The role of collaborative journalism in West Papua: A Jubi and Tirto case study

Abstract

In this article, the author explores the collaboration between Tirto and Jubi in reporting on the Wamena and Jayapura riots in September 2019 in what has been described as the Papuan Uprising. The collaboration was greatly influenced by the desire of both media to improve the quality of news on human rights violations in West Papua. Tirto is an Indonesian online media outlet. Its journalists often criticise various government policies and the Indonesian political world through headlines, news and special articles. Tirto won an award as the Most Innovative Cyber Media in the 2017 Adinegoro Journalism Awards organised by the Indonesian Journalists Association. In the following year, Tirto became the only media outlet in Indonesia to receive an award from the International Fact-Checking Network (IFCN). Jubi is a general news media service from West Papua which reports on the West Papuan conflict, especially human rights issues. At the conceptual level, one can expect an accurate and in-depth report resulting from the journalism collaboration between Tirto and Jubi. However, at the practical level, a question arises about what the collaboration means for the life of West Papuan journalists? Research results using qualitative content analysis and interviews suggest that the collaborative journalism they created was able to restore West Papuan journalists’self-esteem. These findings can contribute to the enhancement of the knowledge in the field of journalism and provide valuable information for West Papuan journalists.