"Keyboardism" End up Political Party: Understanding the Intertwining Relations of Social Media Activism, Citizenship, and the Dynamics of Democracy in Indonesia
The networked citizen-centered perspectives generate opportunities for the democratic innovations through self-actualized networking and interaction. A qualitative case study from Indonesia is used to examine the dynamics of citizenship participation in political discourse through social media. The movement started from public advocacy by clicking the ‘like’ button of Facebook Group to support marginalized individual then the movement evolved into provincial social activism. The Facebook connectivity help the group to build a political party to further back up their main figure in the forecast Presidential candidacy. Archival analysis of Facebook members postings message revealed five categories of Facebook role in facilitating democracy: public defense, political support, presidential allegiance, creative manufacturing, and counter disturbia. Using Breese’s (2011) quadrant in public spheres continuum, the research illustrated that the movements evolve from ‘click’ action to ‘real’ action and develop from civic sphere to the political sphere. The research suggests that citizen participation in conversational politic sphere will face potential challenge in developing country context and security issue.
Desideria Murti is a lecturer at the University of Atma Jaya Yogyakarta, Indonesia and a graduate student in the Communication Department at Colorado State University. She received her bachelors in communication with a focus in Public Relations/Marketing Communication at the University of Atma Jaya Yogyakarta and then continued her master program specifically in rhetoric and civic engagement through the Fulbright Scholarship and Ministry of Education Scholarship of the Republic of Indonesia. Her research interests are in the areas of citizenship, political communication, women, digital media, and social activism. As a novice in academia, she is eager to produce high quality scholarship. In less than two years following the start of her career, she has productively written six articles in book chapters, one journal article, seven newspaper articles in Indonesia and six qualified papers for international conferences. Her research examines digital media within the blogosphere, YouTube, Facebook activism, and visual posters.
