Sociological approach to the study of Russia’s image in the Indonesian media

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The model of the world order has changed dramatically in the postwar era — from the bipolarity (the US and Soviet Russia) that characterized the Cold War to the unipolarity following the fall of Soviet Union in 1989, when America became the sole superpower in a complex multipolar world following the Global Financial Crisis in 2008. Some reseachers argue that the world economic order consists of three dominant poles: the United States, China, and the European Union even though politically the world structure is more complex due to the emergint Sino-­American bipolarity [15]. In the present era, relations between countries are no longer dominated by the struggle between two superpowers (the United States and the Soviet Union — now the Russian Federation), which was the situation in the Cold War era, but develop in the direction of a multipolar world consisting of new centers of power [19]. Many scholars believe that “because the world order is supported by a system of socio-­political interaction between countries that still exists, the world order must benefit both parties. Therefore, states that are able to influence interactive discourse in the society of states that are considered sovereign will have a privileged position in establishing rules of conduct for other states. This essentially violated the principles of the Westphalian system, which considered all sovereign states to be equal. Multipolar world theories propagate ideas that advocate the civilizational integration of countries based on their cultural and political similarities… Such integration… will help weaker countries gain a more productive voice in the process of formulating world order discourse. This can also explain the weakening of state sovereignty and its replacement by civilizational (or alliance) sovereignty” [6].

Image of Russia in the multipolar world attracts attention of many countries, including Indonesia as participating in the birth of a multipolar world together with Russia, China, India and Brazil [3]. The concept of multipolarity was introduced in the 1960s as a response of Western scholars to changes in the bipolar system, characterized by the emergence of the third world — countries with a fairly independent stance towards one of the blocs and even more independent foreign policy ambitions. K. Deutsch and J. Singer were the first to discuss multipolarity by summarizing weaknesses of the bipolar system and its possible changes. The possibility of transformation to a multipolar system is justified by the increasing potential of different countries to stabilize the world political power [2]. In addition, Ch. Krauthammer predicted that “multipolarity will come in time … perhaps in the next generation, there will be great powers equal to the United States, and the structure of the world will resemble the era before the World War I” [10]. The transformation of the bipolar system seems very possible, because it is far from perfect and has clear limitations. Therefore, multipolarity is considered a possible future option — with an increasing number of poles, which would minimize the risk of confrontation between two different poles and international politics from a zero-­sum game. Since international politics is not a zero-­sum game, states’ actions do not require a countervailing response from their opponents. R.N. Rosecrance’s thesis can be summarized as follows: multipolarity is better than bipolarity, but unpredictable actions of all poles is quite challenging for the whole system [7].

There are three main factors that determine the development of the multipolar world theory. First, the unipolar order experienced significant difficulties while strengthening. Recent turmoil in the Middle East, refugee crises and political challenges in other parts of the world have demonstrated that one power cannot manage world affairs successfully and that the participation of other countries is necessary to ensure lasting peace and stability. Second, the unipolar world order has not yet been framed institutionally, giving rise to further difficulties in terms of legitimacy. Indeed, over the last quarter century the United States created a series of precedents — such as “humanitarian intervention”, “regime change” and “disarmament” — that could consolidate its global leadership and frame the main dimensions of the unipolar world. Third, there are regional alliances in various parts of the world, for instance, BRICS, integration processes in Latin America, the post-­Soviet region, Asia and Africa [6].

Discussions about multipolarity often contain a bias regarding how society wants the world to develop compared to how the world does work. Supporters of the multipolar world consider events as determined not by the actions or interests of a global hegemon but by the competing interests of various centers of power. Such supporters often argue that a multipolar world implies that countries with equal power work together to realize their interests, which makes this world more peaceful and desirable for everyone [24]. The concept of a multipolar world was born from the idea of ​​balance and equal rights of every country in the international world. At the Munich Conference on Security Policy on February 10, 2007, V. Putin stated: “I consider the unipolar model not only unacceptable but also impossible in today’s world” [7]. At the 11^th Moscow International Security Conference, Putin added that a multipolar world order would ultimately contribute to a stable and sustainable global development and would help solve pressing social, economic, technological and environmental problems. According to the Russian Defense Doctrine declared by D. Medvedev, the world must be multipolar; a single pole (power, domination) is not acceptable, no country should have the right to make all decisions, even as influential as the United States, since this makes the world unstable and threatened by conflicts. Moreover, to prove its readiness to create a multipolar world, Russia focuses on the development of BRICS (the term was introduced by US economist J. O’Neal in 2001 as an acronym for Brazil, Russia, India, China and later South Africa). The strategic goal of the BRICS group is to ensure a democratic world balance in a multipolar world system, an equitable development and the UN’s central role in all world affairs [17].

Today the media is “a guided market system” driven by profit and guided by the government to follow some agenda — whether political or financial, which determines the importance of emphasizing propaganda in the media as a common means to convince the public [20]. The term “mass media” refers to its use for and by public [5], and the development of information technology has encouraged mass media to transfer from print to online forms [1]. Online media implies that a computerized media system is connected directly to the network [13]. Online media is very different from conventional media (radio, television and print media), because on online media sites communicators can interact directly through channels or networks, and the news of the online media are updated and disseminated instantly [27].

There are many reports in the Indonesian online media on Russia and the multipolar world, presenting a specific image of Russia. We will consider five such essential news stories from the most popular Indonesian online media: Koran-­jakarta.com, Kompas.com, Sindonews.com, Antaranews.com, and kompas.tv. Our study was conducted with the framing analysis method that allows to identify how an event is framed by the media: to frame means to select some aspects of a perceived reality and make them more salient in a text in such a way as to promote a particular problem definition, causal interpretation, moral evaluation, and/or treatment recommendation [8]. We chose a case study approach supplemented by a review of various relevant works and the following main terms: country image — a sum of beliefs, attitudes and impressions that a person or a group has of an object (In this case of a country) [4]; multipolar world concept [8]; mass media (its history in Indonesia began during the Dutch colonial period and witnessed a significant development after the reform at the end of the 1990s [14]). We considered the following reports in the online Indonesian media on Russia and the multipolar world:

• On Jakarta.com — “Multipolar World Vision: Civilization Factors and Russia’s Position in the New World Order”: civilization platform in each country has a unique structure and characteristics, which can be developed by networks or cooperation with other countries to make a pathway to a fundamentally new system which will replace the existing paradigm dominated by one civilization. In this report, Russia is defined as a country that supports the idea and movement to a multipolar world [9].
• On Kompas.com — “Russia Calls Indonesia a Strong Candidate to Join BRICS”: Indonesia has not officially applied, although its President Joko Widodo attended the last BRICS conference. The BRICS group has gone through two waves of expansion since its founding in 2006: in 2011, South Africa joined the founding members — Brazil, Russia, India and China; in 2024, five new members (Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates) started working as BRICS member countries [21].
• On Dindonews.com — “Putin: the Multipolar Campaign and Indonesia”: the Russian President considers the world as developing towards many central poles of power or multipolarity. This change is driven by the rapid growth of such countries as China, Russia and Brazil. Putin called Indonesia a country supporting the world multipolarity due to the strong hegemony of the United States and its allies. Putin reminded that the development of the Indo-­Pacific strategy basically aims at creating a military-­political association controlled by Washington, and that the US steps to integrate NATO and AUKUS aim at building a neo-­colonial Wes and at delaying the formation of a multipolar world by destabilizing and triggering tensions in various regions. According to Putin, most countries were ready to defend their national sovereignty and interests, traditions, culture and way of life, which is why they developed new economic and political centers for a stable and progressive global development of multipolarity [22].
• On Antaranews.com — “Putin Discusses the Stable Development of a Multipolar World Order”: at the 11^th Moscow International Security Conference, Putin mentioned the stable revival of a new multipolar world. When discussing the global shift towards multipolarity, Putin said that most countries were ready to assert their sovereignty and defend their national interests, traditions and culture; thereby, a multipolar world order would contribute to a sustainable global development [29].
• On Kompas.tv — “Putin: Indonesia as a Driver for the Birth of a Multipolar World Together with Russia, China, India and Brazil”. According to Putin, “a multipolar world is being formed and already exists due to the growing potential of many countries, including China… India is developing in Asia just as Indonesia. In Latin America, Brazil is developing. Russia is rising and getting stronger. And I repeat once again that this is a manifestation of the objective development of a multipolar world… And today a global approach to human history… has become even more relevant” [28].

Framing analysis aims at identifying how the media constructs reality [25] by using special frames that limit the selected information and determine the focus of attention (what perspectives journalists use when selecting issues and writing reports) [20]. It is technically impossible for a journalist to present the entire picture, i.e., only parts of important events (happenings) in a story (news) become objects of journalists’ framing [26]. There are four key ways to frame news: (1) identification of the problem (how the event is seen, its positive or negative value); (2) identification of a cause of the problem (causal interpretation); (3) moral evaluation (an assessment of these causes); (4) suggestions for dealing with the problems (recommendations on how to handle the problem and/or to predict its result; thus, framing basically refers to providing definitions, explanations, evaluations and recommendations to emphasize a certain frame (a particular definition, causal interpretation, moral evaluation, etc.) for discussing an event [8] (Table 1).

Table 1
Framing Analysis

 The findings and analysis of the 1st news report from Jakarta.com “Multipolar World Vision: Civilization Factors and Russia’s Position in the New World Order” [9] are presented in Table 2.

Table 2
News matrix

The findings and analysis of the 2nd news report from Kompas.com “Russia Calls Indonesia a Strong Candidate to Join BRICS” is presented in Table 3, of the 3rd report from Sindonews.com “Putin: the Multipolar Campaign and Indonesia” — In Table 4, of the 4th report from Antaranews.com “Putin Discusses the Stable Development of a Multipolar World Order” — in Table 5, of the 5th report from Kompas.tv “Putin: Indonesia as a Driver for the Birth of a Multipolar World Together with Russia, China, India and Brazil” — in Table 6.

Table 3
News Matrix

Table 4
News Matrix

Table 5
News Matrix

 Table 6
News Matrix

Based on these news matrixes, we can define the multipolar world presented in the Indonesian media as a concept emphasizing the idea of ​​balance and equal rights for every country in the system of international relations. This multipolar world develops due to the rapid growth in several countries, which contributes to the global transition from the existing paradigm dominated by one civilization under the slogan of globalization, Westernization, Americanization, universalization and liberalization to the state of multipolarity as not opposed to but rather ignoring the West. To make such conclusions from the framing analysis, we took the following steps: defined the problem by identifying its causal agents with their costs and benefits, found moral judgments to evaluate causal agents and their effects, proposed treatments for the problem and their possible effects. The image of Russia in Indonesia in relation to the multipolar world order is that Russia encourages countries experiencing rapid growth to assert their sovereignty, to defend their national interests, traditions and culture, and to give up the idea of unipolarity. In other words, today’s news framework is determined by geopolitical and civilizational presentations of a multipolar world as being born today, and Russia supports this birth, arguing that the world must not be ruled by any one or two poles, since every state has the right to assert its sovereignty, defend its national interests and strengthen its regional cooperation.

About the authors

V. L Muzykant

Author for correspondence.
Email: vmouzyka@mail.ru
Miklukho-Maklaya St., 6, Moscow, 117198, Russia

Panca Syurkani

Email: pancasyurkani@gmail.com
Miklukho-Maklaya St., 6, Moscow, 117198, Russia

References