The Impact of Social Media Use for Elected Parliamentarians: Evidence from Politicians' Use of Twitter During the Last Two Swiss Legislatures

Abstract

Notwithstanding growing research on how using social media for political campaigning impacts politicians' chances of winning votes, we still have limited knowledge about whether and how the use of social media and online styles of communication affect political success over successive legislatures. We address this deficit by analyzing a panel dataset about the Twitter activity of politicians who have had a parliamentary mandate at least once. We first demonstrate that politicians' interaction with specific online audiences (e.g. in terms of replies and mentions) is still evolving, thus pointing to possible strategic adaptations of politicians' communication as social media are mastered. Then, we show that Twitter-based activity moderately impacts politicians' political success, both in terms of political ranking and media coverage. This success, however, strongly depends on the style of political communication and on the legislature under scrutiny. RésuméMalgré les recherches croissantes sur l'impact de l'utilisation des médias sociaux dans le cadre de campagnes politiques sur le succès électoral des hommes et femmes politiques, les connaissances sur les effets de l'utilisation des médias sociaux et des styles de communication sur le succès

The election campaign for parliament in the age of the Internet

“…The style of political communication embraced by candidates in social media and their frequent use appear to be important for electoral purposes. Politicians who use them to react to voters' comments may be more politically successful than those who do not react because they are evaluated more positively by voters (Reveilhac & Morselli, 2022; Utz, 2009). This interactive style of communication helps create a feeling of empathy between the voters and the political candidate that grows closer the more interaction there is between them (Bright et al, 2020).…”

“…As remarked by Bene (2018, p. 12), ‘these results suggest that the extra votes can be gained from those voters who see the politicians' content mediated by their Facebook friends rather than the followers who engage with the posts’. Reveilhac and Morselli (2022) found that the proportion of replies given to media via Twitter and the proportion of ‘retweeted’ politicians' messages significantly increased politicians' success. Replies to public concerns also increased their political ranking, whereas replies to citizens penalized it during electoral periods.…”

“…Empirical evidence partially confirms this picture. On the one hand, there are some studies that show that the use of personal websites and social media by candidates during election campaigns increases their number of votes received (DiGrazia et al, 2013;Kelm et al, 2023;Kruikemeier, 2014;Reveilhac & Morselli, 2022). On the other hand, some empirical studies reveal an insignificant effect of social media and personal website on votes (Kobayashi & Ichifuji, 2015;Spierings & Jacobs, 2014).…”