Opening the Local Governance of Jakarta Pandora’s Box: A

Case Study of Agenda-Setting on 124 Billion Wood Glue

Expenditure covered by TEMPO

Name : Alvikha Adrian

NIM : 18220130318

Class : 13A-B/SMMM/CER

JAKARTA
2019
Statement Letter of Authenticity

I, the undersigned below:

Name : Alvikha Adrian

NIM : 18220130318

Concentration : Social and Mass Media Management

Hereby, stated that the data presented in this paper called:

Opening the Local Governance of Jakarta Pandora’s Box: A Case Study

of Agenda Setting on 124 Billion Wood Glue Expenditure covered by Tempo is

authentic and resulted from my own research.

If later proven if the data and the title is result from of plagiarism of other

people, therefore according to appropriate academic’s code and conduct, we

state that we are willing will be given the harshest sanctions, including

dismissal/cancellation of our academic degree by Sekolah Tinggi Ilmu

Komunikasi The London School of Public Relations - Jakarta.

Hereby, this letter of authenticity may be used as it is intended.

Jakarta, 13 November 2019

Alvikha Adrian
 TABLE OF CONTENTS

COVER

RESEARCH ORIGINALITY STATEMENT

TABLE OF CONTENTS……………………………………………………………i

CHAPTER I

1.1 Explanation of Agenda Setting and Framing ........................................ 1

1.2 Core Assumption .................................................................................. 2

1.3 Critique on Agenda Setting and Framing ............................................. 4

CHAPTER II

2.1 Case Study ......................................................................................... 4

REFERENCES………………………………………………………………………7

i
1.1 The Definition of Agenda Setting and Framing

In June 1972, five unknown men broke into Democratic National

Committee headquarters looking for unknown, undisclosed information. The

story was published on page 17 of the Washington Post. Initially public consider

that incident as a trivial, local crime story. Yet editor Ben Bradlee and reporters

Brad Woodward and Carl Bernstein gave the story a high visibility. Even

President Nixon mentioned the break-in as a “third-rate burglary”. But as the

time goes by, public seems to get more and more concerned about what

happened in Watergate complex in D.C. Half the population has become familiar

with the word Watergate by 1972 and by 1973 the number went up to 90%.

When television began coverage of the Senate hearing a year after the break-in

almost every adult in the United States know what happened in Watergate,

costing President Nixon his political support and forced to resign from the office

a year later. Simply because most of the citizen held him responsible.

The infamous Watergate incident raise a concern of how much power a

media has. Journalism professor Maxwell McCombs and Donald Shaw

mentioned Watergate incident as a perfect example of agenda setting in mass

media. McCombs and Shaw (2012, p. 378) believe that mass media have the

ability to transfer the prominence of the item in their news agenda to the public

agenda. They also quote Cohen’s observation regarding the matter: “The press

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may not be succeed in in telling people what to think, but they’re very successful

in telling its audience what to think about” (2005, p. 547)

Simply put, Agenda Setting is a creation of public awareness and

concern of important issue by news media (Ali, 2019). The press doesn’t

necessarily reflect reality, instead they direct the audience towards what is

important. By concentrating audience attention towards certain issue, the press

can lead public to perceive those issue as important. This can be done by

utilizing media agency and public agenda. Griffin (2012, p. 379) states that it can

be done by using media agenda, a pattern of news coverage across major print

and broadcast media as measured by prominence and length of story and public

agenda (2012, p. 380), which is defining the most important issue by doing

public opinion surveys.

1.2 Core Assumption

Agenda-setting boast two main feature: it reaffirms the power of the press

while still maintaining audience free will. Griffin quote McCombs and Shaw

(2012, p. 380) hypothesis, that agenda-setting function of the media can

influence what is deemed to be important, hence the public agenda. Although

correlation isn’t always the causation. It is also possible that newspaper and

television coverage simply reflects public concern that already exists. This has

resulted in a predictable cycle as media agenda and public agenda are only

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reflecting the current phenomenon but news professional might be able to tell

what’s going to happen.

Media direct our attention, to some issue that is deemed important. In a

way, media are able to make some information more salient. McCombs said the

media can do more than that. They can influence the way we think. Griffin quote

James Tankard, one of the leading writers on mass communication theory,

define media framing as the main idea of news content that gives a context and

suggest what is important by selecting, emphasis, exclusion, and elaboration of

specific attributes. By doing this, not only media set the agenda for what issue

are most important, they also transfer specific qualities to an object of interest

(2012, p. 381-382).

Framing is an extension of agenda setting. It is a matter of how those

issue are conveyed, to put specific image on the audience. Therefore we can

see two levels of agenda setting. The first level is how the media transfer the

prominence of an issue to the minds of the audience. This is the common

agenda-setting function of the media. The second level is the media can transfer

specific image or attribute toward an issue or attitude object and then modifies

the way we look at it. By selecting and putting emphasis on certain attribute, the

may can lead or maybe insinuate its audience toward what is beyond the

issue/object.

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1.3 Critique on Agenda Setting and Framing

Media has the power to manipulate the flow of information. When it

comes to raise attention toward certain issue, framing is an effective tool if done

correctly. But media needs to be careful as of how it is done. For example, they

need to cover both sides and media has an obligation to deliver the truth. This of

course, contradicts the intended purpose of framing which the media can decide

which portion of the truth to deliver (Ali, 2019). Too much framing will build

distrust towards the media, as they seen to be tendentious.

Truths are easy to distort in the postmodernism era, as perspective one

perceived is considered to be reality. A false information, tucked inside a handful

of facts could be perceived as right. Agenda setting bear a correlation with

cultivation theory, in which the way people saw their life are heavily influenced

by media. Television, in this case. If it isn’t used correctly, this practice will be

disadvantageous as the false information grew and slowly took effect in the long

run.

2.1 Case Study

On 8 November 2019, Tempo published an issue which features an error

in 2020 regional government budget expenditure under Anies Baswedan’s

administration, the most infamous one was the local government spend 82

billion rupiah and 124 billion rupiah to purchase Aica-Aibon glue supposedly for

4
elementary and junior high school in West Jakarta region. I Wayan Agus

Purnomo (2019), Tempo journalist covering the issue said that there are

anomalies in several phases of budget expenditure. Parliament member from

Partai Solidaritas Indonesia, William Aditya Sarana, criticize DPR budget

expenditure using his twitter account, putting an emphasis on glue. He also

mentions that the regional government plans on spending 5 billion rupiah on five

endorser to promote Jakarta tourism.

In this issue, we can see Tempo set an agenda. Tempo decide that this

issue is important and direct audience attention to it. One of the way to

determine the importance of an issue is simply to look at the piece itself. The

article was 19 paragraphs long, and it is the main feature of 8 November issue.

One way to burn an impression into our mind is using a picture, and Tempo gain

notoriety for this. In a Tempo-esque fashion, Tempo decide to criticize and

“make fun” of the situation using caricature, portraying Anies almost drowning in

a Aibon glue. Illustration looks similar to the actual product. This way audience

know, and can almost conclude what is the headline of the issue.

“Good” choices of words are also presented on the headline. “Kotak

Pandora Anggaran Ibu Kota” was chosen as a title by Purnomo to highlight this

issue. Kotak Pandora or Pandora’s Box is an item in Greek mythology said to

contain all evil in the world and was not meant to be opened. Purnomo

subconsciously portray that there’s still hope within parliament member as some

of them express their discontent over the expenditure. The word Pandora’s box

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may be niche and may not be known by Indonesian population, but it’s a good

metaphor.

Tempo decide to make a follow up in the following issue (2019, p. 28).

They publish an short article summarizing the 8 Nov headline Purnomo wrote.

This is done to remind the importance of an issue. It’s safe to assume that

tempo didn’t make a deliberate attempt to make this issue look important as the

Aica-Aibon glue has a notoriety on its own. Almost all of the people living in big

cities know that the glue can be used as a party drug or a gateway drug by

sniffing them. The practice was made popular by homeless and hoodlums.

All in all Tempo is able to achieve the first and the second level of agenda

setting.. Using the magnitude (and the novelty) of the issue allows Tempo to

easily direct audience attention to what is currently happening in the country. By

using picture and choice of words, they are able to assign specific attribute to

local governance insinuating that Anies Baswedan have overlook an error in

budget expenses and/or his staff who ignorantly made such error.

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Reference

Ali, Abdelrahman. (2019). Reviewing Theory of Political Economy, Week 6,

Session 6 notes [Powerpoint slides]

Anon. (2019, 10 Nov 2019). Anggaran Janggal Jakarta. Majalah Tempo.

Retrieved from: https://ebooks.gramedia.com/id/majalah/tempo/ed-4549-
04-10-nov-2019

Griffin, Em. (2012). A First Look at Communications Theory. New York. The
McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.

McCombs, Maxwell. (2005). A Look at Agenda-Setting: Past, Present and

Future. Journalism Studies, Vol. 6, 2005, pp. 543–557.

Purnomo, I Wayan Agus. (2019, 8 Nov 2019). Kotak Pandora Anggaran Ibukota.
Majalah Tempo. Retrieved from:
https://majalah.tempo.co/read/158716/kotak-pandora-anggaran-ibu-kota