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"The Future of the Study of Online Electoral Communication"
By Richard Davis
I remember when I first got an email account and was connected to the Internet back in 1992. I thought it was neat to be able to communicate rapidly with other scholars and explore the resources of libraries all over the world. Shortly thereafter, a plethora of Internet books and articles emerged touting this new medium as more important than Gutenberg’s press and potentially far-reaching in changing attitudes and behavior of citizens around the world. The word revolution was used again and again.
The Internet intrigued me as a research subject, particularly because its promise, as predicted by the extant literature, didn’t seem to fit what I observed about how people used it. Rather than gravitating to political websites where apathetic citizens would become energetic political participants, Internet user’s online habits largely duplicated their traditional interests and behavior. And candidates who had lots of money transferred those resources online to develop whiz-bang websites that attracted a lot of visitors. And, despite the rhetoric of the decline of the two-party system and the advantages of resource-rich candidates through the leveling of the online playing field, the online presence of major party candidates and their respective mainstream political parties got the lion’s share of attention from both the press and the public.
The main question of that era, however, seemed to be whether the Internet was causing a revolution in American politics, including electoral campaigns. We now know that question, much like the initial question of television studies in the 1940s and 1950s, was too broad and vague. That television has impacted American electoral campaigns is clear. But the interaction with other forces that mitigates and channels those effects only became apparent as researchers began to hone their studies to other, narrower questions.
Similarly, Internet research needs to ask other questions about the audience than whether the Internet radically reshapes vote choice or causes massive shifts in political participation. Examples include: Who are the online audiences for candidate online political communication? What are the gratifications for users visiting candidate websites or subscribing to candidate e-mail? How do various groups of voters perceive online content differently and how does candidate web content reflect the varying perspectives of the online audiences?
It is important to remember the undecided voter is only one constituency for campaign online communication, and in fact a fairly small one. The most common user is the candidate supporter. Does exposure reinforce favorable attitudes towards the candidate? Does exposure transform the supporter into a political activist who takes action on behalf of the campaign? Another audience is the journalist. Is press coverage of the campaign affected by web content directed at the press?
Two other components of the communication process are the sender (the campaign) and the method (the website, e-mail, blog, etc.) First, the sender: Why does the campaign go online? Campaigns rarely invest in strategies and technologies that do not work to aid the campaign in some way. Ten years ago, websites weren’t created because they attracted large numbers of candidates. But failure to have a website could attract negative press attention and give the impression the candidate was hostile to technological change. That motivation largely has passed.
Fundraising appears to have saved the Internet from the dustbin of failed electoral tools. Website operations or email campaigns that can pay for themselves and even fund other aspects of the campaign are worth pursuing.
But campaigns now understand that the expected heavy influx of undecided voters rarely occurs. Then, what does online communication do for the campaign? Does it increase volunteer recruitment? Does it help with other traditional campaign functions – identify the base and establish a regular means of reinforcement, create positive press for the campaign, reach important constituencies, assist GOTV drives, etc.? What are the effects of such efforts on these traditional campaign functions? How does online communication become integrated into campaign operations?
The third component is the mode of communication. Online electoral communication began with the candidate website – basically the transferal of a campaign brochure to the Internet – and then expanded to e-mail. The website and e-mail, although potentially important tools for reinforcing supporters and mobilizing activists, are limited in their ability to reach beyond the base. In competitive races, a campaign must find ways to move beyond the base. Particularly in the wake of the Howard Dean fiasco where online interactivity became an echo chamber, candidates today understand the importance of using the Internet to move beyond the already converted.
What are these new online tools candidates are using, and scholars should be exploring? One is the weblog or blog. I speak here not so much of blogs run by candidates, which again are prone to attract supporters, but independent blogs that have become quasi-media forces in their own right. Daily Kos, Instapundit, MichelleMalkin, Wonkette are a few of the blogs that reach a large online audience. Their audiences are partisan, but not necessarily candidate supporters. How do candidates interact with bloggers? What is the relationship between advertising or paid consulting and blog support? How will the blog culture transfer to mainstream electoral campaigning? (John Edwards’ campaign faced that question earlier this year when two bloggers left the campaign over criticism of their blog writings.) At what stage of a campaign are blogs more valuable? Is it during the primaries when candidates seek candidate supporters from among partisans? The Ned Lamont example in the 2006 Connecticut primary suggests that. Or is it during the general election campaign when candidates need to mobilize the base?
Another is the personal space or social network phenomenon. Myspace.com and facebook.com are the largest, but hardly the sole, new web portals where self-publishing potentially reaches a large audience. Candidates like Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and Mitt Romney are making “friends” at these sites. But given the youthful demographic of these sites and the tendency of this same group to not vote, why are candidates devoting resources here? What is the impact of these candidate outreach efforts on personal space participants’ affiliation with parties or candidates, 2008 voter turnout, and long-term political participation?
Conclusion
The study of online campaign communication no longer is limited to a single overarching question about electoral outcome effects or sweeping changes to political participation. Nor is the website the only online communication tool for candidate campaigns. The challenge for scholars will be to employ research that explores the complexity of the Internet as a forum for campaigning and to view the Internet not so much an autonomous entity, but as an integrative tool with traditional campaign strategies and functions. Moreover, researchers should move beyond the candidate website itself to determine how candidates use these new online tools and what effects they are having on the intended audiences.
Over a decade of research on the Internet and campaigns, we have learned that, even though the revolution may not have occurred as expected, there is still much to be known about how the Internet shapes, and is shaped by, the electoral environment in which it operates.
Richard Davis is Professor of Political Science, Brigham Young University.
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