Business as usual?

1. Constituency level Web campaigns in the 2010 UK General Election Business as usual? Benjamin Lee Institute for social change benjamin.lee@postgrad.manchester.ac.uk

2. My thesis: Is a study of the adoption, implementation and organisational implications of Web usage at the local level in the 2010 UK general election This presentation: Focuses on the first two chapters of my thesis dealing with the adoption of web campaign tools and how they are used introduction

3. Political parties • Declining membership (Katz & Mair, Mass & Bizen) • Catch All/Electoral Professional parties (Kircheimer, Panebianco) • The end of linkage? • Campaigns • The arrival of political marketing • Professionalization and modernisation (Green & Smith, Gibson & Rommele, Norris) • Why get involved? Theoretical background – Problems

4. Can technology offer a solution? • Internet and Democracy: Rheingold, Negroponte, Toffler, Castells • Party organisational change • The Cyber-party (Margetts) • The Network Party (Heidar & Saglie) • Organisational hybridity (Chadwick) • What about campaigns? Theoretical background - Solutions

5. We are living in a post-Obama environment, 2008 a perceived watershed • Emergence of Web 2.0 • Highly interactive, based on the ‘architecture of participation’ • In the UK 2010 campaign most often represented by Facebook and Twitter • Easy/free to use • So are we moving towards more connected campaigns in the UK? Campaigns in the web 2.0 era

6. Three things we need to know about the use of Web 2.0 • Are campaigns using it? TOOLS • If so how are they using it? BEHAVIOUR • What kind of campaign organisation is it supporting? ORGANISATION • Today I am focussing on questions one and two Research questions

7. Campaigns unlikely to be uniform, need a framework to distinguish between them Need a socially determined reason to adopt online campaign techniques, reject a purely technologically determinist stand point Adopted Fisher and Denver (2009) indices, sees campaigns as being traditional and modernised to various degrees Analytical framework

8. A heuristic device • Traditional campaigns • Emphasise techniques such as doorstep canvas and distribution of leaflets • Rely on building local networks of supporters, face-to-face or retail politics • Do not have access to political marketing tools, likely to be low priority receive little scrutiny • Modernised campaigns • Emphasise techniques such as direct mail and telephone canvassing • Rely on marketing techniques to deliver votes • With access to money and advanced techniques comes greater scrutiny • NOT mutually exclusive Traditional and modern campaigns

9. H1 traditional campaigns are likely to make more use of social media and be more interactive H2 modernised campaigns are likely to make less use of social media and be less interactive H3 combined campaigns are likely to make less use of social media and be less interactive H4 low activity campaigns are less likely to make use of web campaign techniques overall hypotheses

10. Party affiliation • Different parties have different propensity to campaign online • Campaign status • Incumbent candidates, marginal candidates • The digital divide in constituencies • Some constituencies less likely to be online • The digital divide in candidates • Some candidates less likely to be online Alternate explanations

11. Want to know the extent to which campaigns adopted online tools Data comes from 2010 Electoral Agent Survey 1079 cases across England, Scotland and Wales Established survey, basis for original measures of traditional and modern, although these could not be replicated Good for measures of campaigning, but less so for candidate specific measures Web campaign tools

12. Web campaign tools

13. Web campaign tools Reference category: No Web Pseudo R2 0.0521 Log likelihood -1026.3932 * p<.1 **p<.05 ***p<.01

14. Conventional • Traditional and modern indices remain significant • All parties less likely to engage in conventional campaigns than Conservatives • % pop no qualifications negative effect • Social (small n) • Traditional campaign index positive effect • Hybrid • Both traditional and modern indices positive effects • Nationalists less likely to engage in hybrid only campaigns than Con, others no effect • % pop no qualifications negative effect • Younger and female candidates also more likely to adopt hybrid (CCS model) Web campaign tools

15. So it seems like that the kind of campaign activity engaged in has little impact on the kind of online campaign tools adopted But what about the adoption of online campaign behaviours? Data comes from content analysis of campaign websites in the NW of England during 2010 campaign Addresses three kinds of interactive behaviours public dialogue, potential dialogue and site-based interactivity Web campaign behaviours

16. Content analysis schema

17. Public dialogue behaviours

18. Potential dialogue behaviours

19. Site-based interactivity behaviours

20. But • Not easy to analyse these measures individually • Lack of variation in the sample • To get around this I created an aggregate measure of interactivity • Based on regression scores from Principal Components Analysis Web campaign behaviours

21. Web campaign behaviours * p<.1 **p<.05 ***p<.01

22. BUT • When other contextual variables are added in the significance of this disappears • Only significant result in the wider model concerns incumbent candidates (much less interactive) except where they are in marginal seats (more interactive) • Different approach to analysis and incorporate candidate level data Web campaign behaviours

23. Good reason to think that interactivity isn’t driven by the external factors represented here • Anecdotal evidence shows candidates often struggle to justify why they went online • Online campaigns often seem driven by circumstantial factors e.g. an affinity for tech • ‘I don’t like technology for technologies sake, but I do like what it can do and I enjoy working with technology, just because it’s a fun way of communicating with people.’ • Candidate for campaign E, traditional/hybrid/interactive • Surveys do not cover this level of detail Interview data

24. Are campaigns using Web 2.0? • Yes, very much so • 50% of campaigns report using both social media and conventional websites • Use is driven equally by traditional and modern campaign techniques – intensity • Use also driven by age, gender, party affiliation and incumbency • However – large amounts of variation remain unexplained Conclusions – Web campaign tools

25. How are Web 2.0 tools being used? • Public dialogue very rare • Admittedly a high threshold for interactivity • Potential dialogue far more common but harder to measure • Site-based interactivity also common, campaigns able to bring a level of sophistication to sites beyond brochure-ware • Haven’t been able to analyse the drivers yet but interview data suggests that these may be attitudinal/difficult to measure Conclusions – Web campaign behaviours

26. H1 traditional campaigns are likely to make more use of social media and be more interactive NOT SUPPORTED H2 modernised campaigns are likely to make less use of social media and be less interactive NOT SUPPORTED H3 combined campaigns are likely to make less use of social media and be less interactive NOT SUPPORTED H4 low activity campaigns are less likely to make use of web campaign techniques over all SUPPORTED hypotheses

27. Final question remains, what kind of campaign organisation is Web 2.0 supporting? Networked party models v Managed citizens Framing analysis based on CCS data e.g. attitudes towards democracy or party organisation and adoption of Web 2.0 tools Largely going to be based on interview data Already uncovered some interesting case studies Next steps - organisation

28. Any questions? Feedback welcome The end