Studi kasus di industri pertambangan Indonesia dipilih sebagai jendela untuk memahami fungsi public relations (PR) di era paska Suharto. Partisipan memandang era reformasi yang memungkinkan kebebasan berpendapat dan sistem desentralisasi sebagai pemicu untuk menyusun strategi public relations (PR) yang baru dalam menjalin hubungan dengan publik. Personal relationship model of PR ditemukan sebagai model PR yang dominan di industri pertambangan Indonesia. Model ini dipilih sebagai strategi untuk membangun hubungan baik dengan orangorang kunci di komunitas yang dipahami sebagai masyarakat kolektif. Temuan ini mendukung proposisi yang menyatakan adanya pengaruh budaya setempat dan nilai-nilai lokal terhadap paktekPR.
Key words: public relations, personal influence model, mining industryPublic relations practices vary across the world. Some scholars (Grunig et al., 1995, Vercic et al., 1996 have proposed the concept of generic principles and specific applications of public relations. Generic principles refer to standardised world-wide principles, while specific applications mean that the generic principles are applied differently in different settings (Grunig et al., 2006). Grunig etal (2006) refer to the principles proposed by The Excellence Study as the generic principles. Meanwhile, the culture, political and economic system, the media system, the degree
129Jurnal VOLUME 7, NOMOR 2, Desember 2010: 129-152 ILMU KOMUNIKASI of activism, and the level of economic development have characterised specific applications of public relations (Sriramesh and Vercic, 2003).Several international studies have confirmed that variation in public relations models has been found in many cultures and political systems, illustrating the use of the personal influence model (Grunig et al., 1995, Huang, 2000, Jo and Kim, 2004, Park, 2002, Rhee, 2002, Sriramesh, 1992. Sriramesh (1992) argued that the personal influence model is an additional fifth model that encompasses elements of public relations not covered by the original four models that Grunig and Hunt proposed. In spite of this, it is still unclear why certain public relation practices are more common in certain countries (Jo and Kim, 2004). In relation to this, this article seeks to better understand public relations practices in Indonesia today. The premise of this article is that the economic, social, and political changes after Suharto's resignation have resulted in opportunities and challenges for public relations practices.In Indonesia, public relations was first introduced in the 1950s when a number of multinational companies commenced business in Indonesia and needed to build a good relationship with the government and the public (Ananto, 2004a, Putra, 1996. Public relations practice in government agencies began to develop, when in 1962 the government decided that all government agencies should have public relations departments to facilitate dialogue between government and the public and support decision making process (Ananto, 2004a). The foreign and domestic ca...