General Election Campaign Research Articles

Role of linguistics studies on the political debate

The paper is to find out the linguistics role contribution towards the political debate event at the election party. The presidential debate's primary purpose is to sponsor and produce debates for the United States presidential and vice-presidential candidates and to undertake research and educational activities relating to the debates. A leaders' debate or presidential debate is a public debate held during a general election campaign, where the candidates expose their political opinions and public policy proposals, and criticism of them, to potential voters. They are normally broadcast live on radio, television and the internet. Increasing learners' confidence, poise, and self-esteem. Providing an engaging, active, learner-centered activity. Improving rigorous higher-order and critical thinking skills. Enhancing the ability to structure and organize thoughts.

Negative Political Communication on Social Media and the Gender Gap: A Study of Men's and Women's Reactions to Presidential Candidate Attacks on Facebook in 2012 and 2016

AbstractDo men and women respond differently to negative political communication? Only a limited collection of studies into the effects of negative campaigns have investigated this research question, and the conflicting results produced from such studies have prevented the development of a widely accepted answer. As campaigns transition to new media environments, further problems arise, as any potential gender gap may be magnified on the new political communication battlefield of social media. The present article contributes to this sparsely investigated area through an empirical study of men's and women's reactions on Facebook to US presidential candidate attacks during two general election campaigns (2012 and 2016) and two primaries (2016 Democratic and Republican). Across nearly 400 million reactions and 40 million unique users, women demonstrate lower receptivity to candidate attacks than men. Two potential explanatory factors for the gap are examined, but neither fully captures the magnitude of the differences observed. Conceptualizing the gender gap composition in terms of differential receptivity most accurately explains these findings and potentially resolves the competing explanations for the gap within the existing literature.

Using corpora to investigate the representation of poverty in the 2015 UK general election campaign

This paper investigates the representation of poverty during the 2015 UK general election campaign. The analysis is based on a corpus of articles published in the daily, Sunday and online editions of nine national newspapers. A framework combining the mainly qualitative approach of Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) with corpus-based techniques is used to address the following questions: which themes did the press foreground and background a) when poverty was mentioned explicitly, b) when it was referred to in terms of the welfare system and c) when the two were mentioned together in the same article? The main claim of this study is that explicit discussion of poverty in the media was infrequent during the campaign period, reflecting a lack of attention paid to poverty by politicians. Moreover, when poverty was mentioned, it was talked about as an international issue without tangible public impacts; this placed it firmly outside the arena of the general election campaign. Poverty was presented as a moral issue that must be ended, while the reduction of expenditure on benefits through welfare reform was posed as a necessity for the reduction of debt, and central to the general election campaign. I further argue that the press was able to send such contradictory messages about poverty and the welfare state by separating them into two parallel debates.

Towards an Institutional News Logic of Digital Native News Media? A Case Study of BuzzFeed’s Reporting During the 2015 and 2017 UK General Election Campaigns

Informed by new institutional perspectives to debates about theorising media logic, this study asks whether a popular digital native media platform has, over time, conformed to a singular news logic associated with the norms and routines of legacy media. Drawing on a content analysis of 399 BuzzFeed news items and 1878 sources during the 2015 and 2017 UK general election campaigns, we established that coverage had shifted, reflecting an editorial agenda that is consistent with how legacy media have long reported politics. In the 2017 election campaign there was more substantive policy reported, new specialist reporters employed, a greater reliance on institutional sources, particularly from established legacy media, and a sharper focus on the two main political parties. Overall, we argue that, as digital native media have evolved, become more popular and interconnected with legacy media, the norms and routines of their news reporting are not necessarily that distinguishable from a singular, institutional news media logic.

Gender, politics and the tweeted campaign: tweeting about issues during the UK’s 2017 general election campaign

We aimed to explore the extent to which women and men politicians tweet about different issues. We captured 82,890 tweets sent by Labour and Conservative politicians during the 2017 British general election campaign, analysed 38,255 original tweets and identified 7,651 tweets that mentioned a political issue. We also qualitatively analysed 210 tweets to better understand the content, tone and orientation of content. We suggest that gender and party, both together and separately, exert some influence on tweet topic. However, we also suggest that the particular interests of individual politicians play a role in determining the focus of their issue-based tweets.

The Impact of The Behavior of Smartphone Usage on The Consumption of Fake News by Student

Abstract— The background of this research is the increase of the distribution of fake news in cyberspace to coincide with the 2019 general election (Pemilu) campaign in Indonesia. Undergraduate students in Indonesia, most of whom are beginner voters in the 2019 election, are one of the most important campaign targets calculated by each political party. Fake news produced massively and structurally by political parties to get support from voters can break the unity and the harmony of the nation. Students as young people whose mindsets are critical and have idealism in fighting for their ideas must be able to distinguish between true and fake news for the safety of their own insights. The research method used is a quantitative method to understand the behavior of students in using mobile phones which is the fastest media for disseminating information through the internet. Understanding these behaviors will provide an overview of the impact of the application or information channel most often opened by someone to their ability to distinguish true and fake news. This study aims to get a strategy that needs to be done to improve student behavior in using mobile phones, which will affect the quality of information obtained from the internet via mobile phones. So that young person who are productive and have the right insight are not easily provoked by fake news from the internet

Mediatisation in Twitter: an exploratory analysis of the 2015 Spanish general election

ABSTRACT The mediatisation model in politics assumes that media conveys political messages between parties and citizenship, with the risk of promoting issues that frame the electoral content in terms of competition. These dynamics could distract from the debate of ideas and political policies. However, digital media like Twitter provide direct communication channels between parties, candidates and users. The present research explores Twitter content during an electoral campaign focused on the four issues proposed by Patterson (1980) to assess mediatisation: political, policy, campaign and personal (regarding the candidate). The goal of this research study is to evaluate the degree of mediatisation on Twitter using this typology. The research also evaluates the influence of the issue on retweet volume. The study’s basis was a 15.8 million-tweet corpus obtained during the 2015 Spanish General Election pre-campaign and campaign. This dataset was analysed using an automatic classification system. The results highlighted a predominance of policy issues during both the pre-campaign and campaign, except for the two televised debates, during which campaign issues were the most prevalent. On the election night, users commented much more on political issues. Finally, the kind of issue most likely to be retweeted was policy issues.

Emerging the Concept of Islamic Socialism in Pakistan: Historical Analysis on Political Debates of 1970-1971 Election Campaign

Islamic Socialism was the concept propounded by Mr. Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto during the 1970-71 general election campaign. This ideology was new to Pakistani state as the country was founded on the concept of the Two Nation Theory. Mr. Bhutto's ideology in Pakistan was viewed as against the basic concept of the religion (Islam) by the Islamists parties. The Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) was the main political opponent of his ideology. Mr. Bhutto believed that the socio-economic condition of the country was deteriorated and this new ideology will infuse a better life for everyone in the country. On the other hand, the Amir (chief) of the JI, Maulana Maudoodi, believed it as an atheist ideology and would diminish Islam from Pakistan. This paper is designed to investigate why political elites envisaged such ideology i.e. Islamic Socialism, in 1970 election? Whether this new ideology changed economic conditions of the common man as was envisaged or further worsened the political situation in the country? Further, the paper will investigate what role religious parties played particularly the JI, in countering the Islamic Socialism ideology which it was believed as atheist ideology?

Communicative differences between emergent and traditional parties: An analysis of Facebook posts from Spain’s 2015 general election campaign

Las redes sociales han supuesto una revolución para la comunicación política, posibilita a los partidos tener un canal de comunicación masivo con capacidad de personalizar y crear una comunicación directa con los ciudadanos. Este estudio analiza las publicaciones de los principales partidos políticos españoles en Facebook durante la campaña de las elecciones de 2015. Desde una perspectiva cuantitativa, comparamos la frecuencia de publicación y el contenido de los mensajes a través de un análisis computarizado. Los resultados señalan que existen diferencias entre partidos tradicionales y emergentes en la gestión de las páginas de Facebook.

Messages and Familiar Faces: Crowdfunding in the 2017 U.K. Electoral Campaign

Political crowdfunding is a relatively new process. Research has sought to unveil its functioning in particular case studies. However, crowdfunding in electoral campaigns remains largely unexplored and little is known about why some candidates are more likely to attain targeted donation levels than others. This article addresses this gap in the literature and analyzes the use of crowdfunding in the 2017 U.K. General Election campaign. It aims to explain the variation in candidates’ ability to reach the proposed targets. The analysis uses original data collected from 100 crowdfunding projects, campaign websites, and the social media pages of the candidates during the campaign. The findings indicate that candidates with an aggressive message, who are realistic about their proposed target and who are already in office, are more likely to gather donations closer to their targets.Related ArticlesBrogan, Michael J., and Jonathan Mendilow. 2012. “The Telescoping Effects of Public Campaign Funding: Evaluating the Impact of Clean Elections in Arizona, Maine, and New Jersey.” Politics & Policy 40 (3): 492‐518. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1747-1346.2012.00353.xJäckle, Sebastian, and Thomas Metz. 2017. “Beauty Contest Revisited: The Effects of Perceived Attractiveness, Competence, and Likability on the Electoral Success of German MPs.” Politics & Policy 45 (4): 495‐534. https://doi.org/10.1111/polp.12209Lavery, Lesley. 2013. “Gender Bias in the Media? An Examination of Local Television News Coverage of Male and Female House Candidates.” Politics & Policy 41 (6): 877‐910. https://doi.org/10.1111/polp.12051

A ‘Presidential Look’? An Analysis of Gender Framing in 2016 Persuasive Memes of Hillary Clinton

A persuasive campaign with elements of propaganda was waged on social media against Hillary Clinton during the 2016 U.S. presidential race, partially through a Russian-financed effort to discredit her. This study analyzed doctored images (memes) posted on Twitter about Clinton during the general election campaign. Through qualitative content analysis, researchers sought to identify whether negative memes reflected socially constructed gender stereotypes. Results show gendered frames used in memes against Clinton were based on female biological/physical traits (weak, ill, unattractive), anti-feminine traits (dishonest, untrustworthy), and negative female politician traits (dictatorial, unqualified) that were incongruent with the perceived role of the presidency.

Improving Democratic Discourse in UK General Election and Referendum Campaigns

AbstractThis article is a short overview of the recently released report entitled Doing Democracy Better published by the Constitution Unit based at University College London. The report makes a series of interesting and useful observations about the health of democratic discourse within the UK and advances a selection of recommendations for its improvement. Whilst noting the value of the report as a piece of substantive research, there are a number of further questions which need to be addressed. As such, this report should be seen as the starting point of a broader discussion that takes a more nuanced approach to improving democratic discourse and a less London‐centric approach to conceptualising the UK's political institutions and language.

Across the great divide: gender, Twitter, and elections in New Zealand and the United Kingdom

ABSTRACTPoliticians’ use of Twitter has been well documented over the past decade but few studies have incorporated an explicitly comparative dimension. To explore how political and social context impacts upon tweet content, we analysed the substance and tone of 400 tweets from women MPs during the United Kingdom 2015 and New Zealand 2014 general election campaigns. Across our study, web links, visuals, and references to own campaign were common, though with some notable inter-party differences. A neutral tone prevailed, with positivity more present than negativity. NZ women MPs, particularly from the centre-right, demonstrated a broadcast and highly managed approach to Twitter. UK MPs were more interactive with both citizens and other MPs, shared more personal content, and largely ignored the media agenda. These comparative findings at least partly map onto the concentrated and diffuse personalisation approaches within the equalisation versus normalisation framework of social media.

The role of linguistics studies on the political debate

The paper is to find out the linguistics role contribution towards the political debate event at the election party. The presidential debate's primary purpose is to sponsor and produce debates for the United States presidential and vice-presidential candidates and to undertake research and educational activities relating to the debates. A leaders' debate or presidential debate is a public debate held during a general election campaign, where the candidates expose their political opinions and public policy proposals, and criticism of them, to potential voters. They are normally broadcast live on radio, television and the internet. Increasing learners' confidence, poise, and self-esteem. Providing an engaging, active, learner-centered activity. Improving rigorous higher-order and critical thinking skills. Enhancing the ability to structure and organize thoughts.

Conceived in Harlesden: Candidate-Centred Campaigning in British General Elections

Abstract Recent decades have seen an increasing trend towards the personalisation of election campaigns, even in systems where candidates have few structural incentives to emphasise their personal appeal. In this article, we build on a growing literature that points to the importance of candidate characteristics in determining electoral success. Using a dataset composed of more than 3700 leaflets distributed during the 2015 and 2017 general elections, we explore the conditions under which messages emphasising the personal characteristics of prospective parliamentary candidates appear in British general election campaign materials. Even when we account for party affiliation, we find that there are important contextual and individual-level factors that predict the use of candidate-centred messaging.

“An Australian-style points system”: Individualizing immigration in radical right discourse in the 2015 U.K. General election campaign.

Analyses of racist discourse have often involved data from contexts concerning issues of human mobility. A great deal of this literature points to the extent to which people draw on the tropes of liberalism in order to justify social exclusion, and in particular to warrant negative evaluations of outgroups. Using media data from political debates involving the radical right-wing United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP) in the UK General Election campaign of 2015, the present paper highlights a different rhetorical strategy by which exclusion can be warranted by speakers arguing for a reduction in immigration. This novel strategy explicitly avoids any negative characterisation of outgroups, and instead advocates the individualization of immigration decisions. This is exemplified in UKIP’s policy of basing the UK’s approach to immigration on an ‘Australian style points-based system’. This was invoked by UKIP representatives in the debates as a straightforward ‘off-the-shelf’ system that would enable the UK to ‘take back control’ of immigration, whilst ensuring that immigration decisions were based on individual merit rather than on group membership. As such, the points system could also be invoked specifically to anticipate and counter accusations of racism and/or xenophobia. The findings are discussed in relation to the tacit ideological assumptions underpinning UKIP’s policy, specifically around psychologisation, the reliance on an acultural version of Australia, and the tacit use of categorical accounting.

Politics as usual? Assessing the extent and content of candidate-level online campaigning at the 2015 UK general election

ABSTRACTThere has been much work done investigating the adoption of online campaigns in UK general election campaigns. Although some research has focussed on the candidate-level (Gibson, R., W. Lusoli, and S. Ward. 2008. “Nationalizing and Normalizing the Local? A Comparative Analysis of Online Candidate Campaigning in Australia and Britain.” Journal of Information Technology and Politics 4: 15–30; Lee, B. 2014. “Window Dressing 2.0: Constituency-level Web Campaigns in the 2010 UK General Election.” Politics 34 (1): 45–57; Southern, R. 2015. “Is Web 2.0 Providing a Voice for Outsiders? A Comparison of Personal Web Site and Social Media Use by Candidates at the 2010 UK General Election.” Journal of Information Technology & Politics 12 (1): 1–17), this is an under-researched area. This is despite early web-campaign scholars (Margolis, M., and D. Resnick. 2000. Politics as Usual: The Cyberspace Revolution. Sage) maintaining that e-campaigning could provide the most important advantages to campaigns at the candidate level. In light of this, the paper aims to provide the most comprehensive study of candidate-level online campaigning carried out in the UK to date. This paper employs original data, measuring website and social media use by candidates during the 2015 UK general election campaign. These data allow for a detailed explanation of the normalization thesis, one of the leading theories in the field of e-campaigns. The findings here are significant as there are several instances where normalization does not hold, suggesting that online tools are contributing to campaign change. Green Party candidates subverted normalization to a significant degree, particularly on social media. Assessing the campaign content, a quarter of candidates adopted more than one interactive feature on their website and furthermore, interactive use of Twitter was the most common type of Twitter use.

‘For the Many, Not the Few’: Strategising the Campaign Trail at the 2017 UK General Election

AbstractDuring the 2017 general election campaign, the Conservative and Labour leaders toured the country. While Theresa May operated a conventional approach, encapsulated by limited interactions with the public, Jeremy Corbyn participated in public rallies and appeared at music festivals. This article examines the strategic decisions underpinning leader visits in the 2017 campaign trail. It finds that May and Corbyn’s electoral strategies had more in common than at first sight. The article adds to existing studies by using new interview data from local party campaigners to understand visit organisation and impact on the local campaign. It also makes an important step towards unpicking the causal mechanism through which these visits may affect voter behaviour.

Writing graffiti on the Facebook wall: Understanding the online discourse of citizens to politicians during the 2016 Spanish election

The goal of this research is to examine what form of e-expression we can find from citizens commenting on the Facebook posts of political party leaders in the context of an election. We employ quantitative content analysis, involving the coding of styles of e-expression and counting their occurrences, to determine how politician’s use Facebook, the level of citizen comments, their tone, content, and style of communication, whether comments are monologic or dialogic and the structure of dialogic interactions between citizens. The data is drawn from comments made to a sample of posts by Mariano Rajoy, incumbent Prime Minister and leader of the Popular Party, and Pablo Iglesias, leader of the new insurgent Podemos party during the 2016 Spanish general election campaign. We conceptualise citizen comments as e-expression a means for having a voice, being heard and, potentially at least, joining debates with others. The results of this research show that dynamics on Facebook pages offer an opportunity for understanding wider political dynamics in a society. It is suggested that both exogenous macro-political and endogenous micro-platform factors shape the patterns of discourse found on the social media pages of these leaders and that studying these platforms can indicate trends in wider society and how social media can accentuate attitudes towards political platforms and leaders.

The 2017 Labour General Election Campaign: Ushering in a ‘New Politics’?

In many ways, the British General Election campaign of 2017 marked a return to ‘old politics’ with the reaffirmation of a two-party system and levels of voter turnout not seen in 25 years. The Conservative Party, as in previous elections, relied to a considerable extent on negative campaigning and pledged to implement traditional conservative policies supporting grammar schools and blood sports. Yet, the campaign also appeared to be characterised by a ‘new politics’, embodied by the style and policies of the Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn. This was a politics that largely relied on positive campaigning and mobilised grassroots activism to an extent rarely seen before, ensuring that it inspired new voters. This article focuses on the role of the ‘new politics’ in the election campaign before moving on to discuss the future of such politics under Labour in opposition and perhaps in power. It will be asked to what extent ordinary people can help shape Labour Party policy, questioning whether Labour can manage to liberate itself from its own internal party machinery and from its traditional reliance on the State in order to move durably beyond the ‘old politics’ towards a democratised ‘new politics’.