ABSTRACT
This paper examined political knowledge and perception among young and first time voters. This research is important because political knowledge and perception are two factors that has be known for its ability to drive political participation. Practically, this also because young and first time voters have essential roles in democracy but at the same time, they have lack of interests in politics. Thus, in present study we seek to understand political knowledge and perception of tenagers. We particularly examined their knowledge and perception on political party as one of political institutions. We employed qualitative methods with case study design and use interview to collect the data. 20 senior high school students were employed as participants. Their age ranged from 16 to 18 years old and no voting experience previously. The result ssows the participants had low level of knowledge about concept, roles, and function of political parties. Further, we also found that the participants had negative perception about political parties. They perceived political parties as a corrupt organization and frequently doing superficial impression management conducts, and also selfish.