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Leetocracy : Political participation, social network sites and inequality

Gustafsson, Nils LU orcid (2013) In Lund Political Studies
Abstract
This dissertation is about whether social network sites have the potential to bring about more equal participation. It deals with a phenomenon that has changed the underlying infrastructure of how millions of people communicate. It studies the way the use of social network sites affects communication within existing political organisations in addition to networked campaigns. And it goes beyond digital content analysis to use a broad range of methods in order to capture behaviour and attitudes offline as well as online in a contextual setting.



Social network sites have not brought about any greater equality in political participation. Using social network sites does not in itself lower the thresholds for participation, as... (More)
This dissertation is about whether social network sites have the potential to bring about more equal participation. It deals with a phenomenon that has changed the underlying infrastructure of how millions of people communicate. It studies the way the use of social network sites affects communication within existing political organisations in addition to networked campaigns. And it goes beyond digital content analysis to use a broad range of methods in order to capture behaviour and attitudes offline as well as online in a contextual setting.



Social network sites have not brought about any greater equality in political participation. Using social network sites does not in itself lower the thresholds for participation, as increased accessibility does not outweigh the underlying factors of participation and political interest. Political participation is changing, but what is changing is not related to equality of participation. Instead, the existing system is put under pressure by what is referred to in this dissertation as viral politics and the emergence of temporal elites. Rather than resulting in egalitarian democracy, what we actually have is a leetocracy of sorts, where existing hierarchies are supplemented with new ones. This is shown in six distinct articles, each with its own empirical focus, and an introductory essay summarising the articles and presenting the core argument of the dissertation.



An additional goal of this dissertation is to show how the development of political participation in relation to social network sites can be better understood through the framework of competitive elitist democracy than through that of deliberative democratic theory. A methodological goal is to show how a combination of quantitative and several different qualitative methods applied on a set of different empirical cases can be used to yield a fuller illumination of the overarching research aim.



This dissertation is an ambitious attempt to study the effects of social network site use on several different forms of political participation. It contains the first representative study of political participation in social media in Sweden and the first study of intra-party use of social network sites in parliamentary parties in the world. (Less)
Abstract (Swedish)
Popular Abstract in Swedish

Kan sociala nätverkssajter eller sociala medier som Facebook och Twitter göra att det politiska deltagandet i samhället blir med jämlikt - både med avseende på vilka personer som deltar och med avseende på hur själva engagemanget organiseras? Denna avhandling innehåller sex artiklar som studerar detta med tyngdpunkt på politiskt deltagande i Sverige, samt en introduktionsartikel (eller kappa) som sammanfattar de viktigaste argumenten i artiklarna och försöker ge en övergripande bild av det vetenskapliga problemet.



Avhandlingens slutsatser kan sammanfattas sålunda: att man kan använda sociala nätverkssajter för att engagera sig politiskt tycks inte leda till att lågutbildade... (More)
Popular Abstract in Swedish

Kan sociala nätverkssajter eller sociala medier som Facebook och Twitter göra att det politiska deltagandet i samhället blir med jämlikt - både med avseende på vilka personer som deltar och med avseende på hur själva engagemanget organiseras? Denna avhandling innehåller sex artiklar som studerar detta med tyngdpunkt på politiskt deltagande i Sverige, samt en introduktionsartikel (eller kappa) som sammanfattar de viktigaste argumenten i artiklarna och försöker ge en övergripande bild av det vetenskapliga problemet.



Avhandlingens slutsatser kan sammanfattas sålunda: att man kan använda sociala nätverkssajter för att engagera sig politiskt tycks inte leda till att lågutbildade eller sådana som är mindre intresserade av politik än andra plötsligt engagerar sig. Även om deltagandet i de sociala medierna har lett till att många unga människor har engagerat sig, är dessa också ännu mer högutbildade än sådana som deltar på andra vis. Och de nätverksbaserade politiska kampanjer som har blivit vanligare i spåren av de digitala mediernas frammarsch präglas av hierarkier, precis som traditionella organisationer. Det som förändras är snarare formerna för deltagande än vem det är som känner sig manad att delta.



Om vi är intresserade av politisk jämlikhet, kan vi inte se sociala nätverkssajter I SIG som ett sätt att bidra till detta; politisk jämlikhet kan inte skiljas jämlikhet i termer av materiellt välstånd eller utbildning. Däremot står det klart att sociala nätverkssajter och sociala medier har vuxit fram som viktiga och effektiva instrument för alla som är intresserade av att organisera sig och förändra samhället. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
author
supervisor
opponent
  • Associate professor Anduiza, Eva, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona
organization
publishing date
type
Thesis
publication status
published
subject
keywords
political participation, social network sites, social media, Web 2.0, political mobilization, social movements, political parties, democratic theory
in
Lund Political Studies
issue
169
publisher
Department of Political Science, Lund University
defense location
Stora Hörsalen, IKDC, Sölvegatan 26, Lund.
defense date
2013-05-03 10:15:00
ISSN
0460-0037
ISBN
978-91-7473-455-3
project
Viral politik. Politisk mobilisering i sociala medier
language
English
LU publication?
yes
id
338c8ca1-1dc4-486b-ab35-7623fe1e3fe7 (old id 3631637)
date added to LUP
2016-04-01 14:51:39
date last changed
2019-07-04 14:40:03
@phdthesis{338c8ca1-1dc4-486b-ab35-7623fe1e3fe7,
  abstract     = {{This dissertation is about whether social network sites have the potential to bring about more equal participation. It deals with a phenomenon that has changed the underlying infrastructure of how millions of people communicate. It studies the way the use of social network sites affects communication within existing political organisations in addition to networked campaigns. And it goes beyond digital content analysis to use a broad range of methods in order to capture behaviour and attitudes offline as well as online in a contextual setting.<br/><br>
<br/><br>
Social network sites have not brought about any greater equality in political participation. Using social network sites does not in itself lower the thresholds for participation, as increased accessibility does not outweigh the underlying factors of participation and political interest. Political participation is changing, but what is changing is not related to equality of participation. Instead, the existing system is put under pressure by what is referred to in this dissertation as viral politics and the emergence of temporal elites. Rather than resulting in egalitarian democracy, what we actually have is a leetocracy of sorts, where existing hierarchies are supplemented with new ones. This is shown in six distinct articles, each with its own empirical focus, and an introductory essay summarising the articles and presenting the core argument of the dissertation. <br/><br>
<br/><br>
An additional goal of this dissertation is to show how the development of political participation in relation to social network sites can be better understood through the framework of competitive elitist democracy than through that of deliberative democratic theory. A methodological goal is to show how a combination of quantitative and several different qualitative methods applied on a set of different empirical cases can be used to yield a fuller illumination of the overarching research aim.<br/><br>
<br/><br>
This dissertation is an ambitious attempt to study the effects of social network site use on several different forms of political participation. It contains the first representative study of political participation in social media in Sweden and the first study of intra-party use of social network sites in parliamentary parties in the world.}},
  author       = {{Gustafsson, Nils}},
  isbn         = {{978-91-7473-455-3}},
  issn         = {{0460-0037}},
  keywords     = {{political participation; social network sites; social media; Web 2.0; political mobilization; social movements; political parties; democratic theory}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  number       = {{169}},
  publisher    = {{Department of Political Science, Lund University}},
  school       = {{Lund University}},
  series       = {{Lund Political Studies}},
  title        = {{Leetocracy : Political participation, social network sites and inequality}},
  url          = {{https://lup.lub.lu.se/search/files/4203433/3631662.pdf}},
  year         = {{2013}},
}