Yogyakarta, July 27th 2020—Gadjah Mada University’s Community Service organization (PkM) held the first discussion session on Monday (27/7). This discussion was titled “Mapping Pesantren (Religious Boarding School) Socio-Economic Vulnerability and Resilience”. This discussion was filled by two speakers from the PkM research team; Luqman Nul Hakim and Mustaghfiroh Rahayu. There were also other speakers such as Ahsan Salim as a convection businessman in Mlangi and Muhammad Mustafied as the caretaker of PPIM Aswaja Nusantara Pesantren in Mlangi. Through Webex, Rully Mufarika as the moderator started the discussion at10 am. The discussion started with a short video screening about the pandemic and its effect on Mlangi’s convection production. Luqman then explained the reason why his research is focused on the convection business that has been in Mlangi for a long time. The problem with the convection business is complex. Luqman said that the pandemic not only affects the distribution process but also the production process. Other than that, compared to other sectors at Mlati, the convection sector is hit the hardest during the pandemic. “Compared to other sectors, this sector is affected the most economically because 90% of the market is dependent on tourism,” Luqman explained. Rahayu then elaborated the challenges that the convection business faces during her research for one and a half month in Mlati. The first problem is the uncertainty of when the pandemic will end, this makes the small businessmen in the convection sector more vulnerable in the social and economic aspect. The second problem is the fact that the complexity of the production-distribution chain at the Mlangi convection is reliant on the tourism sector. The third problem is that there is no comprehensive mapping from the government about the pandemic’ effect on small and informal business. The fourth problem is the fact that Mlangi’s businessmen usually work in their own house. The business therefore can be characterized as informal, within a family scale, and it doesn’t need a lot of capital. Based on those challenges, Rahayu found that there are two recommendations – long term and short term recommendation – that is issued by her and her team. The short term recommendation is to reorient the production and training as well as to teach businessman digital economy. Additionally, a strategic and safe analysis on opening the tourism sector as well as allocating a budget for managing the pandemic’s socio-economic effect in the society is needed. Rahayu also elaborated several long term recommendations which includes the suggestion to transform the economy after the pandemic. Not only that, a cross-sector synergy – between small businesses and the tourism economy – is needed. Creating marketing facilities is also seen as a good option. “These two suggestions can be done by future generations, for example by the children of the convection stores,” Rahayu added. To round up the research elaboration, Ahsan Salim elaborated the condition in Mlangi. One of the convection store said that the convection condition in Mlangi can also be seen in Malioboro. “When Malioboro is closed, the production and distribution process in Mlangi also needs to be closed,” Ahsan said. Ahsan also said that the production process in the convection business doesn’t always come to a halt. Some businessmen chose to deviate to another sector such as making a mask. Even though that is the case, he said the revenue from that business can’t cover the production cost before the pandemic. Other than that, Ahsan also said that the asset cycle is crashing. “If businesses don’t sell other assets such as their land and vehicles, it will be hard for them to get back up,” he said. Adding to the previous speakers’ statements, Mustafid highlighted several things that needs to be paid attention to. He said that a lot of the convection businesses in Mlangi are discontinued. This could be because many children chose to not continue their parents’ business. Other than that, Mustafid also said that the convection businesses in Mlangi are still managed with traditional systems. Mustafid said that Mlangi’s citizen technical knowledge is astounding in the convection business. But, the design innovation is lacking. “We have yet to find a convection design that can be a trendsetter,” he explained. In relation to the pesantren, Mustafid said that the society and the pesantren used to have a strong economic collaboration. This is because the majority of pesantren students or santri in Mlangi is an employee and they get their money from working in the convection business. Mustafit admits that this is not the case anymore. He said that the convection employees are not santri but they are outsourced from people outside of Mlangi. “The connection should be strengthened once again because a lot of pesantren teach santri to be independent and to have their own skillset. Therefore, when they go home, they can do something,” Mustafid added.

Yogyakarta, July 27^th2020—Quarantine that have been going on for a couple of months have made people search for new activities to fill their free time, including learning to make music. To give a picture on how to produce music at home, Fisipol UGM’s Center for Digital Society brought up that topic in its 28^thdigital discussion.

In a discussion titled “A Fun Way to Create Music At Home”, CfDS had M. Anada Alifiaarry, a final year Fisipol UGM student who is also a musician and guitarist. Right now, Nanda is a guitarist in the Honest Pineapple band. He is also learning audio production, especially record and music producing, as well as mixing engineer. read more

Yogyakarta, 26 Juli 2020—Creative Hub/C-Hub FISIPOL UGM organized its virtual discussion titled Small Talk with Neo Wedding Solution/NWS, a participant of Second Batch C-Hub Talent, via Instagram. The discussion examined socioentrepreneurship in wedding organization, inviting Arif and Bagas from NWS as speakers. Also present was Dea as the moderator.

The speaker began the discussion by briefly introducing NWS. NWS is a digital marketplace established in 2019, in which trusted wedding organization vendors in Yogyakarta promote its services. Another service provided by NWS is wedding event consultation. read more

Yogyakarta, July 24th 2020 – Telephone conference usage in this pandemic time was inevitable. People got used to move from one online meeting to another. This activity affected their time allocation for their hobbies, including reading. Because of that, Department of Public Policy Management tried to accommodate anyone to use teleconference or video as a way to exchange information about books in a discussion called MKP Book Corner. Not only limited to book review, but this forum also designed to discuss about journals, documentary films, even podcast from the point of view of public policy management. read more

Yogyakarta, July 23rd 2020 – During this pandemic, ASEAN had a lot of contacts with partner countries such as South Korea, China and Japan. Besides that, ASEAN must anticipated various threats and challenges in this time. ASEAN Studies Center (ASC) Fisipol UGM discussed this theme on its webinar called ‘ASEAN Talk: Anticipated Traditional and Non-traditional Security Threats in the COVID-19 Pandemic Era – the Challenges of Indonesia and ASEAN’. This webinar was held on Zoom and YouTube on Thursday (23/7) from 10.00 a.m. In this webinar that joined by, at least, 500 people, ASC presented Coordinating Ministry for Political, Legal, and Security Affairs of Republic of Indonesia. read more

Yogyakarta, July 23rd – Welcoming the arrival of the electoral party at the elections which will be held in December this year, Department of Politics and Government Fisipol UGM held a virtual discussion session called Candidation Process in 2020 Local Elections: A Dark Room Full of Mystery and presented Djarot Saiful Hidayat (Chairperson of the Ideology and Cadre Development of Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle), Hasyim Asy’ari (Member of General Elections Commission of the Republic of Indonesia), and Arya Budi (Lecturer of Department of Politics and Government Fisipol UGM) as the three main speakers in this discussion. Moderated by Mada Sukmadjati, lecturer of Department of Politics and Government Fisipol UGM, the discussion lasted comprehensively because the speakers not only gave lectures about theories, but also gave an empirical illustration, one of them was Djarot Saiful Hidayat that begun the discussion by explaining about the context of the dynamics of local elections candidation process which have done by Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P). read more

Yogyakarta, July 20th 2020—The 5th Papua Strategic Policy Forum event is back with a discussion titled “The Urgency of Creating a Human Rights Court & Truth and Reconciliation Commission for Papua” which was held by UGM Papua Taskforce and The Center for Capacity and Cooperation Building Fisipol UGM. The event was held online through Zoom and live streamed on Youtube. The discussion started with a presentation by Beka Ulung Hapsara, an Education and Counseling Commissioner in the National Committee of Human Rights. He said that the issue of papua is very complex, not just about the inequality but also the law enforcement in Papua. He said that there are only four human rights violations in Papua that are being investigated. Therefore, the Papua Truth and Reconciliation Commission (KKR) needs to investigate now. In the future, KKR will also create a clarification of Papua’s history, establish reconciliation steps, and ensure that there will be no more human rights violations in Papua in the future. read more

Yogyakarta, July 20th 2020—Gadjah Mada University’s Center for Digital Society held the 27th digital discussion. In this episode, CfDS invited Izzati Dwifitriani, a content writer at RWE Digital Agency. The event titled “Content writing: from Hobby to Profession” was held through a Whatsapp Group. As usual, half an hour before the event started, the moderator — Made Agus Bayu Sudharma, CfDS’s Event Assistant — reminded the attendant that the event will start soon. Right at 7 pm, the moderator opened the discussion by introducing himself and telling the attendant the rules. The moderator also gave a chance for the speaker to introduce herself. read more

Yogyakarta, 18 July 2020—Korps Mahasiswa Politik Pemerintahan/KOMAP and Dema Fisipol UGM organized virtual discussion Warung Politik under the theme of Freedom of Press and Disinformation in Papua. The discussion was held through Zoom and aired live via DEMA Fisipol UGM’s Youtube channel. Well-known speakers were invited, namely Veronika Koman (working as a human rights lawyer), Victor Mambor (working as a senior journalist focusing on issues of Papua), and Aprilia Wayar (as a writer and member of AJI Yogyakarta). Bayu Krisna, a student of Government and Political Sciences UGM, acted as the moderator. read more

Yogyakarta, July 17th 2020 – Department of Communication Science Fisipol UGM held another ‘Ngopi’ discussion. This fifth series of Ngopi called ‘The People’s Opinions and Crisis Communication of the Corona Pandemic’. This discussion presented three speakers, they were a researcher of Indonesia Indicator, Nur Imroatus S. Then, an advisor of International Media Support, Denmark, R. Kristiwan. And the last was a lecturer of Department of Communication Science, Wisnu Martha Adiputra. The moderator of this event was a lecturer from Department of Communication Science of Fisipol UGM, Wisnu Prasetyo Utomo.Nur began the discussion by showing the Indonesia Indicator observation result towards the news in the online medias during the period from March, 23rd to July, 2nd 2020. She found at least 70 steps of the central government which were reported by the Indonesian online medias. This report, according to Nur, shown the liveliness of the government to talked about their steps to the media. But, the informations about COVID-19 from the government seemed unplanned. “Public communication between central government and local government was often out of sync,” said this woman who was familiarly called Iím. read more