The Role of Samin Tribe’s Opinion Leaders in COVID-19 Socialization

Abstract

Abstract: The COVID-19 pandemic has affected the lives of billions of people across the globe. Indonesia’s failure to handle the pandemic is due to the lack of public trust in the government. The study aims to investigate the impact of the pandemic on the traditions and beliefs of the Samin Tribe in Blimbing Village, Blora as well as their trust in the government’s policy on COVID-19. Furthermore, the author wants to examine the role of opinion leaders among the Samin Tribe in socializing the COVID-19 to increasing public awareness. This qualitative study was conducted using two-step flow theory through in-depth interviews with Mbah Pramugi Prawironegoro, an elder for Samin Tribe of Blimbing Village, Blora. A literature review was also done to define the concept of the Samin Tribe and opinion leaders. The results show that the role of opinion leaders proved to be important because the Samin Tribe regularly held meetings. A Javanese analogy ‘wong urip nek mudeng keiket’ makes them obey the government and through that, they believe will be spared of the virus. Consequently, they adopted the health protocols in daily life and limited the number of people during their weekly gatherings. Previous studies only focused on the concept of the Samin Tribe and current studies focus on COVID-19 disruption amongst urban people. This paper is contributive as the socio-cultural aspect of the Samin Tribe is analyzed concerning the COVID-19 impacts.
Keywords: Covid-19