Citizen’s Participation Through E-Petition: New Wave of Green Movement in Indonesia

Abstract

At the present, internet era brings a huge change in people lifestyle. The way people interact with their virtual environment represents their thought about the real environment. Go green campaign become widely shared on the internet through various internet communication. This study identified what environmental issues which netizens concern and who they think should take action. We analysed e-petitions issued between January until October 2016 which published by netizens in change.org. A qualitative content analysis was performed to conclude the main message delivered in each e-petition. There were 136 petitions retrieved by keyword environment, but only 62 e-petitions contained go green campaign. This study shows that green movement on the internet mostly initiated by common people. Moreover, the existences of independent lifestyle communities also promising watchdog on environmental issues. Both of these non-incorporated netizens mostly underlined the quality of environment they living as the main messages of the e-petitions. On the other hand, issues related wildlife preservation was spoken up by incorporated netizens such as NGO. Surprisingly, netizens tend to pointed government as the responsible actor in this environmental damage rather than considered to shared responsibility. Finally, we found that citizen’s participation in go green campaign was determined by their nearest daily living environment which same idealized vision will bring them to more solid movement.