Is social media good for politics? That’s the question to be debated next week by teams of politicians and academics at Robert Gordon University as part of the ESRC’s Festival of Social Science.
We will be investigating how the use of social media such as Twitter and Facebook has impacted on modern politics in front of an audience of local school pupils studying Politics, Media and Modern Studies,.
Academics from RGU will be joined in the debate by Mark McDonald, MSP for Aberdeen Donside and Minister for Childcare and Early Years in the Scottish Parliament; Stuart Donaldson, MP for West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine; and Piotr Teodorowski, a member of the Scottish Youth Parliament.
In Scotland, the engagement of young people in political debate has been stimulated by the lowering of the voting age to 16 for local and Scottish elections. We know that many young people are engaged in political debate or learn about politics through social media.
Instead of reading newspapers on a regular basis or watching a daily television news programme, they access political information through Facebook or Twitter, following links and watching videos posted by others. On one hand, this enables them to access political news and debate from across the globe.
On the other, however, there tends to be an echo-chamber effect on social media, where you choose who to follow, meaning that they are rarely challenged by material from a different point of view. There is also no guarantee of the quality or validity of the material they are accessing.
It is therefore important to consider how politics might be changed by the use of this new medium. We hope that our debate will help the audience consider the pros and cons of the use of social media for political communication so that they become informed participants.
On the positive side, the use of social media means that politicians are able to engage with grassroots opinion easily, quickly accessing the opinion of others on the issues of the day. Use of social media removes some of the barriers and costs of engagement in political debate.
There is no longer a requirement to attend a public meeting or politician’s surgery to make your voice heard. Proponents of the use of social media in politics argue that everyone now has the opportunity to enter the public sphere and contribute their opinions and experience, meaning the widening of public engagement.
The costs of participation are reduced and the opportunity to become involved in political debate is offered to groups who might have been marginalised in the past, such as young people or those in rural communities.
The use of social media also allows individual politicians to make their constituents more aware of what they are doing on a day-to-day basis, their contributions at Westminster or Holyrood, and involvement with community issues in their own constituency.
There are Twitter feeds for the Scottish Parliament (@ScotParl) and Westminster (@UKParliament or @HouseofCommons), and for different political parties and individual politicians. To check if your MP tweets, check out the list at @tweetminster.
The use of social media during election time is certainly well established. Barack Obama’s use of Twitter and Facebook groups to engage and mobilise young voters taught an entire generation of politicians how valuable such tools can be.
However, there is also a less positive side of the use of social media for politics. While it is certainly true that it can be used to engage hitherto neglected groups, there is also the danger that others, who are not so experienced in the use of social media or have less opportunity to access the Internet, might become less visible.
While access to grassroots opinion can be valuable, we have to be careful that the opinion that is accessed is genuine grassroots and not ‘astro-turf opinion’. This term describes the creation of fake or artificial support on a subject by public-relations organisations or pressure groups, made to look as though it comes from genuine public opinion in order to increase its credibility.
There is also the suggestion that political parties and politicians tend to use social media as another form of broadcasting, rather than genuinely engaging in debate and discussion with their followers. At RGU our research has suggested that political parties are happy to use social media to spread their own message but less willing to engage in two-way dialogue with those they seek to influence.
Social media can also become something of an echo chamber, with the majority of those who follow a politician on Twitter or Facebook being either enthusiastic supporters or vehement critics. Where is the centre ground?
As we all know, the darker side of social media means that it offers the perfect breeding ground for trolls and bullies. The aggression, misogyny and even death threats that many politicians suffer via social media can have very real consequences, impacting their mental well-being.
In recent months we have seen a number of cases where politicians have reported real fear of physical danger based on social-media attacks. Does the need for a modern politician to use social media put off some young people from considering a career in politics? This will be one of the questions we will be asking our audience next week.
For further information about the debate, or if you would like to come along, please contact s.pedersen@rgu.ac.uk.
The 14th annual Festival of Social Science takes place from 5-12 November 2016 with more than 250 free events nationwide, including many in Aberdeen. Run by the Economic and Social Research Council, the Festival provides an opportunity for anyone to meet with some of the country’s leading social scientists and discover, discuss and debate the role that research plays in everyday life.
With a whole range of creative and engaging events there’s something for everyone including businesses, charities, schools and government agencies. A full programme is available at www.esrc.ac.uk/festival. You can also join the discussion on Twitter using #esrcfestival.