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Social Sciences
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Rethinking and Analyzing Political Communication in the Digital Era
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Rethinking and Analyzing Political Communication in the Digital Era

A special issue of Social Sciences (ISSN 2076-0760).

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (10 October 2023) | Viewed by 16673

Special Issue Editors

Dr. Ana Fernández Zubieta

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Faculty of Information Sciences, Complutense University of Madrid, 28040 Madrid, Spain
Interests: public policies for science; technology and innovation; sociology of science and science communication
Dr. Belén Casas-Mas

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Faculty of Information Sciences, Complutense University of Madrid, 28040 Madrid, Spain
Interests: virtualization of communication; social uses of ICT; digital media and socio-political polarization

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

In the field of social research, the emergence of devices that constantly collect and store our practices and opinions has necessitated profound readjustment in the analysis of political processes. Social media and big data techniques have become crucial to understand the changes in digital political communication. Social media has allowed citizens to compete in the public sphere with traditional actors that used to have a remarkable influence on public opinion. This disintermediation process has diversified citizen exposure and participation in public political communication. Scholars are increasingly concerned with the increase in the polarization of discourses, the effects of disinformation on changes in opinion, the contagion processes in social networks, and the use of communication strategies such as incivility or emotivism in public discourse. These types of communication dynamics are making open and inclusive debates more difficult, which can pose a threat to democratic processes. The dynamics of digital political communication and its consequences require us to reflect on how we understand and analyze them.

The aim of this Special Issue is to explore how social media and big data analysis are applied to the understanding of the dynamics of digital political communication and other sociopolitical processes. Specifically, we focus on how platforms, social networks, and technologies deal with big data in digitally mediated debates. We aim to promote interdisciplinary collaboration in data science research to improve our understanding of phenomena such as public debates during electoral campaigns around the world, public discussion processes on controversial issues, emerging social issues, and social coordination. 

We seek to receive innovative approaches and papers that employ a wide range of methodologies, such as the use of recently booming techniques within the repertoire of social science methods, (i.e., big data, social network analysis, and computational simulation), although other methodological approaches are equally welcome. Potential topics include, but are not limited to: 

  • Politics of disinformation
  • Methodological approaches using big data, machine learning, and other techniques in political communication
  • The role of public opinion in policymaking
  • Digital transparency and political communication
  • Echo chambers and filter bubbles in political discussions
  • Identities and stereotypes on social media
  • Digital activism
  • Big data and digital gap
  • Language and polarization in sociopolitical discourses
  • Analysis of social and political debates in digital social networks. 

Dr. Ana Fernández Zubieta
Dr. Belén Casas-Mas
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a double-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Social Sciences is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1800 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • political communication
  • digital research methods
  • social media
  • big data
  • digital activism
  • digital public sphere
  • polarization
  • disinformation
  • digital inequalities
  • digital transparency

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Published Papers (7 papers)

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Research

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26 pages, 4914 KiB  
Article
The Discursive Dimensions of Pernicious Polarization. Analysis of Right-Wing Populists in Western Europe on Twitter
by Suania Acampa and Federica Nunziata
Soc. Sci. 2024, 13(6), 292; https://doi.org/10.3390/socsci13060292 - 29 May 2024
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 1045
Abstract
The objective of this research is to explore the political discourse of West European right-wing populist leaders in the perspective of pernicious polarization, focusing on their positions and argumentation styles. To achieve this, over 50,000 tweets from right-wing populist leaders in Western Europe [...] Read more.
The objective of this research is to explore the political discourse of West European right-wing populist leaders in the perspective of pernicious polarization, focusing on their positions and argumentation styles. To achieve this, over 50,000 tweets from right-wing populist leaders in Western Europe (Italy, France and Spain) were collected for a period spanning from 2 July 2019, which marks the beginning of the 9th legislature of the European Parliament, to 2 July 2023. Employing Text Mining and Topic Modeling techniques, this research will reconstruct and comparatively analyze the topics addressed by the leaders from different countries and the dynamics of polarization discourse proposing an exploratory study aiming to locate the words of pernicious polarization used by each leader. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Rethinking and Analyzing Political Communication in the Digital Era)
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19 pages, 597 KiB  
Article
Redefining the Communication Dynamics in Bolsonaro’s Brazil: Media Consumption and Political Preferences
by Joao Feres Junior, Bruno Marques Schaefer and Eduardo Barbabela
Soc. Sci. 2024, 13(5), 245; https://doi.org/10.3390/socsci13050245 - 29 Apr 2024
Viewed by 2503
Abstract
In this article, we contend that understanding Brazil’s current communicative landscape requires a closer examination of the relevance of legacy media outlets, challenging the widely accepted “traditional media bypass” thesis, which posits that social media platforms have overtaken traditional media as the primary [...] Read more.
In this article, we contend that understanding Brazil’s current communicative landscape requires a closer examination of the relevance of legacy media outlets, challenging the widely accepted “traditional media bypass” thesis, which posits that social media platforms have overtaken traditional media as the primary influencers of political discourse, an argument often used to explain the rise of extreme-right ideologies across different national contexts. In order to test the association between voting preferences and the use of different types of media, we employ logistic regression analysis using data from a recent survey that includes numerous questions about the information and media consumption habits of Brazilian voters. Our findings highlight that legacy media, particularly broadcast TV channels like Globo, Record, and SBT, remain dominant in Brazil as sources of political information. Contrary to the bypass thesis, Bolsonaro’s supporters, while favoring social media, also consume significant amounts of legacy media. Analysis reveals stark differences in media preferences between the supporters of different political candidates, challenging the notion of an exclusive reliance on social media by right-wing supporters. The data also indicate nuanced media consumption habits, such as a preference for certain TV channels and fact-checking behaviors, underscoring the complex interplay between legacy and social media. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Rethinking and Analyzing Political Communication in the Digital Era)
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17 pages, 3323 KiB  
Article
Emotivism Trends in Digital Political Communication: The Influence on the Results of the US Presidential Elections
by Belén Casas-Mas, Martin Fernández Marcellán, José Manuel Robles and Daniel Vélez
Soc. Sci. 2024, 13(2), 80; https://doi.org/10.3390/socsci13020080 - 26 Jan 2024
Viewed by 1912
Abstract
Citizens, organizations and institutions are increasingly making use of digital social networks such as Twitter as a means by which to express their position as regards political topics. However, an increasing amount of academic literature coincides, in that it highlights the emotive and [...] Read more.
Citizens, organizations and institutions are increasingly making use of digital social networks such as Twitter as a means by which to express their position as regards political topics. However, an increasing amount of academic literature coincides, in that it highlights the emotive and expressive nature of these positions. In other words, for the most part, the political opinions that are publicized are more like backing based on support or rejection (without arguments or motives). In parallel, said expressions have a key emotional element (expressions of a positive or negative affective disposition). This article consists of an analysis that aims, on the one hand, to measure the affective disposition of US citizens as expressed on Twitter during the two most recent electoral campaigns (2016 and 2020). Similarly, we have generated a model that facilitates the measurement of the extent to which the content of the aforementioned messages demonstrates arguments or motives, or lack of. By way of the use of a database for the same Twitter accounts in both elections, we provide very consistent results that highlight the lack of argumentation of the public debate and the notably polarized profile of the affective dispositions shown by participants. We use the thesis of emotivism to give a more significant analytical weighting to this research. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Rethinking and Analyzing Political Communication in the Digital Era)
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14 pages, 1301 KiB  
Article
Reciprocal Communication and Political Deliberation on Twitter
by Robert Ackland, Felix Gumbert, Ole Pütz, Bryan Gertzel and Matthias Orlikowski
Soc. Sci. 2024, 13(1), 5; https://doi.org/10.3390/socsci13010005 - 20 Dec 2023
Viewed by 1748
Abstract
Social media platforms such as Twitter/X are increasingly important for political communication but the empirical question as to whether such communication enhances democratic consensus building (the ideal of deliberative democracy) or instead contributes to societal polarisation via fostering of hate speech and “information [...] Read more.
Social media platforms such as Twitter/X are increasingly important for political communication but the empirical question as to whether such communication enhances democratic consensus building (the ideal of deliberative democracy) or instead contributes to societal polarisation via fostering of hate speech and “information disorders” such as echo chambers is worth exploring. Political deliberation involves reciprocal communication between users, but much of the recent research into politics on social media has focused on one-to-many communication, in particular the sharing and diffusion of information on Twitter via retweets. This paper presents a new approach to studying reciprocal political communication on Twitter, with a focus on extending network-analytic indicators of deliberation. We use the Twitter v2 API to collect a new dataset (#debatenight2020) of reciprocal communication on Twitter during the first debate of the 2020 US presidential election and show that a hashtag-based collection alone would have collected only 1% of the debate-related communication. Previous work into using social network analysis to measure deliberation has involved using discussion tree networks to quantify the extent of argumentation (maximum depth) and representation (maximum width); we extend these measures by explicitly incorporating reciprocal communication (via triad census) and the political partisanship of users (inferred via usage of partisan hashtags). Using these methods, we find evidence for reciprocal communication among partisan actors, but also point to a need for further research to understand what forms this communication takes. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Rethinking and Analyzing Political Communication in the Digital Era)
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19 pages, 356 KiB  
Article
The Role of Media in Risk Management Processes—Analysis of the News Coverage of the Forest Fires in Spain
by Ariadna Rodríguez-Teijeiro and Laura Román-Masedo
Soc. Sci. 2023, 12(12), 688; https://doi.org/10.3390/socsci12120688 - 15 Dec 2023
Viewed by 1388
Abstract
This paper focuses on the analysis of information on environmental catastrophes published in the digital editions of different national and regional newspapers, from a theoretical perspective that situates them as possible amplifiers of the social perception of risk or generators of alarm among [...] Read more.
This paper focuses on the analysis of information on environmental catastrophes published in the digital editions of different national and regional newspapers, from a theoretical perspective that situates them as possible amplifiers of the social perception of risk or generators of alarm among the population in situations of risk or catastrophe. Within this framework, the general objective of the research was to find out to what extent the analysed media (a) transmit specialized, accurate, truthful and contrasted information that moves away from the characteristics of sensationalist news; (b) are useful sources of information for the public in the face of the possibility that they may act as generators of confusion and biased perceptions; and (c) show “communication gaps” in their news in relation to two cases of forest fires in Spain: the fires in Galicia in 2017 and those in Gran Canaria in 2019. The results obtained highlight the need for the media to make an effort to transmit truthful and useful communication for citizens in situations of crisis or catastrophe. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Rethinking and Analyzing Political Communication in the Digital Era)
24 pages, 3613 KiB  
Article
Digital Activism Masked―The Fridays for Future Movement and the “Global Day of Climate Action”: Testing Social Function and Framing Typologies of Claims on Twitter
by Ana Fernández-Zubieta, Juan Antonio Guevara, Rafael Caballero Roldan and José Manuel Robles
Soc. Sci. 2023, 12(12), 676; https://doi.org/10.3390/socsci12120676 - 6 Dec 2023
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 3238
Abstract
This article analyzed the Fridays for Future (FFF) movement and its online mobilization around the Global Day of Climate Action on 25 September 2020. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, this event is a unique opportunity to study digital activism as marchers were considered [...] Read more.
This article analyzed the Fridays for Future (FFF) movement and its online mobilization around the Global Day of Climate Action on 25 September 2020. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, this event is a unique opportunity to study digital activism as marchers were considered not appropriate. Using Twitter’s API with keywords “#climateStrike”, and “#FridaysForFuture”, we collected 111,844 unique tweets and retweets from 47,892 unique users. We used two typologies based on social media activism and framing literature to understand the main function of tweets (information opinion, mobilization, and blame) and their framing (diagnosis, prognosis, and motivational). We also analyzed its relationship and tested its automated classification potential. To do so we manually coded a randomly selected sample of 950 tweets that were used as input for the automated classification process (SVM algorithm with balancing classification techniques). We found that the automated classification of the COVID-19 pandemic appeared to not increase the mobilization function of tweets, as the frequencies of mobilization tweets were low. We also found a balanced diversity of framing tasks, with an important number of tweets that envisaged solutions to legislation and policy changes. COVID-related tweets were less frequently prognostically framed. We found that both typologies were not independent. Tweets with a blaming function tended to be framed in a prognostic way and therefore were related to possible solutions. The automated data classification model performed well, especially across social function typology and the “other” category. This indicated that these tools could help researchers working with social media data to process the information across categories that are currently mainly processed manually. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Rethinking and Analyzing Political Communication in the Digital Era)
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Review

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18 pages, 2540 KiB  
Review
Digital Communication Studies during the Pandemic: A Sociological Review Using Topic Modeling Strategy
by Alba Taboada-Villamarín and Cristóbal Torres-Albero
Soc. Sci. 2024, 13(2), 78; https://doi.org/10.3390/socsci13020078 - 25 Jan 2024
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 3070
Abstract
The health crisis triggered by COVID-19 has exerted a profound influence on both conventional communication methods and the manifestations of interaction within the virtual sphere. Gradually, studies on digital communication have taken on an increasingly prominent role in various social science disciplines that [...] Read more.
The health crisis triggered by COVID-19 has exerted a profound influence on both conventional communication methods and the manifestations of interaction within the virtual sphere. Gradually, studies on digital communication have taken on an increasingly prominent role in various social science disciplines that address determinants such as the crisis of misinformation or digital interaction in contemporary societies. This study aims to analyze the key research topics that sociology has addressed in relation to the pandemic, along with the level of innovation in the utilization of digital sources and analytical methodology. The analysis is grounded in the hypothesis that the effects of the pandemic have led the discipline of sociology to reassess and more fully integrate studies on digital communication. On this premise, a systematic review of studies sourced from the Web of Science (WoS) and Scopus databases was executed. Innovative computational methodologies were employed for the categorization of articles and the elucidation of principal research topics. Furthermore, this research scrutinized the principal digital platforms utilized in these investigations and assessed the extent of methodological innovation applied to data analysis. The outcomes unveiled a pronounced ascendancy in the prominence of communication studies during the pandemic. Nevertheless, it is noteworthy that the utilization of digital data sources in research remains surprisingly limited. This observation highlights a potential avenue for further exploration within the domain of sociological research, promising a more profound and contemporaneous comprehension of social phenomena amid times of crisis. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Rethinking and Analyzing Political Communication in the Digital Era)
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