Abstract
The Internet has by now affected virtually every aspect of political campaigns and campaigning. While this statement may seem fairly banal, it hides a number of realities about the various roles the medium plays in selecting presidents and other politicians.
For example, not only can citizens now get news about campaigns, candidates, and so on, whenever and wherever they find it convenient, but this news now includes in-depth, insider information that was previously available only to die-hard political junkies. Web sites like Politico, ABC News’ “The Note,” and others track and report on the most esoteric, but often critical information about organization and other developments of the campaign. This includes tracking candidate movements, who attended which fund-raisers, which candidates hired which campaign professionals, who endorsed whom, and so on.
Campaigning itself has also been changed as the result of the Internet. Campaign organizations now put considerable effort into their online presence. What began in the mid-1990s as simple and static campaign Web sites expanded into aggressive fund-raising efforts in 2000, outreach programs and organizational efforts in 2004, and social networking presence in 2008. This does not exhaust the list. The point is that the online campaign has now evolved into an extensive, sophisticated, and integral part of electioneering.
Citizens themselves can now directly—and often rapidly—affect the course of a campaign, by posting videos that are subsequently viewed by large numbers of people online and sometimes covered by traditional news organizations. The same holds true in some cases with forwarded e-mails. Bloggers—often ordinary citizens—are now considered “journalists,” with access to the campaign, and whose posts can also affect the campaign. Finally, the Internet has had an effect on how citizens learn about, view, and interact with campaigns and candidates. The Internet campaign clearly has an effect on various aspects of political participation, including how citizens cast their votes.
This overview does not exhaust the ways in which the Internet is used by campaigns, organizations, and citizens, to cover, engage in, interact with, and so on, political campaigns. However, in spite of the fact that the foregoing are now all considered to be standard fare, in 2012 there were a number developments in the Internet campaign. This is inevitable, given the rapid rate of technological change and the ability of citizens, news organizations, candidates, parties, and interest groups to adapt to them. To name only one example, while social networking sites were widely used by campaigns and citizens alike in 2008, by 2012 Twitter, a newer form of social media, seemed to be the big story.
Accordingly, the eight articles in this symposium are devoted to various developments in the continued evolution of the Internet’s role in political campaigns. Five of the eight examine various aspects of social media, including how citizens connect and talk with each other in this new medium, how candidates use social networking sites, and the effect social networking has on various forms of political engagement. One article examines a newer form of the digital divide and the remaining two look at political campaigning and self-presentation strategies on the web.
I would like to extend a special thanks to Jonathan Morris of East Carolina University. I have worked with Jay for over a decade now, and to call him a valued colleague would in many ways diminish the relationship. He very willingly volunteered his help with a number of tasks associated with this project, and beyond that he was always willing to listen and offer his insight when asked. Thanks also to the Editor of SSCR, David Garson of North Carolina State University, who allowed me to proceed with this project. Finally, thanks to the contributors, whose fine scholarship and collegiality made putting this symposium together a pleasure.