| dc.description.abstract | Since the era of reformation, the Indonesian press which was shut up during the
repressive New Order administration has entered a free era which had been dreamed by
the press in Indonesia. Yet, the freedom they get turns into a new problem resulted from
the misunderstanding created by the journalists or some of the journalists themselves.
Many opinions come up. The question is what kind of freedom which is appropriate for
the press in Indonesia.
This study looks at the freedom of press in Indonesia especially that in Sumatera
Utara. The research method used is a case study technique with qualitative approach. The
respondents are 52 journalists associated in the Independence Journalists Alliance (AJI)
and the members of the Indonesian Journalist Association (PWI) Sumatera Utara Branch
in Medan who were interviewed to learn what their opinions are, especially, about the
freedom of press in Sumatera Utara. The primary data obtained through interviews are
supported with the secondary data collected through library research.
The result of the study reveals that most of the 52 journalists of AJI Medan and
PWI Sumatera Utara Branch judge that the freedom of press is a freedom that guarantees
journalists to bring up their opinion and fact as well as their safety, security and comfort
inn doing their journalistic activities that they can more freely tell the society about all
the important things to know without constraint and intervention from the outsiders
especially the stakeholder of the newspaper company itself. Since the freedom of press is
a freedom whose essence is to provide the public with factual information, and the
information belongs to the public, the respondents request that the press be given a
freedom to look for and publicize the information. | en_US |
