POLITICAL AWARENESS OF PHI GENERATION

Abstract

According to the Youth Laboratory Indonesia, Indonesia's Generation Z, known as Phi Generation, has been considered an individual born and raised in the Internet Era, they are accustomed to getting information quickly and hanging out without meeting face to face. As they become more individualistic than the previous generation, several opinions state that Phi Generation has lost Indonesia's local wisdom of courtesy and respect to elders. Despite being individualistic, discussing politics with Phi Generation is interesting since political issues deal with many people's well-being. This study is then intended to examine whether or not Indonesia's Phi Generation truly cares about political issues happening around them. This research belongs to a qualitative study in which the researcher obtained the data through Focus Group Discussion. The subject of the research is college students who are categorized as first-time voters in the 2019 election. This study found that the Phi generation did not hesitate to disagree with elders, especially if they had valid information. However, they would not show these different attitudes, especially to parents, because they still maintain the manners. The Phi generation is aware of Indonesia's political situation, but they have not trusted the current politicians yet, especially in the legislature. The Phi generation, who spend most of their free time on social media, realizes that they should have known the candidates for the next member of representatives in the political year, so they try to find information about them on Instagram and Twitter.