Election Campaigning on Social Media: Politicians, Audiences, and the Mediation of Political Communication on Facebook and Twitter

Abstract

Although considerable research has concentrated on online campaigning, it is still unclear how politicians use different social media platforms in political communication. Focusing on the German federal election campaign 2013, this article investigates whether election candidates address the topics most important to the mass audience and to which extent their communication is shaped by the characteristics of Facebook and Twitter. Based on open-ended responses from a representative survey conducted during the election campaign, we train a human-interpretable Bayesian language model to identify political topics. Applying the model to social media messages of candidates and their direct audiences, we find that both prioritize different topics than the mass audience. The analysis also shows that politicians use Facebook and Twitter for different purposes. We relate the various findings to the mediation of political communication on social media induced by the particular characteristics of audiences and sociotechnical environments.

Political Astroturfing on Twitter: How to Coordinate a Disinformation Campaign

“…Social media platforms such as Twitter and Facebook have become major venues for ordinary citizens to discuss politics, disseminate news, and organize collective action (Bennett & Segerberg, 2013;Lilleker & Koc-Michalska, 2017;Stier et al, 2018;Thorson & Wells, 2016;Vaccari, 2017). Social media also have the potential to set the news agenda (Chadwick, 2013;Neuman, Guggenheim, Jang, & Bae, 2014) as journalists pay close attention to social media buzz (Lukito et al, 2018).…”

“…Third, we contribute to the debate on disinformation by measuring the impact of such a campaign on Twitter (Vosoughi, Roy, & Aral, 2018). Disinformation might be especially detrimental for democratic processes given the increasingly central role of social media in political communication (Bode, Hanna, Yang, & Shah, 2015;Jungherr, 2016;Stier, Bleier, Lietz, & Strohmaier, 2018;Thorson & Wells, 2016;Vaccari, 2017). We argue that the NIS campaign was, in many ways, a best-case scenario for an astroturfing campaign aimed at swaying public opinion: The campaign had considerable resources and professional manpower at its disposal and targeted an unsuspecting and politically polarized audience.…”

The Rise of Germany's AfD

“…In order to understand and evaluate the AfD's strategies on social media, a long-term multi-platform analysis is needed. Even though research on digital campaigns over the last two decades has been extensive, few studies have focused on how candidates and parties use multiple social media channels [50,57]. The social media environment itself has become more complex, and the fast pace of technology and digitalization calls for researchers to adapt their methods to cross-platform research.…”

Government Communication in Digital Environment

“…Indeed, it is common knowledge that nowadays "social media have become ubiquitous communication channels for candidates during election campaigns. Platforms like Facebook and Twitter enable candidates to directly reach out to voters, mobilize supporters, and influence the public agenda" [14]. However, civil servants too turn to social media platforms to interact with citizen.…”