DEPOK, June 11, 2026 —
The Department of Communication Studies, Graduate Program of the Faculty of Social and Political Sciences (FISIP), University of Indonesia, will hold a hybrid doctoral defense in Communication Studies on Thursday, June 11, 2026, from 9:00 a.m. to 11:00 a.m.00 WIB at the Juwono Sudarsono Auditorium (AJS), Building F, 2nd Floor, FISIP UI Campus, Depok. This doctoral defense was chaired by Prof. Isbandi Rukminto Adi, Ph.D. The dissertation was supervised by Prof. Dr. Donna Asteria, with Prof. Dr. Widjajanti Mulyono Santoso serving as co-supervisor. The examination committee consisted of Fadjar Ibnu Thufail, Ph.D., Prof. Dr. Semiarto Aji Purwanto, Lugina Setyawati Setiono, Ph.D., and Dr. Niken Febrina Ernungtyas.
During the defense, Yunus successfully defended his dissertation titled “Translational Trajectories in the Transactional-Material Communication Network of Renewable Energy Innovation: The Contestation of Non-Human Agency and Message Dislocation at the Dieng Geothermal Power Plant.” This dissertation examines the dynamics of geothermal energy innovation at the Dieng Geothermal Power Plant as a communication process within a complex socio-technical network.
This study is based on the view that the development of renewable energy is not merely a matter of technology, policy, and investment, but also involves how the meaning, risks, benefits, and legitimacy of energy are negotiated by various actors. Using the framework of Actor-Network Theory (ANT), this study explores the relationships between human actors—such as regulators, scientists, local governments, local communities, and the media—and non-human actors, such as geothermal fluids, H₂S gas, geoscience data, infrastructure, policy documents, and geothermal technology.
In his academic address, Yunus emphasized, “The contribution of this research to the field of communication studies is the development of the concept of transactional-material communication—that is, communication involving simultaneous interactions between human and nonhuman actors.” Through this research, Yunus demonstrated that the process of translating geothermal innovations does not proceed in a linear or stable manner. Instead, translation proceeds dynamically, non-linearly, and is continuously negotiated through problematization, interessement, enrollment, and mobilization. Yunus also emphasized that communication failures in energy innovation projects cannot be adequately explained solely as a lack of information or poor outreach. “Failure is also related to the asymmetry of voice, the distribution of representation, and the failure of interaction among actors,” he explained.
This dissertation makes a theoretical contribution by developing the concept of transactional-material communication and expanding the understanding of Actor-Network Theory through the concept of translational trajectories as a dynamic and reversible process. Communication functions both as the transmission of messages and as a mechanism of translation that determines how energy innovations are interpreted, accepted, contested, or negotiated. Thus, Muhammad Yunus Zulkifli has been declared to have graduated with the grade of “Highly Satisfactory.” With this graduation, Yunus has officially earned the 164th Doctor of Communication degree from the Faculty of Social and Political Sciences at the University of Indonesia. (MAP)
