by the profit logic will
give birth to a new tyranny, instead of being the
pioneer of peaceful journalism, it will bring about a
media phobia that will degrade the substance of the
media as a counterweight. It is important for
journalists and media actors to avoid mass media
instrumentation as a tool of unilateral political
economy by ignoring their social responsibility.
Meanwhile, the ideological identity of mass
media is another aspect of its development that
needs attention. Such strong media dynamics have
contributed to expanding media coverage as well as
accessibility. Mass media that tend to be dominated
by certain ideological groups is prone to be slipped
as the interests of the perpetrators. It is not
surprising that mass media needs to be sorted and
selected based on its mission, although it’s
complicated by people who have not been included
Peace Journalism vs Provocative Journalism: Reading the Political Identity Models of Mass Media in Indonesia
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as the critical reader category. Insofar as the identity
ideologization, mass media is potentially destructive
for the spirit of integration. At this point, mass
media may be present as a breakaway of peaceful
journalism. It should be noted that mass media
identity ideology colonialization will have the
opportunity to bring up the seeds of conflict if it’s
not carefully managed.
In the end, actors and mass media activists have the
opportunity to become saviours for the wider public
- whose merits may not be recorded and become
enlightened for all elements by promoting the
peaceful journalism principle as the primary basis
for carrying out its role. This is what the media
called as the public sensitive one, a media principle
that does not lose its alignment to the public interest.
Quoting Mongare Serote in Ma’ruf (2002), the
writers are humanity maids insofar as they used the
word to believe the truth complexity and presented it
objectively: that is where the direction of peaceful
journalism is directed.
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