The Limited Influence of Right-Wing Movements on Social Media User Engagement

Abstract

This article generates new insights into the dynamic interplay between social media content generated by right-wing movements, user engagement, and the public attention movements receive. I argue that movement leaders seek to achieve high user engagement for utilizing mechanisms of information diffusion to increase both online and on-site mobilization. In a case study, I analyze the German right-wing movement Pegida, which uses Facebook for spreading its anti-Islam agenda online. Data from Pegida’s Facebook page are combined with news reports over a period of 18 months to measure activity on Facebook and in the public sphere simultaneously. Results of quantitative text and time series analysis show that Pegida cannot influence user engagement by simply creating more posts. Instead, it is the content of posts that matters. Moreover, findings highlight a strong connection between Facebook activities and the public sphere. In times of decreasing attention, the movement changes its social media strategy in response to exogenous shocks: Pegida resorts increasingly to radical mobilization methods by posting xenophobic content that is more likely to incite users to engage on Facebook.

The Systemic Impact of Deplatforming on Social Media

“…Compared to previous Gettr studies which showed that users quickly become idle after registration [30], possibly due to the lack of engaging content [31], our results reveal the discrepancy between users banned from Twitter and users who remain active on Twitter, indicating that Gettr was most successful at retaining users who had lost their Twitter audience. Our results also show that deplatforming events of exceptional prominence can induce a significant influx of accounts into a fringe platform, but not necessarily a corresponding outflux from the dominant mainstream platform.…”

Audience Engagement and the Dynamics of Online Activism: Far-Right Mobilization on Facebook*

“…Framing may be particularly important for right-wing groups due to their tendency to focus on informationalizing (Schradie 2019). Indeed, Carsten Schwemmer (2021) finds that audience engagement on Facebook with the German PEGIDA movement was primarily a function of framing, with posts about Islam and alleged sexual assaults attracting particularly large numbers of comments. In contrast, posts about protests received far less engagement.…”

“…Events can modify these political opportunity structures, altering the potential for activism. There is evidence that far-right actors strategically respond to salient events by modifying their online behavior (Schwemmer 2021). I consider the role of two different classes of events relevant to contemporary far-right activism.…”

A Comprehensive Survey of Detection and Prevention Approaches for Online Radicalization: Identifying Gaps and Future Directions

“…The report in [40] indicates that more than 100k Twitter users are regarded as active alt-right users in 2018. According to [41], the RW just needed a few months to garner more than 90k likes on posts critical of Islam (such as those on street rallies). In 2018, [42] hypothesizes that there are 169,071 members in Facebook groups who post racist content, and there were 5k tweets about violence against refugees in November 2015 and 6k tweets encouraging refugees to commit acts of violence.…”