BUCHAREST UNIVERSITY OF ECONOMIC STUDIES

Faculty of International Business and Economics

GRADUATION THESIS

Scientific Coordinator :

Author :

Bucharest, 2017
 BUCHAREST UNIVERSITY OF ECONOMIC STUDIES
Faculty of International Business and Economics

Mass Media as an Instrument of

Political Mobilization
-The Social Media influence in the Romanian
parliamentary elections, 2016-

Scientific Coordinator :

Author :

Bucharest, 2017
 TABLE OF CONTENTS

Abstract

INTRODUCTION

CHAPTER 1- MASS MEDIA AND SOCIAL MEDIA

1.1. General presentation of the notion of Mass Media

1.1.1. What is Mass Media?

1.2. Social Media

1.2.1. What is Social Media?

1.2.2. Social Media Platforms

1.2.3. Common characteristics of Social Media’s components

CHAPTER 2- SOCIAL MEDIA AND CONNECTION WITH POLITICS

2.1. Social Media and Political communication

2.1.1. Social media’s involvement in political communication strategies

2.1.2. Social Media’s political communication in Romania

2.1.3. The process of political communication through Facebook

2.2. Social Media and Political mobilization

2.2.1. Social Media: effective instruments for political mobilization

2.2.2. Social Media: ineffective instruments for political mobilization

CHAPTER 3-CASE STUDY: The Social Media influence in the Romanian parliamentary
elections, 2016

3.1. Methodology

3.1.1. Research Objectives

3.1.2. Research Hypotheses

3.1.3. Research Methods

 3.2. Case Study- Analysis and Results

3.2.1. The way political parties and leaders use Facebook

3.2.1.1 Number of Facebook posts during electoral campaign

3.2.1.2. Frequency of posting

3.2.1.3 Type of post

3.2.2. The reactions that posts generate among the public

3.2.2.1. Public reaction depending on the type of post

3.2.2.2. Public reaction (average number per post)

3.2.2.3. Public reaction on parties’ pages and leaders’ pages

3.2.3. The top 10 posts with the highest number of reactions

3.2.4. The actual content of messages and comments posted on parties and leaders
official Facebook pages

3.2.5. The Engagement Rate of each party and leader Facebook page during the electoral
campaign

CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS

Bibliography
Abstract

In the field of political communication there have been radical transformations in the last
decades both in terms of the form and content of communication and the means of transmitting
them for a higher political mobilization rate of the public. Nowadays, Social Media platforms
have an increasingly important role in terms of political communication. The purpose of this
paper is to analyse the way in which Social Media can influence political mobilization in
Romanian context. It will focus especially on making the connection between the concepts of
intensity in online interaction with the degree of political participation and mobilization. For
reaching my goal I analysed the official Facebook pages of three Romanian political parties and
their leaders during the electoral campaign for the parliamentary elections in 2016.

Key words: political communication, Social Media, online environment, political mobilization

Introduction

In the contemporary society, social media plays a crucial role, becoming, over time, an
increasing and indispensable power, with a strong influence on different segments in society.
The confidence that the great mass of people have in these new technologies, makes social media
one of the most powerful tools of the 21st century that can start wars, set new standards, destroy
or create careers and unify the thoughts, wishes and ideas of a community in order to achieve a
common goal.

In this paper I will explore especially a branch of mass-media, namely social media. I will
focus on the influence of social media on politics especially how this can mobilize the people in
making different political decisions. The decision to choose this topic was one that did not take
me a lot of time to think because I am an avid consumer of online content and I get most of the
information exclusively from the online environment. Also, the presence of social-media,
regardless of its type, to such an extent in our lives, was also one of the main reasons for
choosing to conduct a research on this topic. The way in which social networks work and the
impact they generate among people seems fascinating to me and I think that the studies that can
be done on this topic are inexhaustible. I chose the Facebook social network because it is the one
that I use most often and I spend a relatively important time of the day on it. I chose to go on the
political side because I wanted to see if, indeed, the political sphere, chooses to pay attention also
to the social media and to take advantage of its benefits, not focusing anymore so much on the
traditional media as it used to do in the past.
 The purpose of this research is to demonstrate how social media and messages transmitted
through Facebook have influenced the results of the parliamentary elections in Romania in 2016,
and how political parties and their leaders chose to communicate with the public. I think that this
campaign is relevant because we can analyze how political parties with a history and a reputation
(PSD and PNL) competed in the online environment with a newly formed party (USR) that has
deployed its electoral campaign almost exclusively on Facebook and which was the final result
of this competition. I wanted to analyze the way in which political parties and leaders use
Facebook, the reactions that posts generate among the public and the actual content of messages
and comments posted on parties and leaders official Facebook pages because they seemed to me
the most relevant elements that could help me validate the hypotheses I had established.

The literature addressing this subject is divided into two different schools of thought
regarding the social media’s efficiency in the context of political mobilization. One of the
schools argues that social media is a factor that can lead to political mobilization and brings as an
argument the efficient distribution of the message, the possibility of practicing an online political
discourse that does not have to go through the rigorous pressures of the written press, and so the
message has a stronger impact on the audience, but also the possibility of receiving a response
from the audience that can comment on the messages sent by political leaders and can express
directly its appreciation or its complaints. Among the theoreticians in this category, there are
Fadi Hirzalla, Cheris Carpenter and Yochai Benkler.

The second school of thought states that social media are not effective tools for political
mobilization. The proponents of this perspective claim that in the world there are many areas
where the population does not have access to the Internet, so they cannot receive the messages
sent by politicians through social networks. They also talk about the fact that a constant and
intense activity in the online environment does not necessarily mean mobilization and
participation in real life. Evgeny Morozov and Steven M. Buechler are some of the supporters of
this school of thought.

I have taken the premise that social media are effective instruments for political mobilization
and thus I started from the following research hypotheses: the first one states that a political
party that conducts an intense activity on Facebook during the electoral campaign can mobilize
the population and obtain very good results in the parliamentary elections. The second one tells
that the more evident a deployment the electoral campaign has in the online environment, the
more important the appearances of party leaders are in the social media in shaping political
preferences. The third hypothesis states that including an emotional appeal to people’s feelings
and simultaneously transmitting political ideas in the political parties’ messages and addressed
themes, has a far greater impact on the public than the typical formal messages.
After the analysis of the case study’s results, all of these three hypotheses will be validated and
confirmed.

Regarding the methodology of my research, I used qualitative research methods such as the
review of the existing literature, the works that have been written over time on this subject and
academic articles that deal with this theme, so that I could obtain as much truthful information as
possible to use it in my approach. In the case study part, the research method that I used is a
quantitative one, namely the collection and analysis of media content but also information with
qualitative nuances, respectively the main themes found in the posts from the period November
11 - December 11, as well as the analysis of the most popular posts in order to try to identify the
elements of those messages that determined people to react.

My research thesis is composed of three main chapters. The first one represents the first
section of the literature review and has 2 distinct subchapters where I will present the meaning of
the notion of mass media, the notion of social media and its components. The second chapter
represents the second part of the literature that was analyzed for this research and in this part the
connection with politics is created. It also has 2 subchapters which present the relationship
between social media and political communication and social media and political mobilization.
The third chapter, is represented by the case study that was conducted and presents the
methodology and the analysis of the case study results. The methodological part includes
research objectives, hypotheses and methods and in the case study I presented the way in which
three Romanian political parties namely PSD, PNL and USR and their leaders used Facebook
during the electoral campaign for the parliamentary election in 2016 and the reactions they
generated among the public.

Through the paper work, I want to make the concepts of mass media, social media and the
relationship between politics and the social media best understood by analysing the influence of
online electoral communication on the political involvement of voters. This study draws
attention to the situation of Romanian society and urges to broader research into the phenomenon
of digital democracy in the context in which the evolution of the means of communication is
increasingly affecting the sphere of political communication.
 CHAPTER 1- MASS MEDIA AND SOCIAL MEDIA

1.1. General presentation of the notion of Mass Media

1.1.1. What is Mass Media?

In contemporary society, the term mass-media is almost omnipresent. That is because of the
fact that mass-media still remains the main instrument in spreading a message to the large
public and people are addicted to information. When we want to obtain certain information, we
turn on the TV, we read a newspaper, we listen to the radio or we search on the Internet.

In my opinion, the mass-media doesn’t do only that. Besides information, it forms, educates,
persuades, entertains, following the satisfaction of the needs and requirements of the information
consumer, namely the public. Everything you need to know is in the mass-media. The mass-
media provides you with information in any field and keeps you updated. It offers you
information about history, economics, geography, politics and about almost anything. Maybe
that is why the mass-media is so present in our life and so addictive. The mass media consists of
print press, radio, television and the internet, which are communication channels. All these
means of mass communications have served the interests of society, at least apparently,
managing to reach their own goals. Today, the radio, television and especially the Internet, tend
to detach more and more from the traditional media, corresponding to the requirements of a
postmodern society.

As I said, people have certain necessities that they try to satisfy in various ways, one of these
being the use of mass-media. The power of mass-media doesn’t lie on the fact that there could be
a mass society, where individuals are isolated, but in the fact that mass-media has control over
certain resources of information that individuals need to fulfil their goals. Thus, in a complex
society where the media system is strengthened, it creates a real addiction of individuals for
information resources of this system. Over the time, the mass-media system has become
increasingly necessary to achieve the coordination of political and economic activities or to
mobilize citizens.

Due to the facilities offered by the mass communication’s system, the access to information
is democratized: the ones that want to consult those data can obtain them, without any kind of
political, religious, racial and social restrictions. But there are limits of transmission speed and
cost of access. From this perspective, the history of mass communication is a history of constant
improvement, of technological possibilities and of increase in number of institutions specialized
in production and distribution of these goods, which meant a permanent decrease in the access
costs.1

Because the phenomenon of mass communication or in specialized language mass media, is

a very complex one, in the course of time many researchers of this type of communication have
developed all sorts of definitions to reach one as complex as possible and which could expose
what mass media means as concretely as possible. Further on I will present 6 definitions of mass
media, in a chronological order, that were created over time by famous scholars and I will
express my opinion regarding them.

In 1953, the sociologist Eliot Freidson in his work ‘Communications Research and the
Concept of the Mass’, outlined what he perceived as being the predominant definition of mass
communication, which contained four distinguishing characteristics for the mass audience: 1) its
composition is heterogeneous; 2) it is composed of individuals who do not know each other; 3)
the members of the mass are not located in the same space; and 4) the mass has not a specific
leader and it is organized in a very undefined way.2 I think that Freidson’s theory maintains its
validity even nowadays. Indeed, the audience is still a heterogeneous one because it may belong
to different cultures, races, groups, etc. It is also very large and can be formed of millions of
people that, of course, will not ever get to know each other. I believe that the third feature is very
present, as well. The public is not organized in a certain area, rather it is highly dispersed in
different geographical areas. The receivers of messages of mass communication could be found
in any place of a specific country and even in any place of the world. Also, there is not a precise
organization of the audience. Almost anyone, anytime can access any type of information.

Another definition of mass media is provided by a classic author of this type of

communication’s studies, C. Wright, who states that "the media is oriented towards large,
heterogeneous and anonymous audiences; content is transmitted publicly, and often reaches
audiences simultaneously, the communicator tends to be, or operate within, a complex
organization that may involve great expense”.3 As we can see, he keeps the audience’s
1
Coman, M. (2016), Introducere in sistemul mass-media, 4th Edition, Iasi:Polirom, p.16
2
Freidson, E. (1953), ‘Communications Research and the Concept of the Mass’, American Sociological
Review, p. 313-317.

3
Wright, Charles R. (1964), ‘Functional Analysis and Mass Communication’, in Lewis Anthony Dexter,
David M. White (ed.), People, Society and Mass Communication, Macmillan, New York, p. 94
characterization made by Freidson and adds elements that refer to content but also talks about the
person who sends the message, namely the communicator.

In 1987, another definition media was formulated and states that mass-media refers to all
social institutions which deal with production and distribution of knowledge and which
distinguish themselves from others by certain characteristics, such as: the techniques that are
used for mass production and distribution of messages are relatively advanced; they have a
rigorous organization and a social regulation of their activities and messages are sent to
audiences which are (potentially) very large, which are unknown to communicator and which
have the possibility to receive the messages or to reject them. 4 As can be noticed, if in the first
two definitions the focus was on the audience, here we find out more about the communicator of
the message. In addition, this definition by McQuail adds another feature for the audience,
namely its ability to receive or to reject messages. This characteristic of the public was also taken
into account by other scholars which expressed their opposite opinion regarding the belief that
mass-media was always just one-way distribution of content amongst an undifferentiated, large,
and generally passive audience. 5 6

Later on, another definition of mass media was given by the American Sociologist Morris
Janowitz who states that mass media „…comprise the institutions and techniques by which
specialized social groups employ technological devices (press, radio, films, etc.) to disseminate
symbolic content to large heterogeneous and widely dispersed audiences.”(M. Janowitz, 1996,
vol. 3, p. 41). 7

In 2007, Mabillot stated that the concept of mass communication can effectively clarify the
dramatic changes taking place within the contemporary media environment, when the term
‘mass’ is conceptualized a bit more inclusively, to include not just the receivers of content, but
the senders of content as well.8 The Web 2.0 applications such as Facebook, YouTube, MySpace,
and Flickr are increasingly leading to a new way of perceiving the mass communication in which

4
McQuail, D. (1987), Mass Communication Theory, Sage, London, p.498
5
Corner, J. (1979) ‘“Mass” in Communication Research’, Journal of Communication, Volume 29, p.26-
32
6
Mosco, V. and L. Kaye (2000) ‘Questioning the Concept of the Audience’, in I. Hagen and J. Wasko
(eds). Consuming Audiences. Production and Reception in Media Research. Cresskill, NJ: Hampton
Press, p.31-46
7
Janowitz, M. (1968), ‘The Study of Mass Communication’, in David L. Sills, International
Encyclopedia of Social Sciences, Macmillan-Free Press, New York, p.41
8
Mabillot, D. (2007) ‘User Generated Content: Web 2.0 Taking the Video Sector by Storm’, available at
SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1008860, accessed 26th of February 2017
the individual that is part of the audience operates to the same extent in which the more
traditional institutional communicator does. As can be noticed, Mabillot puts somehow the
receiver of the message and the communicator on an equal footing. The receiver is no longer just
passive but, by his/her reactions, (s)he also sends a message to the communicator.

1.2. Social Media

1.2.1. What is Social Media?

The emergence of social media is closely related to the development of the Internet and its
transition from Web 1.0 to Web 2.0 at the beginning of the third millennium. Web 2.0, also
called "The Internet of user" has developed a new model of mass communication, characterized
by a high degree of interaction between communicator and online public through a highly level
of accessibility while also offering the possibility that information to "no longer be issued only
by mass media, governments and companies, but also by individuals”. 9 If mass media puts the
audience in a passive position, Social Media puts it in the center, giving it the possibility of an
active position.

Thus, social media appear as a group of technological applications, services and websites
that allow users to build personal public profiles, to create and manage user lists, to receive and
also to create different messages and to share them with others, in other words to control the
production and dispersion of messages. On Facebook, Twitter, Google, Instagram, YouTube,
etc., the information travels faster and reaches larger audiences than the mass-media (some
editorial production processes are important factors of delay). These platforms facilitate so-
called user generated content (UGC), process characterized by a) openness-anyone who wants
can read and post messages on a social network; b) collaboration- working together, people
create new content, which can always be supplemented and improved c) pooling- users benefit
of others’ information and ideas and let everyone to have access to the ideas and information that
they have uploaded on the platform d) global thinking -contents are public and messages can
reach people all over the planet (especially when they are expressed in English).10

The best way to define social media is to define it by its components. Media is a tool of
communication, such as a newspaper or radio, so social media could be considered a social type
9
Suciu, S., Petcu, D.(2012), ‘Social Media and Political Unrest’, Tibiscus University of Timisoara’s
Annals, Vol. XVIII, p.843

10
Tapscott, D. and Anthony D. Williams (2008), Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes
Everything, New York, p.21
instrument of communication on the Internet. In simple terms this could be compared with a
website that gives you not only information but interacts with you in the same time. This
interaction is achieved by simple request of leaving a comment or voting an article.

For the social side to be accomplished there is a need for a platform, a site where all these
interactions to take place. Social media encompasses and covers a large scale of websites but the
element that connects all these websites together is the ability to interact with the website’s users
or the site itself. Currently there are 6 types of social media: social networks - sites where users
have the opportunity to build personal websites through which they can communicate with
friends and share content and information (Facebook, LinkedIn); blogs - the most popular form
of social media which represents an online journal (Tumblr, WordPress); forums - can be
described as areas of discussion in the online environment, of a community or group whose
members share a common goal or idea; wiki - sites that enable users to add or edit information
that already exists on the site, being common database (Wikipedia); podcasts -a collection of
audio and video materials available by subscription or free through services like Apple iTunes or
Amazon; content communities - are those communities that organize and share some specific
types of content, such as video community YouTube, Pinterest for photos, etc.; microblogging -
social networks combined with the blog through which brief information (updates) is distributed
online through telephone networks (Twitter).11

Social networks create huge audiences. Just as televisions can gather millions of people
during the live broadcast of an event of planetary interest (Olympics), so institutions and
individuals can create, in social media, incredible concentrations of followers. For example,
Cristiano Ronaldo has 120,319,134 followers on Facebook and 50,846,728 on Twitter, while
Microsoft founder, Bill Gates, has 19,098,873 faithful followers on Facebook and 34,013,132 on
Twitter.

1.2.2. Social Media Platforms

There are a lot of Social Media platforms with different characteristics and applications. I
will present the five most important ones and also the most popular regarding the number of
users.
1) Facebook (www.facebook.com) - It is the most popular social platform and was founded in

11
Mayfield, A. (2008) ‘What is Social Media?’, available at
http://www.icrossing.com/uk/sites/default/files_uk/insight_pdf_files/What%20is%20Social
%20Media_iCrossing_ebook.pdf, accessed 28th of February 2017, p.6
2004. The online community allows users to create a page with personal information, to connect
with friends and to distribute images, videos and events from their personal life. Facebook has
today over 1.87 billion of users. 
2) YouTube (www.youtube.com) - YouTube is not a traditional social network. Its aim is to
provide a place where people can unload and watch videos. It is one of the most popular places
where registered users can interact via videos and comments. Anyone can visualize a video on
YouTube, but for posting a video you must have an account. Today the number of users on
YouTube is around 1.30 billion.
3) Tumblr (www.tumblr.com) - Being categorized both as a social network and a microblogging
platform, Tumblr allows its users to post multimedia content within a private or a public blog
depending on their own preference. They can follow the activity of other blogs through a simple
follow option. Tumblr has almost 550 million active blog users.
4) Twitter (www.twitter.com) - It is a social network where users have the opportunity to post
mini-articles of up to 140 characters, called tweets, related to their personal life or to what
happens on the Internet. Twitter has around 317 million users.
5) LinkedIn (www.linkedin.com) - It is a social network that offers its users the opportunity to
interact for professional purposes. User profiles focuses on professional experience and skills
that a member has. The site supports activities such as networking between potential employees,
employers or clients.

1.2.3. Common characteristics of Social Media’s components

As we have seen, Social Media is composed of several types of networks or communication

channels and each of them can be used in different ways. Therefore, it is quite difficult to find a
common denominator between them. However, the professional communicator Rich Maggiani
identified a set of common features that are found in all types of Social Media. Maggiani called
these key concepts the 5 C: Conversation, Contribution, Collaboration, Connection and
Community.12

Starting from the first concept, the conversation one, Maggiani claims that Social media does
not perform anymore based on the communication’s principles of traditional mass-media, where
communication was made only from one direction and the public was just a passive receiver.

12
Magianni, R. (2013), ‘Social Media and Its Effect on Communication. Multidimensional interactions
have altered the basic rules of communication’, Solari Communication, available at
http://www.solari.net/position-papers/Solari-Social-Media-and-Communication.pdf, accessed 08th
February 2017
Social media has developed a new model of conversation characterized by an active involvement
of all parties participating in the communication process. Thus, a new type of unconventional
advertising was developed, called "word of mouth". Just as Mihai Bădău said, "information
travels from one friend to another, and the degree of confidence varies depending on the sender.
Hence, the communicators are no longer in control over information circulating about a brand”.13
In this way, the main strategy in Social Media is to focus on the dialogue with the public, voters,
customers, etc., to identify their needs and interests and to guide the conversation and according
to the interest of the person that sent the message.

Contribution is the second concept that has as foundation for development, the sharing of
information, opinions and content. Traditional communication’s leaders no longer have the same
power and influence in mass-media, so that the contribution from users represents the main tool
through which the information can reach the large public. Thus, the consuming public becomes a
"reporter" sharing information, photos, and video elements.

Collaboration is also another important feature of social media due to the fact that social
media promotes the exchange of information and content between politicians, journalists and the
public. Through this mechanism, a message can become viral almost instantly if it is distributed
by the category of public interested in a particular type of information.

The fourth characteristic is connection. Social Media is closely related to this concept. If
access of information on the Internet is done via a single click, Social Media is full of such
connections. Users can even personalize these connections according to their interests and
concerns. Through these connections and this freedom, social media gives power to the "people"
in order to manifest and even to impose themselves.

Another characteristic of social media is the ability to create and manage virtual
communities. Due to this fact, the public is more effectively segmented, establishing its own
associations and relationships with users who share common attitudes, interests and even goals,
creating virtual communities.

CHAPTER 2- SOCIAL MEDIA AND CONNECTION WITH POLITICS

2.1. Social Media and Political communication

13
Badau, H., M. (2011), Tehnici de comunicare in Social Media, Iasi :Polirom, p.30
 2.1.1. Social media’s involvement in political communication strategies

As Social Media is present today in all areas and sectors of activity, it could not be absent
from the political sphere.

The most visible implication of social media in political and election communication strategies
was noticed during the campaign for presidential elections of the United States in 2008. Barack
Obama’s victory might not have been possible without a solid strategy where the use of the
Internet and the idea of changing occupied a key position. Obama was present on the majority of
social networking sites such as Myspace, Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, etc.

By using these tools the Democratic candidate was able to mobilize particularly the young
people. Also, a study of the Pew Internet & American Life Project shows that 6 out of 10
Americans have appealed to the online environment in 2008 to inform themselves about the
political process.14 It can be noticed that the television’s supremacy in political communication
was replaced by social networks, which provide the opportunity to exploit a segment of the
whole public that was neglected so far by other means of mass communication namely young
people. Communicators of Obama’s staff managed, due to the implementation of efficient
communication strategies through Social Media and without the substitution of traditional
communication media, to stimulate and to mobilize the social category formed by young
individuals, which from the electoral point of view, was considered a critical group without
enthusiasm and skeptical regarding the effectiveness of any political program proposed.

The method by which Obama's strategies have managed to mobilize young people was to
meet their need of interaction which is specific to this category of voters. Also very important
was the constant update of information and the diversification of online mass communication
channels (Cismaru, 2012, p. 44).15

The visible success of Barack Obama in 2008 has also mobilized many political actors in
order to use social networks for the presentation and promotion of the platform and of their
electoral message and have relied heavily on the satisfaction of debate needs of social media
users. Thus, in the context where the politician understands the psychology of a social network
user and behaves accordingly, the active presence in a social network can help him/her in the
14
Smith, A., (2009), ‘The Internet’s Role in Campaign 2008’, Pew Internet & American Life Project,
available at http://www.pewinternet.org/files/old-
media/Files/Reports/2009/The_Internets_Role_in_Campaign_2008.pdf, accesed 1st of March, p.4

15
Cismaru, D., (2012), Social Media si Managementul Reputatiei, Bucuresti: Tritonic, p.44
process of influencing the public, because a social network can be a very good channel for the
propagation of messages, and through it the interaction with opinion leaders of online
communities can be done more effectively (Ciacu, 2009, p. 41-47).16

2.1.2. Social Media’s political communication in Romania

In Romania, the evolution of political communication through Social Media can be divided
into three clearly defined periods: the forums’ period, the blogs’ period and finally the Facebook
period. The first Social Media components that determined the increase in the degree of
interaction on political issues were discussion forums within the period 2000-2007. Starting with
2007 political communication emerged on blogs. Thus, both politicians and journalists, as well
as regular users of the Internet have created personal blogs and began to propagate political
messages that they could control more easily than the forums, a period characterized by a
minimal supervision from political actors.

The year 2008 had approximately 30,000 blogs and nowadays, in 2017, their number went up
to 94,900 blogs.17 Although the blogosphere was in full progress, 2010 was marked by the
highlighting of Facebook social network as a main tool of political communication in the virtual
environment. This reversal was possible due to the much easier way of using the Facebook
platform and to the possibility of tracking the messages posted on the network without a great
effort, through a news feed tool that automatically updates the content on the personal news
page.

Political parties that exploited the benefits of promoting the image and political messages
through social networks, enjoyed the active involvement of supporters on Facebook. They
initiated discussion groups and online communities and supported actively any attempt of
political parties. In Romania, political parties which enjoy the largest number of followers are
the National Liberal Party (PNL) with 255,386 fans on their official Facebook page, Union Save
Romania (USR) with 61,456 followers and the Social Democratic Party (PSD) with 69,843 likes
on its Facebook page.

PSD party was founded on March 31, 1893. PSD is a modern social-democratic, left-wing
party. It is forward-oriented, a party with European vocation, anchored in national realities, open

16
Ciacu, N., (2009), ‘Old and new techniques in political communication’, Sibiu Alma Master University
Journals, Series C. Social Sciences, vol. 2, p. 41-47
17
http://www.zelist.ro/, accessed 15th of April, 2017
to modernization and social development, a firm promoter of democracy and of reform in all the
components of the Romanian society, with a special emphasis on economic reform.

PNL party was officially founded on 24th of May 1875. The National Liberal Party is a right-
wing party, a promoter of individual, social, economic and political liberty through conception,
action and tradition. PNL is the one who carries forward the concept of liberal thinking in
Romania.

USR party was formed on August 21, 2016 by the merger of three political unions. USR has
stated that it does not want to have a certain political ideology. This formation aims to develop
Romania on the basis of correct principles and social relations, by promoting morality and
competence, by respecting the law, through an efficient public administration and by a fair
economic competition that will ensure the substantial increase of the Romanians’ quality of life.

Regarding the number of Facebook users, Romania has 9.6 million users. In the top of
Romanian cities with the most Facebook users, Bucharest ranks 1 st place with a rate of 19%
(1.76066 million), followed by Cluj Napoca-3,24% (300,000), Iasi- 3.13% (290,200), Timisoara
3.13% (290,000), Constanta-2.19% (202,990) and Craiova-2.17% (200,810).

In terms of biological gender distribution, the data shows an equal distribution, namely 50%
men and 50% women. With reference to age categories, the one ranging between the ages of 25
and 34 have the highest percentages 27%. The category aged between 18 and 24 years has 22%
and the category aged between 35 and 44 years have 21%. People younger than 18, i.e. those
who have not the right to vote, use Facebook at a rate of 9% (age group 6-17), those aged 45-54
(13%), 55-64 (6%) and 65+ (2%) according to analytical website for Social Media,
www.facebrands.ro. From this data, there can be noticed that Facebook is a communication tool
very often used especially by young people in Romania.

2.1.3. The process of political communication through Facebook

Some of the main reasons why the social network Facebook has become the main instrument
used for communication between users worldwide are accessibility and diversity of tools that
they can use through Facebook. Political actors have legitimated the huge propagation power of
the political message, but also the ease of managing the users’ feedback in order to be harnessed
to optimize the communication process.

Current research made on the use of social network Facebook in political communication is
still analyzed from the theoretical point of view, because there is no concrete empirical evidence.
A research undertaken by Marika Steenkamp and Nathalie Hyde-Clarke (2012) treats the use of
Facebook for political comments in South Africa. 18 Through this paperwork, the authors tested
four theoretical assumptions regarding the power that Facebook has on the public, in terms of
political communication as follows:

- in its role as a tool which facilitates participation, Facebook acts as a political communication
channel with a different mechanism than the one of traditional media,

- Facebook provides new means for receiving the public’s message,

- the Facebook page of a political party facilitates the interaction and political participation,
allowing a two-way communication model,

- Facebook facilitates an increased participation of public opinion from the political point of
view.

The findings of this research have demonstrated that “The platform is unmediated and lacks
the boundaries of traditional media, which means that the parties have direct access to more
individuals than ever before”.19

Also it is noted that on Facebook the political message does not go through filters of editorial
policy, as it happens in traditional mass-media, and that is why Facebook is used as a powerful
tool of interaction with target audience or with an audience who had never considered the
political communication strategies. To get to mobilize the public, the political message that is
transmitted via Facebook must be created based on a certain pattern, very different from the
official pattern of political discourse that we see on TV or read in newspapers. First, the
language of the political message that is transmitted through Facebook is informal, even
colloquial, and any attempt of a political actor to communicate political messages in a formal
language is doomed to failure from the start in terms of the feedback that is received.

The major revolution of communication via Facebook is that any type of reaction is not in
vain and it will be known by many users. Thus, if in conventional systems of political
communication, the feedback from voters comes with a delay or doesn’t come at all, Social
Media in general and Facebook in particular attaches great importance to the interactions from
18
Steenkamp, M., Hyde-Clark,N. (2012), ‘The use of Facebook for political commentary in South
Africa’, Telematics and Informatics, Elvier, available at
https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Nathalie_Hyde-
Clarke/publication/259131618_The_use_of_Facebook_for_political_commentary_in_South_Africa/links/
5880ac3145851503b6edd4a6.pdf?origin=publication_list, accessed 2nd March 2017, p.96
19
Ibidem.
the audience, once considered only the end of the line of the political communication process.
The objective of every person on Facebook, but especially of political actors in relation to
potential new voters and the electorate in general is to make themselves as pleasant as possible.
Through a social media strategy highly set up, a political actor can become very quickly a
desirable character. In this equation, the dialogue or interaction is a core indicator. Facebook
allows its users multiple ways to centralize and manage feedback such as: like, comment, share.

These tools are very useful also when we analyze the engagement rate (ER) of various
Facebook pages. Engagement rate or engagement as a percentage of total fans is calculated based
on the ratio between the sum of reactions (likes, comments and shares) of Facebook fans and the
total number of fans, according to the following equation presented by social analytics website,
www.simplymeasured.com:

Total Engagement (Likes+Comments+ Shares)

Engagement Rate=
Total Fans

2.2. Social Media and Political mobilization

A current issue in what concerns the means for the mobilization of voters is related to the
effects of social networks on the electorate. In other words, specialists search for an answer to
the question: to what extent the votes for a candidate / a party can be attracted through the
Internet? A concrete answer to this question could not be identified yet. There are no studies
showing how many supporters of a candidate / a party from the online environment go to the
polls on Election Day. But one can talk about an increase of information possibilities of voters,
fulfilling one of the desiderata for which an election campaign is designed.

Over time the following issue has been debated by specialists: whether social media can in
fact provoke political mobilizations or not. Until now, there is no clear answer to this debate
because the supporters of each of the two contradictory theories can provide empirical data for
these. Existing research is far from providing a clear-cut answer to this debate, as studies
published so far have arrived at varying conclusions meaning that supporters of each of the
two contradictory theses can find empirical support for their claims in empirical data.
Existing research is far from providing a clear-cut answer to this debate, as studies published so
far have arrived at varying conclusions meaning that supporters of each of the two contradictory
theses can find empirical support for their claims in empirical data.

One school of thought upholds the idea that social media is not an effective instrument for
mobilization. Its argument is entrenched primarily in the four following reasons: restricted access
to some political webpages, a simple way to enter into social media resulting in an abundance of
occasional participants, the digital divide which set apart those who have ready access to
computers and the Internet, and those who do not, and also the fact that the majority of
movements motivated by social media lack an important scope and are restricted to cultural or
economic causes rather than political ones. On the other hand, another school of thought find that
social media can be a valuable environment for political mobilization and that the internet and its
instruments of social media such as Facebook, YouTube and weblogs, Twitter can play a role in
terms of creating a social network where people could meet, socialize and interact constantly.
Such meetings, despite the fact that they are virtual, would have the same impact as a traditional
social network that could have such a big influence over a critical mass so that it could determine
that to operate a political movement. Their viewpoint is rooted in the following four reasons:
political discourse, digital activism, reach out, and 'vote-advice applications'. These two
opposing schools of thought will be analyzed and the reference to literature will be made through
scholars such as Bob Samuels, Van Zoonen, Cheris Carpenter, Fadi Hirzalla, Nelson A. Pichardo
and others that will highlight the strengths and weaknesses of each position.

2.2.1. Social Media: effective instruments for political mobilization

In this section I will present some of the main arguments which state that social media are
effective tools for political mobilization. Researchers such as Fadi Hirzalla, Cheris Carpenter,
Yochai Benkler, Gregory Sholette & Gene Ray argue that social media could play an important
role in mobilizing people and succeed in engaging them in different political actions and
decisions.

1. Online Activism

Online activism, also known as digital activism, Internet activism, refers to antagonistic
forms of interaction between citizens and the upper class having as a purpose the achievement of
a higher level of legitimacy and transparency.20 In the new technology it is available a new
format called “Do It Yourself” (DIY) which has enabled citizens to become more than just
spectators, namely players in the political game. What made possible this shift is the Internet and
the development of new technologies. For example YouTube, the popular video-sharing service,
has produced a large amount of political, and not only, videos created by users, using a DIY

20
Hirzalla, F. , van Zoonen, L. and de Ridder (2011) 'Internet Use and Political Participation: Reflections
on the Mobilization/Normalization Controversy', The Information Society, 27: 1, available at
http://www.icsd.aegean.gr/website_files/proptyxiako/938098214.pdf, accessed 17th of February 2017, p.
1-15
format. The result of this was the production of very effective campaign videos that were
produced at a lower cost without using professional media production. Some of the politicians
that used this method are the candidates in the United States which tried to create a more familiar
connection with their voters and which actually benefited from this due to the high-level use of
YouTube. Beside the fact that YouTube is one of the most popular Internet applications, also it
has become today an essential instrument used by politicians to distribute diverse political
content.21

2. Efficient spread of message

The Internet enables all types of organizations, including political ones to propagate their
message. When a social movement is created, the ability of its members to communicate and to
connect with the general public in order to develop alliances is vital for its success. When an
opposing movement to an existing one is created, it would use similar tactics to attract their own
public and audiences (Sholette, Ray, 2008, p.549-558).22

3. The Political Discourse

Researchers discovered that a trend which gains more and more popularity is the practice
of online political discussions on Web forums and network sites. A number of studies suggests
that the Internet is in a continuous expansion and thus it increases the public sphere. According
to Benkler, “the easy possibility of communicating effectively into the public sphere allows
individuals to reorient themselves from passive readers and listeners to potential speakers and
participants in a conversation“23 .Thus, within the public sphere, the public opinion will develop
and the media will play a very important role in this process. In the past, mass media dominated
the public sphere but the rise of a new form of media, the interactive one, due to the new
technologies led to the of facilitation communication process between holders of power and the
citizens.

4. Fusion

21
Carpenter, Cheris A. (2010), ‘The Obamachine: Technopolitics 2.0’, Journal Of Information
Technology & Politics, p.216-225
22
Sholette, Gregory; Ray, Gene. (2008), ‘Reloading Tactical Media An Exchange with Geert Lovink’,
Third Text, p.549-558
23
Benkler, Y., (2006), The Wealth of Networks: How Social Production Transforms Markets and
Freedom, New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, p.213
 Social networking sites (SNSs), such as MySpace, LinkedIn or Facebook give users the
possibility to connect with their social circle. Users start with the creation of a personal account.
Then they can search for persons they are interested in and become “friends” in order to be able
to send and receive messages and content - text, video, pictures, etc. between each other. A
Facebook group page brings together hundreds or even thousands of people who share a
common interest. The structure of the Internet itself is based on linking different sites and people
together. This possibility of association enabled people to connect and organize across traditional
gender, class and race boundaries. SNSs are places where multiple elements and actors interact
in ways that shape online public discourse. 24 These sites do not impose certain limits or specific
conditions on web use but define the scope of online political practices, influence public
discussion and connect the public together. This hybridity allows activists to enroll non-
politicized citizens and it obstruct the ability of governments to apply any type of censorship or
to restrain online users from communicating with each other.

5. Publicity

There are different types of exchange among friends on Facebook. They can be news stories
that allow users to stay informed about their friends’ Facebook activities or private messages that
are similar with emails. Facebook can ease the communication within and to a network through
special features like invitations and reminders. Thus, users can invite their own friends to join a
group or an event either by simply sending them a private message or posting it on their wall or
they can update their status in order to be seen by friends. 25 Regarding the political part,
Facebook users can express their political views in many ways; for example they can “like” a
politician’s profile, they can join or even create a specific group that has a political content or on
their own profile they can post different thoughts and opinions related to a political topic.
Regarding the participatory nature of social media, researchers suggest that Facebook groups
reflect more than a politician’s profile page, which often follows a top-down model of decision-
making.26

2.2.2. Social Media: ineffective instruments for political mobilization

24
Newsom, V. A., Lengel, L. (2012). ‘Arab Women, Social Media, and the Arab Spring: Applying the
framework of digital reflexivity to analyze gender and online activism’, Journal of International
Women's Studies, vol. 13, article 5, available at http://vc.bridgew.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?
article=1004&context=jiws, accessed 15th of March 2017, p.31-44
25
Langlois, G., Elmer, G., Mckelvey, F. & Devereux, Z. (2009), ‘Networked Publics: The Double
Articulation of Code And Politics On Facebook’,Canadian Journal Of Communication, 34 (3),p. 415-434.
26
Ibidem.
 In this section I will present the four most important arguments, which state that social
media are not effective tools for political mobilization.

1. Restricted access to some political webpages

Some critics of online political mobilization argue that Internet is not able to engage all the
population in an online political participation because of various factors. Political engagement is
naturally practiced by those participants who are already engaged users. These users tend to visit
specific political forums and blogs. Discussions and contents that have a political theme and that
supposedly demonstrate the Internet’s potential for mobilization are concentrated on specific
Websites which cover only this subject. Various research findings that state the fact that the
Internet can create a public opinion are based definitely on investigations of such political web
pages. These findings claim the fact that the Internet cannot be seen as a certain factor of
mobilization because for that to happen the Internet should reach beyond the population that is
already politically active and to engage in the movement other people from outside. In
conclusion, some critics of social media point out that such marginal engagement is one of the
reasons for which social media is limited in becoming a mobilizing factor.27

2. Slacktivism

Although initially used with positive connotations regarding the young people’ small
activities done in order to achieve something big, the term „slacktivism” has recently become an
offensive word used to minimize computerized versions of political participation
(involvement). (This term has been made widely popular especially by Eugeny Morozov
who used it to characterize) It has been made widely popular especially by Evgeny Morozov,
who has used it to describe “feel-good online activism that has zero political or social
impact. It gives to those who participate in ‘slacktivist’ campaigns an illusion of having a
meaningful impact on the world without demanding anything more than joining a
Facebook group”.28 Those who see social media as ineffective, claim that this type of actions
that require minimal personal effort, are not effective and do not automatically represent a
change in the real world.
27
Hirzalla, F. , van Zoonen, L. and de Ridder (2011) 'Internet Use and Political Participation: Reflections
on the Mobilization/Normalization Controversy', The Information Society, 27: 1, available at
http://www.icsd.aegean.gr/website_files/proptyxiako/938098214.pdf, accessed 17th of February 2017, p.
1-15
28
Morozov, E. (2009) ‘The brave new world of slacktivism’, Foreign Policy (19 May), available at
http://foreignpolicy.com/2009/05/19/the-brave-new-world-of-slacktivism/, accessed 16th of March 2017
3. The Digital Divide

The digital divide refers to the gap between demographics and regions (areas) that have
access to communications technology and modern information and those that have not at all or
have a restricted access.29 The disadvantaged class, who supposedly needs political change the
most, is actually the one lacking access to technology. This fact reduces the expectation for
online mobilization. The universal access to computers and implicit to the Internet is seen as a
goal and a value for many societies. The researcher Van Dijk (2012) explores four types of
access that come in a successive order - motivational, material, skills and usage – in order to
clarify the important issue of inequality in society.30 These four types of access constitute the
criteria that users should satisfy in order to have what is considered full access. The first one,
motivational access, represents the motivation to use a computer with an Internet connection.
The second type of access is the material one which represents the physical possession of a
computer with Internet connection and in addition to it the capability of paying for related
expenses that cover the computer, services, network hardware and software. The third one, skills
access, represents the ability to work with computer hardware, software and with the Internet and
the capacity to use information contained on the computer and Internet to achieve certain goals.
The last type of access is usage access and it basically represents the actual use of digital media.
The number and diversity of applications, actual usage time, the active and creative use (such as
publishing a blog, having a webpage, etc.) are some of the elements than can determine this type
of access. Inequalities in these four types of access presented above reveal the existence of a
digital divide.

4. New Social Movements limit the Online Activity

New Social Movements (NSMs) are activities that have developed in many Western countries
since the mid-1960s in a post-industrial economy. These movements were perceived as “new” in
opposition to the “old” working-class movement identified by the theory of Karl Marx as the
major challenger to capitalist society. In marked contrast with that, NSMs are organized around
race, gender, ethnicity, sexuality, youth, spirituality, countercultures, environmentalism, human
rights, animal rights, pacifism, etc.31 Examples of such movements are the anti-war movement,
29
https://digitaldivide28.wordpress.com/the-digital-divide/, accessed 14th of March 2017
30
Van Dijk, (2012), The Network Society: Social Aspects of New Media, Sage Publications. 

31
Snow, D. A,  della Porta, D., Klandermans, B., McAdam, D., (2013), The Wiley-Blackwell
Encyclopedia of Social and Political Movements, 1st Edition, p.443-446
movements for women and gay liberation, the student movement, and the environmental
movement.32 These movements are formed of a not very well organized and informal social
network of supporters that have no leaders and manifest no interest in an ideological
bureaucracy. They oppose the formally organized and ideologically committed members. In
contrast with the traditional movements of the industrial era whose key actor was the working-
class, the key actors in the new social movements are represented by members of the middle
class who aspire to a higher level of education and therefore to have access to information and
resources. What researchers see as a barrier to achieve a broad political change is the fact that
working-class, which was the primary component of old social movements, is missing from the
class base of NSMs.33

CHAPTER III- CASE STUDY: The Social Media influence in the Romanian
parliamentary elections, 2016

3.1. Methodology

Pichardo, N., A. (1997), ‘New Social Movements: A Critical Review’, Annual Review of Sociology,
32

Vol. 23, available at https://www.scribd.com/document/163212551/Pichardo-Nelon-a-New-Social-

Movements-a-Critical-Review-1997, accessed at 25th of February 2017, , p.411-430
33
Buechler, S., M. (1995) ‘New Social Movement Theories’, The Sociological Quartely, p. 441-64
 My case study consists of the analysis of the online activity that three Romanian political
parties and their leaders deployed on Facebook social platform during the electoral campaign for
the parliamentary elections dated 11th of December, 2016 and it is an analysis conducted during
November 11 and December 11. I conducted this analysis to find out if Facebook, as a social
media platform, had any role in mobilizing the electorate, and if the parties that had an intense
activity on this social network had something to gain at the end of the campaign.

3.1.1. Research Objectives

As I mentioned above, the main purpose of the research is to discover the link between
online interaction between the political party and the electorate and the political involvement of
the latter ones through voting that specific party. For these, the following objectives will be
considered, objectives which are also the main parts of the case study:

O1. The analysis of the way political parties and leaders use Facebook
O2. The analysis of the reactions that posts generate among the public
O3. The analysis of the actual content of messages and comments posted on parties and leaders
official Facebook pages
O4. The analysis of the Engagement Rate of each party and leader Facebook page during the
electoral campaign

To analyze the way in which political parties and their leaders used Facebook, so implicitly to
reach the first objective, I will analyze on the official page of each party and leader, the number
of posts, the frequency of posts, and an average of daily posts and also the type of posts (links,
status, video, events, and photos). Thus, I will be able to see which official Facebook page has
conducted the most intense online activity.

In order to analyze the reaction of the public, the presumed future voter, I have chosen that
for each party’s pages to calculate the cumulated number of likes, comments and shares from all
the posts published at that time in order to determine which pages have enjoyed the greatest
reaction from the public and what kind of post has attracted the attention of the public, leading to
concrete active reactions (comments) and passive reactions (like) and number of shares for each
post. I will try to analyze whether political parties have taken into account the public's reactions
to certain posts and have sent their messages in a certain form or their posts were strictly in the
form they wanted to transmit their information. Also, I will make a comparison between number
of reactions attracted by the messages transmitted on political parties’ Facebook pages and their
leaders’ pages.

In order to reach the third objective and to analyze what political parties actually transmitted
on their official Facebook pages, I used computational and automatic word processing methods,
such as the www.wordcounter.com website, which identifies the most commonly used words or
constructions of words, and also a Microsoft Word tool that helped me to process the text and
eliminate the punctuation marks and the words that are very commonly used in English, such as
prepositions, conjunctions, and pronouns. I collected and analyzed the content of over 700
messages from the pages of political parties and their leaders. Messages were either simple
statuses, or messages attached to the description of video or photo elements, and were copied
from parties’ and leaders’ pages and transposed into a Microsoft Word document. After I copied
the messages and ran them through the website www.wordcounter.ro, I selected the words that
were identified as the most commonly used and put them in categories, because of the fact that
for the same word that was found several times but at different times or forms, the website put it
separately. After identifying the words and analyzing the data that was obtained, I divided these
most commonly used words into two categories: the first category contains the common words
used by the parties and in the second category I put the words that were specific to a party and
which are not used by the others, in order to determine the specific theme of each party and the
essence of the messages that all three parties wanted to transmit.

The last objective is represented by the calculation of the Engagement Rate of each party
page and leader page between November 11 and December 11, 2016. This will be calculated
using the formula:

Total Engagement (Likes+Comments+ Shares)

Engagement Rate=
Total Fans

2.1.2. Research Hypothesis

My research project starts from three hypotheses:

1. A political party that conducts an intense activity on Facebook during the electoral campaign
can mobilize the population and obtain very good results and even win the parliamentary
elections.
2. The more evident a deployment the electoral campaign has in the online environment, the
more important the appearances of party leaders are in the social media in shaping political
preferences.

3. Including an emotional appeal to people’s feelings and simultaneously transmitting political

ideas in the political parties’ messages and addressed themes , has a far greater impact on the
public than the typical formal messages.

Thus, I think that a party that engages itself in an intense activity in the online environment
can attract public attention and through the content of its posts it can mobilize the electors to go
to vote and support it in order to help the party win the election. As it is presented in the
literature review section, Romania has about 10 million Facebook users out of the 21 million of
the total population, so a fairly large proportion. Of course that not all Facebook users have the
right to vote, of course not all users will access Facebook pages of these parties or leaders or
most likely not all users who have watched and reacted to the online activity during the electoral
period will really go to vote. However, I think it is enough for a single person to see information
on Facebook to forward it to others in the offline environment. What specifically led me to
formulate this hypothesis was the situation of the USR party that carried out its electoral
campaign almost exclusively on Facebook because of scarcity of funds.

The second hypothesis is related to the presence of parties’ leaders in the online environment.
I think that political leaders have a much greater power to influence and can attract more
reactions on their pages than the party as an entity. That is why I will analyze the number of
reactions on the parties’ pages in comparison to the reactions on the leaders' Facebook pages so
that I can see if this hypothesis is confirmed or not.

The last hypothesis is related with the way in which political parties have chosen to transmit
their messages. I think that sending messages in a more informal way that manages to stir
emotions in the souls of people can generate more reactions and can have a greater impact on the
public. I will also try to find out if the political parties had specific themes for their messages or
they simply transmitted their information to the public without thinking about a certain strategy.

3.1.3. Research Methods

The research method that I used is a quantitative one, namely the collection and analysis of
media content. This implied the construction of a rating scale of daily postings on the Facebook
pages of the three political parties from Romania and pages of their leaders, between November
11 and December 11, 2016, the period equivalent to the interval of conducting the electoral
campaign for the 2016 parliamentary elections. On December 12, I started analyzing each page
starting with 11th of November. So, for each post I noted the number of likes, the number of
comments and the number of shares. In order to have a clearer analysis, I grouped the posts in 5
categories, namely in photo, video, link, simple status and event. Thus, I was considering the
collection of strictly quantitative information, such as: the number of posts, the average
frequency of daily posts, the number of active interactions (through comments) or passive
interactions (through likes), but also information with qualitative nuances , respectively the main
themes found in the posts from the aforementioned period, as well as the analysis of the most
popular posts in order to try to identify the elements of those messages that determined people to
react. The raw data was collected from the Facebook pages of the targeted political actors.

Although in the fight for the parliamentary elections more than 10 political parties entered, I
have chosen for the analysis the first three political parties in Romania with the highest number
of followers on their official Facebook pages, namely the Social Democratic Party (PSD) with
69,807 likes, the National Liberal Party (PNL) with 255,240 followers and the Union Save
Romania (USR) with 61,397 likes on their official page. I have also analyzed the Facebook
pages of their presidents, namely Liviu Dragnea (155,916 likes), Alina Gorghiu (123,587 likes)
and Nicusor Dan (158,978 likes).

3.2. Case Study- Analysis and Results

3.2.1. The way political parties and leaders use Facebook

3.2.1.1. Number of Facebook posts during electoral campaign

Graph 3.1.-Number of Facebook posts during electoral campaign

 From the start of the electoral campaign and until its end, on December 11, the three parties
and their leaders posted a total of more than 800 Facebook messages. The most active party was
USR, with over 380 messages posted on its pages, followed by PSD with 226 messages and PNL
with 218. There are also differences between the number of posts on the official pages of the
parties and the number of posts on the leaders' pages. As can be seen in Graph 1, PSD and PNL
leaders’ pages have conducted a more intense activity than parties’ pages. If in the case of PSD
the difference between the two pages is of only 16 posts, in the case of PNL it can be noticed that
Alina Gorghiu’s page, PNL leader, has performed an activity almost 3 times more intense than
the activity on the party's page. The only exception is represented by USR where the party's page
had a more intense activity than the leader’s, even if the difference is a small one, of only 13
posts. It can be noticed that of the three political leaders of the selected parties, Nicusor Dan,
president of USR, had the most intense activity on his Facebook page, followed by Alina
Gorghiu and Liviu Dragnea.

After this analysis, we can notice the fact that, indeed, Facebook offers the possibility for
political leaders and, implicitly, for political parties to transmit their messages to the general
public and to connect with it. In this way the theory Hirzalla et al. is confirmed: it talks about the
ability of social networks to offer an efficient spread of messages, theory presented in the
literature section of the this paper.

3.2.1.2. Frequency of posting

Graph 3.2.-Frequency of posting (posts/day)

Regarding the frequency of posts, as can be seen in Graph 2, in the case of USR, both the
party's page and the leader's page had a frequency of about 6 posts per day. In the case of PSD,
we can see that both pages of the party returned with information about 3-4 times a day. For
PNL, the party's page had an average of 2 posts per day while Alina Goghiu, on her page
returned with information even 5 times a day.

3.2.1.3. Type of post

Graph 3.3.-Type of post

Regarding the type of postings (Graph 3), it can be noticed that PSD mainly betted on links
to transmit its messages. The links connected either to various websites that featured news about
PSD’s activity or, in the case of the party's page, most of the links sent the public to Liviu
Dragnea's Facebook page, and were actually shares of his posts. Thus, the links represent about
44% of the total of these pages’ posts. In terms of photo and video elements, these have also
been an important part of PSD posts. Videos represent 30%, and photos 22% of all posts. Simple
statuses appear in a very small proportion, namely 3%, and the remaining 1% is for the event
type posts.

On the other hand, for PNL, the video elements were the main ways of transmitting their
message, these representing 35%, followed by photos present in a proportion of 34% of total
postings. Also in this case, the links have a fairly high percentage of 29%. The remaining 2% is
allocated to the status posts.

As for USR, it seems that the photos have the highest proportion of posts, respectively 37%
followed immediately by links that have a 36% percent and that play, as in the case of other
parties, an important role. USR links sent the public to the pages of the USR candidates as well
as to various news websites when these provided information about USR party and its members.
3.2.2. Reactions that posts generate among the public

3.2.2.1. Public reaction depending on the type of post

Graph 3.4.-Public reaction depending on the type of post

If so far I have analyzed the activity of political parties on the Facebook social network, in
the following I will focus on the reactions that these posts generated among the public. I will
start with an analysis of the public reaction generated by the type of post. As it can be seen in
Graph 4, the height of the bars represents the number of reactions, and the inner percentages
represent the proportion that corresponds to each type of reaction (comment, like or share) within
each message category. Posts that include video elements generate the most reactions from the
public in terms of both passive (likes) and active (comments) reactions and shares.
In total, the three parties received around 353,000 likes, 65,000 comments and 156,000
shares for posts that included video elements. The photos have also played a very important role.
The three parties have accumulated a total of 320,000 likes, 29,000 comments, and nearly 74,000
shares of photo elements. Although it does not generate an equally large number of reactions,
links sometimes managed to capture the attention of the public, mainly through passive
reactions. Thus, the three parties gathered 153,000 likes, 14,000 comments and 13,000 shares to
this type of posts. The statuses that do not include any media element or the events created on
Facebook pages generated the slightest response from the public, which adds up to 48,000 likes,
6,000 comments, but having a higher number of shares than links, namely 17,000. As it can be
seen from this analysis, the videos and links generate the highest total number of comments.

3.2.2.2. Public reaction (average number per post)

Graph 3.5.-Public reaction (average number per post)

As it can be noticed in Graph 5, the party with the highest average number of likes, shares
and comments per post in this campaign was PSD, with an average of nearly 1,280 likes per post
and whose messages were shared on average 448 times. PSD was also the party that generated
the largest amount of discussion among the public, with an average of 202 comments per posting
on the official page of the party and of its leader. At a very small difference, the second position
was occupied by PNL that recorded an average of 1,200 likes per post, a number of 409 shares
and an average number of 184 comments. As far as USR is concerned, it succeeded to generate
reactions at a smaller scale than the other parties, with an average number of 840 likes, 63
comments; its messages were distributed on average 183 times.

The presence of this reaction from the public in this situation confirms many of the theories
presented in the literature section. Thus it is confirmed the McQuail's theory which states that the
audience has the opportunity within social media networks to receive or to ignore the messages
because, although only a large number of people have appreciated the page of a particular
political party, only some of them have chosen to receive the political message that was
transmitted and to react to it. Also, the theory of online activism, formulated by Hirzalla et al.
has also been confirmed because, indeed, social media networks, in this case Facebook, allowed
citizens to get involved and not to be just spectators in the political process. Also, the theories of
Maggiani, Langlois, Benkler or Mabillot that talk about this active engagement of the public who
has now the opportunity to express its opinions and dissatisfactions about a particular political
subject, theories which somehow puts on an equal footing the receiver of the message with the
communicator of the message have been also confirmed.

3.2.2.3. Public reaction on parties’ pages and leaders’ pages

After I presented a comparative analysis of the audience’s response regarding the three
parties, I will continue to analyze the number of reactions making a comparison between leaders’
pages and parties’ Facebook pages.

Graph 3.6.-Public reaction on parties’ pages and leaders’ pages

As it can be noticed in Graph 3.6., the posts on the leaders' pages have generally generated
more reactions than parties’ pages. Starting with PSD’s case, it can be clearly seen that the
reactions on Liviu Dragnea's page were much higher than on the party's page. Thus, Dragnea
received 5 times more likes, 16 times more shares and 10 times more comments on posts than
PSD’s Facebook page. In the same situation can be found USR party, where on the leader's page,
Nicusor Dan, the audience reacted much better than on the party’s page. Nicusor Dan gathered a
triple number of likes and shares against PNL’s page and a 5 times higher number of comments
than the party's Facebook page. An exception is PNL. In the case of this party, it can be noticed
that the leader's page did not manage to get as many public reactions as the party did, although
the difference is indeed not a big one. In the case of the likes and comments, the difference is
small, but regarding the number of shares, the party's page managed to get 3 times more shares
than the leader's page, Alina Gorghiu.

Thus, as it can see, the presence of leaders in the online environment during the electoral
campaign for the parliamentary elections played a rather important role in 2 of the 3 cases that
were presented. The messages sent by the political leaders quickly reached the people and
managed to engage them and to make them express their ideas and opinions and maybe also to
mobilize them to vote.

Hence, through this analysis, we can observe the similarity with Ciacu's idea, presented also
in the literature section, which talked about the fact that the presence of a politician on a social
platform can help him/her communicate better with the public and can facilitate the process of
influencing the audience and attracting votes.

3.2.3. The top 10 posts with the highest number of reactions

After I did an analysis of the public's reaction and I have discovered the types of posts that
generated the most reactions, I will still analyze ten postings that registered the highest number
of reactions on Facebook. In this way I want to find out what distinguished these posts and
implicitly what caused people to react to such an extent to these posts.

Graph 3.7.-Top 10 posts

As it can be seen in Graph 3.7., during the electoral campaign, in the top of the most popular
ten posts, four are of PNL, three are of USR leader, Nicusor Dan, and three belong to PSD
leader, Liviu Dragnea.
1. The most popular post concerning the number of likes (21,000), shares (21,118) and
comments (870) belongs to PNL and was published on November 28. This post is a video where
an elderly voter encountered "on the field during the campaign" expresses his dissatisfaction
regarding social aid in Romania that is wrongly granted and destroys the country. The citizen
thinks that people have to work because this is the only way for Romania to develop. It seems
that the simple message transmitted by an ordinary man has managed to mobilize the audience in
the best way, most of the public sharing this voter’s beliefs.
2. The second post regarding the number of reactions also belongs to PNL with 35,000 likes,
3,300 shares and 4,210 comments. The message is "Due to the fact that in 2016 Romania had
the highest economic growth in the EU, the PNL supports Dacian Ciolos to continue as prime
minister. #RomaniaAhead (#RomaniaInainte)” and the post includes the electoral poster of PNL
with Dacian Ciolos’ picture and some economic statistics published on November 17. Most of
the reactions were negative ones, in comments people being outraged at the word "growth" from
the message, because most of them said that they had not seen any improvement in their living
standards or a rise in wages.
3. The third post belongs to the USR leader, Nicusor Dan, accumulating 16,000 likes, 5,118
shares and 2,374 comments and was published on 2nd of December. The posting consists of a
photo in whose description Nicusor Dan expresses his indignation regarding the PSD initiative
that proposed a criminal and judicial amnesty, i.e. the forgiveness of politicians who committed
certain facts and the possibility of paying damages. Nicusor Dan enumerates several members of
Parliament who support this initiative, warning the public of the great possibility that these
people may enter the Parliament. Most of the people who reacted to this post also expressed their
disagreement and dissatisfaction with the PSD's initiative, many saying they will vote for USR
because it is a party of honest and correct people.
4. The fourth post belongs to Liviu Dragnea and managed to gather 15,000 likes, 2,778 shares
and 2,600 comments. The posting consists of a video message in which the president of the PSD
party wishes „Happy Birthday!” to Romanians on the occasion of the national day of Romania.
In this video, Liviu Dragnea talks about a better situation for the Romanians, about the
possibility that even the poorest Romanians could get into the middle class and about the
investments that PSD wants to do in health and education. The public's reactions were diverse.
Many complained about the falsity of the president in passing the message, others appreciated
the gesture and expressed their determination to give their vote to PSD. Most of them
commented with „Happy Birthday!” wishes addressed to Romanians from all over the world.
5. The next post from the list with the most popular ones belongs again to Nicusor Dan and is a
video in which the political parties that have been in charge of leadership over the time as well as
the alliances that have been made are presented chronologically. The post raised a total of 10,000
likes, 4,888 shares and 1,054 active reactions. In the description of the video, Nicusor Dan
argued that USR is alone in this fight and is not going to make any alliance to achieve its goals.
Also he reminded the public that actually people represent their campaign and the active
participation of the public is the only one which can bring them victory. The public's response
did not delay. Many were saying that they would vote for USR because it is a young party,
supported by young Romanians who have a clearer vision of the future. Nevertheless, many
condemn the statement that USR is alone in this fight. People mention the USR's bond with PNL
by supporting the same man, namely Dacian Ciolos, as Prime Minister of Romania. Also, many
were convinced that if USR got into Parliament, this would definitely make it create alliances
with other parties.
6. On the 6th place on the list is a message transmitted by PNL that drew 12,000 likes, 2,368
shares and 780 comments and was posted on December 10, the day before the elections. The
posting is a video clip with an interview that Dacian Ciolos gave to a famous Romanian vlogger.
In this video, Ciolos talked about the importance of participating in the vote and urged all
Romanians to go and express their preference because, contrary to general beliefs, non-
participation is also a choice with great consequences. Most commentators on this post said that
voting was not a solution because although many of them had been voting over time, nothing had
really changed. But there were people who agreed with Ciolos's words and saw the vote as the
only way for the better.
7. The seventh post was published on December 4 and belongs to the PSD’s president, Liviu
Dragnea. The post gathered over 11,000 likes, 1,550 shares and over 1,200 comments. The
posting was made up of a photo that portrayed Liviu Dragnea with the mayor of Bucharest,
Gabriela Firea. In the photo description Dragnea talked about the PSD’s plan to increase the
wages of the doctors so that they remain in the country. He also announced that a republican
hospital and other 8 regional hospitals would be built. Those who commented on this post
seemed to have no confidence in the politician's words. Many said that no hospital would be built
or renovated because nothing special had been done so far. People claimed that everything that
PSD built during the years they were in power was a greater degree of corruption, of thievery,
and that what people really received were just some empty promises.
8. The 8th place belongs to a post by Liviu Dragnea and represents a video with a live broadcast
of a press conference attended by the PSD leader immediately after the results of the election
were announced, namely the announcement of the PSD victory. It gathered 6,800 likes, 1,485
shares and 3,500 comments. The reactions to this post were, as in the other cases, diverse. Many
congratulated the PSD leader for the victory and felt proud to have voted for this party, while
others talked about how easily the Romanian people can be manipulated only through promises.
Many said the PSD victory was due to elderly voters who had been promised higher pensions.
9. On 9th place with 9,400 passive reactions, 1,658 shares and 600 comments is a PNL party
post. This is actually a picture in which a comparison was made between President Klaus
Iohannis (PNL member) and his political opponent in the fight for presidential elections, Victor
Ponta (PSD member) and a parallel between Dacian Ciolos and Liviu Dragnea. PNL urged
people to repeat what they did in 2014 and vote again with PNL. Many of those who commented
on this post did not see the comparison from the right picture an appropriate one because most
claimed that they were disappointed with the Romanian president's government and if they had
the chance, they would not vote for Klaus Iohannis anymore. Also, many users condemned PNL
of trying to manipulate the public through party representatives, and that it did not have a well-
structured government plan.
10. The last posting from this top is one by Nicusor Dan. This is a photo that contained the
message "Thank you!" and it was published at the end of the electoral campaign when the results
of the elections were announced. The audience also responds with "Thank you!" to show their
pride to the party they forfeited, even if it had failed to win. Many people asked for USR to have
a stronger presence on both social media and in traditional media because many voters did not
know about their existence, which may have led them to lose elections. The post gathered 9,500
likes, 22 shares and 362 comments.
As a conclusion of this analysis, it can be seen that the success of PNL’s top posts is due to
the appearance of Dacian Ciolos in these because he is present in 3 out of 4 PNL posts. In what
concerns Nicusor Dan's postings, it seems that the key to success was the exposure of the wrong
deeds that USR’s political opponents have made. In the case of Liviu Dragnea's postings, I do
not think there is a pattern, but it can be said that the popularity of these posts was given by
Dragnea's speeches where he was presenting PSD's intentions for political leadership.

3.2.4. Actual content of messages and comments posted on parties and leaders official
Facebook pages

In this section I will analyze the content of all the posts made by political parties and their
leaders on Facebook pages to determine which the main issues addressed in this campaign and
the theme of each party were.

I will start with the Facebook page of PSD and its leader Liviu Dragnea. Thus, the one that
appears most often on these two pages is the PSD slogan "Dare to believe"(Indrazneste sa crezi),
used about 200 times. Also, Romania and Romanians are often mentioned in the PSD’s
messages (about 165 times) because the party wants to address citizens directly in order to create
more personal messages that will lead to public’s involvement and mobilization. The name of the
party is also often mentioned, along with the name of the leader, Liviu Dragnea. In PSD’s posts,
the word "wages" is often seen alongside the noun "increase", because in the campaign PSD
greatly promised wages’ increase, especially those of doctors and teachers, which are mentioned
in many of PSD’s posts. Regarding the reference to other parties, PSD uses the term "the zero
government" when it refers to PNL, the phrase used about 23 times, while USR is not found in
PSD’s posts, which indicates that PSD does not consider it a true opponent. One of the ideas
promoted by the PSD in the campaign was that of a Romania in which even the poorest to
become part of the "middle class", the phrase used at least 25 times in the PSD party's messages.
The urge of the population to vote is also quite present in the PSD’s posts and the word
"together", which states that PSD's partner in this fight is the public and only with this it can
succeed, also appears at least 10 times. A segment of the public that is the most mentioned is the
youth, especially Liviu Dragnea referring to young people of Romania in 15 of his posts. Verbs
such as can, to want, to do, to bring, to succeed are some of the most used on PSD’s pages.
As far as PNL is concerned, after the same analysis, I could find out that on PNL’s
Facebook pages, PSD name was almost as often mentioned as the name of PNL. Thus, PNL is
mentioned cumulatively in the messages posted on the leader’s page and on the party’s page 72
times and the PSD’s name 71 times. Dacian Ciolos, the one that PNL supported as Prime
Minister of Romania, is also quite present in PNL’s posts, being mentioned about 50 times. The
PSD leader was as well a common subject, Liviu Dragnea appearing about 30 times, which
means the same frequency with which the PNL’s slogan “Romania Ahead” appears on the PNL
Facebook pages. As with PSD, urging the population to vote are also quite common. Thus, the
word "vote" appears on average 50 times on PNL’s pages. The idea of change, development and
the idea of a better future appear often in the party posts, with a frequency of about 10
appearances. Young people are also mentioned most often alongside the word "future" to
highlight that PNL will fight to provide young people with a better life and a bright future. Like
PSD, on the PNL’s pages the same verbs could be noticed: to do, to bring, to succeed.
Regarding the last party that has been analyzed, namely USR, it has a wider range of very
commonly used words, due to a larger number of posts than other parties, but I will analyze, as
before, the ones that have recorded the highest frequency. Thus, the name of the party is the most
mentioned item in the posts of the two pages, registering a frequency of 236 sightings. The
slogan of the party is also very common, the phrase "Finally, you have someone"(In sfarsit, ai cu
cine) appears 70 times in total. The messages including Romania are very common for this party,
the country of Romanians being mentioned at least 100 times. As in the case of PNL and PSD,
the USR party invites people to vote, but it does so very often because the number of uses of the
word "vote" is 160, which means almost half of USR’s posts. Regarding the discussions about
other parties, what can be observed is that PSD appears in USR’s posts almost 8 times more than
PNL does. One reason could be that PNL and USR support the same person as Romanian Prime
Minister, respectively Dacian Ciolos, and thus, USR chose to hit more the remaining party,
namely PSD. In many of its posts, USR informs the population about the voting rules, especially
the ones for people living in other cities than their hometowns, the term "polling stations" being
used at least 25 times. Again, the idea of unity and collaboration between the party and the
people is met, "together" being used in this case about 10 times. As with other parties, we find
numerous verbs as can, to make, to trust, to save through which USR tries to persuade voters that
voting for it, they will make the best choice.

After this analysis, it can be noticed that there is a number of words that are common to all
parties. Thus, it would be interesting to eliminate these words in order to have a clearer idea of
the essence of the messages posted by the parties and of the themes specific to each of them.
Figures 1-3, namely those on the first column, represent the most common terms in general,
while figures 4-6 of the second column represent the most common terms that are specific to a
party and are not commonly used by the other parties. The size of words is given by their
frequency - bigger words are used more often, the smallest ones are used less often.

Common words Specific words

PSD
PNL

USR

Thus, as it can be seen, the common terms used by all three parties include the names of the
parties, some of the leaders’ names, the name of the country, Romania, and the main purpose of
these parties, namely to obtain the vote of the public. Also, there are a series of common verbs
such as: to do, to succeed, to want, etc.

    Concerning the discovery of each party’s theme, I will start by analyzing the PSD’s case. It
can be seen that the party's slogan is very present and this is, in fact, an impulse directed to
voters who have to dare to believe in the idea of a brighter future and a better life alongside PSD.
Also, this party aspires to the idea that as many Romanians as possible should be part of the
middle class, so the idea of evolution, the party claiming higher salaries for teachers and doctors,
which represents implicitly the idea of a better education and health system. Economic growth is
also one of the goals and themes of PSD’s messages. In the case of PNL, the domination of their
political slogan can be noticed; it symbolizes the idea of evolution, evolution that will be made
only through the winning of the parliamentary election by PNL. Themes such as change and
development, but also the idea of a better future can also be seen. In the case of USR, there is
also the idea of change that is expressed by the political slogan itself, which also contains the
word "finally". USR wants to convey the message that Romania needs a change, needs a new
party that has no connection with the past and will lead the country to the future.
3.2.5. Engagement Rate of each party and leader Facebook page during the electoral
campaign

As I mentioned in the methodology section, the fifth part of my case study involves
calculating engagement rates for each page of political parties and their leaders during the
electoral campaign, to see which party resonated best with its audience during the campaign and
what Facebook page has raised the greatest interest for users. Therefore:

PSD Total Engagement (Likes+Comments+Shares) = 58,140

Total Fans= 69,807
So ER= 0.83

Liviu Dragnea Total Engagement= 377,926

Total Fans= 155,916
So ER=2.42

PNL Total Engagement=232,257

Total Fans=255,240
So ER=0.90

Alina Gorghiu Total Engagement=159,112

Total Fans= 123,587
So ER=1.28

USR Total Engagement=103,741

Total Fans=61,397
So ER=1.68

Nicusor Dan Total Engagement=314,959

Total Fans= 158,978
So ER=1.97

So, as this analysis shows, the page with the highest engagement rate during the electoral
campaign was the one of Liviu Dragnea with a rate of almost 2.5. It is immediately followed by
Nicusor Dan’s page, which also registered an engagement of almost 2 and USR with an
engagement rate of 1.7. The last 3 places are held by Alina Gorghiu with 1.3, PNL with 0.9 and
PSD with 0.8. Surprisingly, despite the fact that Liviu Dragnea's page ranked first, his party’s
page, PSD, had the lowest engagement rate. A good position is occupied by USR where both the
leader's page and the party's page had good engagement rates.

Conclusions and Recommendations

During half a century, the political communication systems have gone through many stages
and transformations to reach the current level of development. Even though the emergence of the
Internet has not revolutionized political communication very much, real changes have occurred
with the development of Social Media, characterized by a high degree of interaction,
commitment and political participation of citizens.

The research I made in this paper aimed at analysing the way in which the online political
message circulates from the political actors towards the online audience and the reactions of the
latter. Thus, I analysed how the three political parties and their leaders used Facebook during the
electoral campaign for the 2016 parliamentary elections in Romania, namely the number of
posts, the frequency of posts and what type of post they chose to do (photo, video, status, event
or link). Then, I analysed how the audience reacted, respectively its response according to the
type of post, the average number of reactions per post, and how the public responded according
to the author of the post (the leaders or the parties on their official pages). More than that, I
selected the first 10 messages that have gathered the greatest number of reactions to determine
which elements determined people to react in such a big number through comments, likes or
shares. Additionally, I analysed the content of all messages posted on Facebook pages of
political parties and their leaders to discover the themes and topics that were most often
addressed during the campaign, and whether the parties had a strategy to attract the public or not.
At the end, I calculated the engagement rate for each Facebook page to see which party
resonated best with its audience during the campaign and what Facebook page raised the greatest
interest for users.

Regarding the results of the electoral campaign, they placed PSD on the first place and
elections’ winner, followed by PNL and USR. PSD’s victory was not a surprising one. As we
have seen, PSD has been one of the most important political parties in Romania since its
founding. Its electoral campaign for parliamentary elections was a complex one that used all the
available means. PSD has also been using Social Media very well, in this case, the Facebook
platform and, following the analysis of this case study, it can be noticed that it ranked second in
terms of activity that it had on Facebook, drawing the highest average number of reactions per
post from the public.
 A surprise was USR. The party that was formed on the occasion of 2016 parliamentary
elections, conducted its campaign almost exclusively on Facebook because of the lack of funds,
situation which seems helped it. Thus, USR was the most active on the social platform of all
three parties, with the highest number of posts and the highest frequency of posts. The public did
not delay in answering. Behind Liviu Dragnea's page, Nicusor Dan's page ranks second as
number of reactions from the public. Also, PSD’s and USR’s leaders' pages had the highest
engagement rate during the campaign. The PNL didn’t stand out either for the number of posts or
the number of reactions from the public. Thus, after performing the above analyses, the first
hypothesis of research according to which a political party that conducts an intense activity on
Facebook during the electoral campaign can mobilize the population and obtain very good
results and even win the parliamentary elections is validated.

The second hypothesis according to which the more evident a deployment the electoral
campaign has in the online environment, the more important the appearances of party leaders are
in the social media in shaping political preferences is also validated. As it was observed in the
case study analysis, in 2 of the 3 cases, respectively in the case of PSD and USR, the leaders of
the two parties have gathered a larger number of reactions from the public than the official pages
of the parties.

As for the third hypothesis according to which including an emotional appeal to people’s
feelings and simultaneously transmitting political ideas in the political parties’ messages and
addressed themes , has a far greater impact on the public than the typical formal messages, have
a far greater impact on the public than the formal ones is also validated.

If we look at the analysis of the 10 most important posts and the themes that political parties
had during the campaign, it can be noticed that most of the reactions were drawn by messages
with an emotional impact. The PNL is in this top on the first place with a simple message which
describes the society in which we live through the eyes of an old elector. Liviu Dragnea is also in
this top with a video in which he wishes “Happy Birthday!” to Romanians with the occasion of
the national day, so again a message with an emotional tinge. Also, a popular post is the one in
which Nicusor Dan sends a “Thank you!” message at the end of the campaign for all those who
supported and voted USR party.

Regarding the themes of the parties, it could be noticed that PSD touched very much the idea
of evolution and on the idea of a middle class society majority, idea which raised another
emotion, namely hope in Romanians’ souls. PNL also had the idea of evolution and of a better
future but these were not as well promoted and sustained as in the case of PSD. USR promoted
the idea of change and did this almost exclusively through its slogan.

This study presents also a series of limitations, which, once removed, would increase the
accuracy and the degree of representativeness of the obtained results. First of all, the analysis of
a single online campaign does not allow for a valid general truth, in relation to other electoral
campaigns deployed on Social Media platforms. Secondly, there is no way to prove that all those
who have reacted and have been active in the online environment have indeed gone to exercise
their right to vote.

In conclusion, this research demonstrates that Social Media really can be a tool for political
mobilization and it can be a starting point for a future research. This study also draws attention to
the situation of Romanian society and urges to broader research into the phenomenon of digital
democracy in the context in which the evolution of the means of communication is affecting
increasingly the sphere of political communication.

Bibliography

1. Badau, H., M. (2011), Tehnici de comunicare in Social Media, Iasi :Polirom, p.30

2. Benkler, Y., (2006), The Wealth of Networks: How Social Production Transforms
Markets and Freedom, New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
3. Buechler, S., M. (1995) ‘New Social Movement Theories’, The Sociological Quartely, p.
441-64
4. Carpenter, Cheris A. (2010), ‘The Obamachine: Technopolitics 2.0’, Journal Of
5. Ciacu, N., (2009), ‘Old and new techniques in political communication’, Sibiu Alma
Master University Journals, Series C. Social Sciences, vol. 2
6. Cismaru, D., (2012), Social Media si Managementul Reputatiei, Bucuresti: Tritonic
7. Coman, M. (2016), Introducere in sistemul mass-media, 4th Edition, Iasi:Polirom
8. Corner, J. (1979) ‘“Mass” in Communication Research’, Journal of Communication,
Volume 29,
9. Freidson, E. (1953), ‘Communications Research and the Concept of the Mass’, American
Sociological Review, p. 313-317.
10. Hirzalla, F. , van Zoonen, L. and de Ridder (2011) 'Internet Use and Political
Participation: Reflections on the Mobilization/Normalization Controversy', The
Information Society, 27: 1, available at
http://www.icsd.aegean.gr/website_files/proptyxiako/938098214.pdf, accessed 17th of
February 2017, p. 1-15
Information Technology & Politics
11. Janowitz, M. (1968), ‘The Study of Mass Communication’, in David L. Sills,
International Encyclopedia of Social Sciences, Macmillan-Free Press, New York, p.41
12. Langlois, G., Elmer, G., Mckelvey, F. & Devereux, Z. (2009), ‘Networked Publics: The
Double Articulation of Code And Politics On Facebook’, Canadian Journal Of
Communication, 34 (3), 415-434.
13. Mabillot, D. (2007) ‘User Generated Content: Web 2.0 Taking the Video Sector by
Storm’, available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1008860, accessed 26th of February
2017
14. Magianni, R. (2013), ‘Social Media and Its Effect on Communication. Multidimensional
interactions have altered the basic rules of communication’, Solari Communication, available at
http://www.solari.net/position-papers/Solari-Social-Media-and-Communication.pdf, accessed
08th February 2017
15. Mayfield, A. (2008) ‘What is Social Media?’, available at
http://www.icrossing.com/uk/sites/default/files_uk/insight_pdf_files/What%20is
%20Social%20Media_iCrossing_ebook.pdf, accessed 28th of February 2017
16. McQuail, D. (1987), Mass Communication Theory, Sage, London, p.498
17. Morozov, E. (2009) ‘The brave new world of slacktivism’, Foreign Policy (19 May),
available at http://foreignpolicy.com/2009/05/19/the-brave-new-world-of-slacktivism/,
accessed 16th of March 2017
18. Mosco, V. and L. Kaye (2000) ‘Questioning the Concept of the Audience’, in I. Hagen
and J. Wasko (eds). Consuming Audiences. Production and Reception in Media
Research. Cresskill, NJ: Hampton Press, p.31-46
19. Newsom, V. A., Lengel, L. (2012). ‘Arab Women, Social Media, and the Arab Spring:
Applying the framework of digital reflexivity to analyze gender and online
activism’, Journal of International Women's Studies, vol. 13, article 5, available at
http://vc.bridgew.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1004&context=jiws, accessed 15th of
March 2017
20. Pichardo, N., A. (1997), ‘New Social Movements: A Critical Review’, Annual Review of
Sociology, Vol. 23, p.411-430, available at
https://www.scribd.com/document/163212551/Pichardo-Nelon-a-New-Social-
Movements-a-Critical-Review-1997, accessed at 25th of February 2017.
21. Sholette, Gregory; Ray, Gene. (2008), ‘Reloading Tactical Media An Exchange with
Geert Lovink’, Third Text
22. Smith, A., (2009), ‘The Internet’s Role in Campaign 2008’, Pew Internet & American
Life Project, available at http://www.pewinternet.org/files/old-
media/Files/Reports/2009/The_Internets_Role_in_Campaign_2008.pdf, accesed 1st of
March.
23. Snow, D. A,  della Porta, D., Klandermans, B., McAdam, D., (2013), The Wiley-
Blackwell Encyclopedia of Social and Political Movements, 1st Edition
24. Steenkamp, M., Hyde-Clark,N. (2012), ‘The use of Facebook for political commentary in
South Africa’, Telematics and Informatics, Elvier, available at
https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Nathalie_Hyde-
Clarke/publication/259131618_The_use_of_Facebook_for_political_commentary_in_So
uth_Africa/links/5880ac3145851503b6edd4a6.pdf?origin=publication_list, accessed 2nd
March 2017
25. Suciu, S., Petcu, D.(2012), ‘Social Media and Political Unrest’, Tibiscus University of
Timisoara’s Annals, Vol. XVIII
26. Tapscott, D. and Anthony D. Williams (2008), Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration
Changes Everything, New York.
27. Van Dijk, (2012), The Network Society: Social Aspects of New Media, Sage
Publications. 
28. Wright, Charles R. (1964), ‘Functional Analysis and Mass Communication’, in Lewis
Anthony Dexter, David M. White (ed.), People, Society and Mass Communication,
Macmillan, New York, p. 94

Links

29. Facebook Developers, ‘Like button’ (2013), available at

https://developers.facebook.com/docs/plugins/like-button, accessed 2nd of March 2017
30. https://www.facebook.com/USRNational/, accessed 11th of November 2016- 11th of
December 2016
31. https://www.facebook.com/psdbiroupresa/, accessed 11th of November 2016- 11th of
December 2016
32. https://www.facebook.com/liviudragnea.ro/, accessed 11th of November 2016- 11th of
December 2016
33. https://www.facebook.com/alinagorghiu/?ref=br_rs, accessed 11th of November 2016-
11th of December 2016
34. https://www.facebook.com/NicusorDanUSR/, accessed 11th of November 2016- 11th of
December 2016
35. https://www.statista.com/statistics/272014/global-social-networks-ranked-by-number-of-
users/
36. https://www.facebook.com/pnl.ro/, accessed 11th of November 2016- 11th of December
2016
37. http://www.zelist.ro/, accessed 19th March 2017
38. http://www.facebrands.ro/map.html, accessed 19th of March 2017