Introduction
Digital technology has been invaluable to the art of political communication since David Cameron and Barack Obama frustrated opposition with their use of social media advertisement. Since then, social media has become a primary vehicle of political movement. The most successful digital campaigns have managed to both demonise their opponents to their base whilst cultivating a ‘cult of personality’ around the figureheads.
Despite losing the 2017 political campaign in question, former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn made use of social media in an effort to mobilise a generation that had become disenfranchised with the political status-quo. With print media largely against him and most pundits expecting a domination by his Conservative rival Theresa May, Corbyn was able to speak to those active on social media and sell his brand of socialism that newspaper readers found so concerning, yet social media users largely found attractive.
Perhaps the poster-boy of effective digital communication in the political sphere, former-President Donald Trump also mobilised a group of social media users but via an entirely different brand. Painting himself as anti-establishment, hated by the “Lamestream Media” (@realDonaldTrump, Trump Twitter Archive V2, n.d.)and writing to entertain, Trump’s digital communication arguably did more for his eternal place in the vocabulary of teenagers and young adults today than anything else in his time involved in politics. The unique, comedic style of Trump’s Twitter in particular made him easily parodiable yet easily understood by potential voters. This allowed him to communicate attacks against his opponents and detractors whilst maintaining a larger-than-life veneer. Trump’s adoption of memes and alt-right dog whistles also provided an avenue to play stupid yet expand his audience to the fringes of the political sphere. He managed to let those in denial of the implications view Trump as in-touch with internet culture whilst he gave a knowing-wink to the extremes who had also adopted such symbols and memes.
Despite being quite different in practice, both Corbyn and Trump recognised the value in communicating to their respective audiences outsides of the bounds of traditional mainstream avenues, finding their audiences to be more receptive to digital campaigns. Set up to lose badly by the establishment, both candidates defied the odds in-part by using digital technology to aid their campaigns, access their audiences and effectively transmitting their messages.
Jeremy Corbyn and the 2017 Labour Party: Positive Politics, Social Media and Momentum
As a self-described socialist (Settle, 2015), Jeremy Corbyn realised few friends in the traditional media. A report by the London School of Economics found that 57% of the articles they studied were critical or antagonistic towards Corbyn, with 67% of opinion pieces also being critical or antagonistic (Bart Cammaerts, 2016). Despite being from before the election itself, this gives an accurate insight into the media’s treatment of Corbyn and his politics as Labour leader. As a result, Labour turned to social media to engage with their potential voting base.
Twitter, as a social media platform built for discussion and debate, often rises to the forefront when discussing politics in relation to social media. Indeed, Labour’s use of Twitter was astute.
In a case study published by Twitter themselves, they make note of how Labour used the First View advertising feature. By making sure Labour was the first thing seen by their base when opening the app or website, they were able to communicate specific messages. On polling day, this allowed Labour to push their digitally engaged base to vote. Tom Lavelle, Labour’s head of digital campaigns, cited the usefulness of First View in its ability to “reach everyone in the UK” (Twitter, n.d.). The impact of this campaign went further than mobilising those already swayed by Labour, however. Labour’s insistence on getting young people voting showed a perceived care for the young and dispossessed, something that the Conservative party lacked. By presenting themselves as caring about this group, Labour engendered favourability within these groups and if they were to vote, the idea would be that they might vote Labour (Nassour, 2017).
Labour’s dominance in the Twitter-sphere extended far beyond the day of the election. The entire discourse in the build-up to the 2017 General Election was dominated by Labour. A University of Edinburgh analysis shows that Labour’s hashtag coverage outperformed Conservative hashtag coverage “by almost three times”. The study does acknowledge that hashtags do not indicate support, but at the very least are indicative of engagement and spread in those issues (Laura Cram, 2017). An advanced Twitter search analysing the posts from Labour involved accounts such as Jeremy Corbyn, UK Labour or Momentum during election time yields an immense emphasis on video content. These clips include traditional political advertisements such as convincing swing voters to vote Labour or manifesto promises. They also include clips from interviews and news shows outlining Conservative failures and ways that Labour aims to course correct (@jeremycorbyn, 2017).
Finally, a big way in which Labour advertised is short-form endorsements from real people. These could be celebrity indorsements which would help to mobilise that celebrity’s base. Many of these were grime artists, a music genre which largely turned out for Corbyn with names such as Stormzy, AJ Tracey and JME backing him loudly to their largely adolescent fanbase (Duggins, 2017). However, they could also have been regular people who have been negatively impacted by Conservative policy (@jeremycorbyn, 2017). This, like the ‘go out and vote’ message, presented Labour as caring for the groups affected and might mobilise other members of the same or similar groups to vote Labour. It also evokes a sense of empathy and injustice towards the status quo, an emotion which pushes towards the radical change which Corbyn’s Labour represented.
A focus primarily on “mobile first” platforms allowed Labour another avenue to the youth. Facebook is a platform that is a website first and an app second. It is also a platform that most of the younger generations neglect, instead opting for app-based social media services like Instagram or Snapchat. Thus, Labour’s use of videos and images, which those platforms hinge upon, was effectively received by the youth. Corbyn’s embracing of Snapchat upon becoming Labour leader showed a clear willingness to engage with young people in their own digital homes. By already establishing a base on this platform upon becoming leader, Corbyn ensured that by election time he was able to communicate to a base familiar, perhaps even sympathetic to him and his policies (Margetts, 2017).
This is not to say that Labour’s Facebook strategies were absent or ineffective. In the 2019 Labour Party Digital Campaigning Guide, Twitter is referred to as “less effective than Facebook as a channel for persuading undecided voters”. Labour sees it more as a place to acknowledge those that already sympathise with Labour’s cause, to share updates and campaign policies (The Labour Party, 2019). Despite being a guide from the election two years on, this does still provide insight into Labour’s view of the differences between social media platforms and how best to tackle individual audiences differently. Facebook, then, is seen as the place to engage with the undecided. Labour’s Facebook strategy revolved largely around making sure that the traditional media’s bias was circumvented. Much of this came in the way of battling misrepresentation. They provided videos of Corbyn speaking without having his words distorted by media write-ups. They also made sure that their policies were outlined clearly in videos that explained them in their own terms, rather than the critical tone that the British press might use (Bell, n.d).
One large part of Corbyn’s political campaign was a focus on positive politics. This is to say that rather than an overwhelming focus on the Conservatives and their failings, Labour would lead with solutions and ideas of hope (Paolo Gerbaudo, 2019). Social media, whilst often cynically portrayed as a breeding ground of negativity, may have been the perfect place for this messaging. Targeting young people, who are typically more hopeful in their political ideals, allows Labour’s positive messaging to strike a chord versus the Conservative’s more negative campaigns. Facebook and Twitter may be places more attuned to negativity, discourse, and heated political debate. On the other hand, Instagram is a platform that on the surface encourages positivity and uplifting content above all else (Margetts, 2017). In this, Labour’s messaging harmoniously fit these platforms in ways that the Conservatives’ failed to.
It is hard to discuss the digital strategies of Corbyn’s Labour without mentioning his support network: Momentum. As a “grassroots movement supportive of the Labour Party” (Wikipedia, n.d.), Momentum was able to work in ways which may be slightly too cynical for Labour’s positive, policy focused and down-to-earth strategies. One such example of this is the famous “Dad, Do You Hate Me” video which viciously attacked Tory voters, accusing them of ruining the world for their children. This video gained traction and has 1.1 million views on Twitter alone as of writing. Whilst at a dissonance with Labour’s official campaign style Momentum, working outside of this structure, was able to hit the politically engaged users with harsh satire that proved effective in sparking debate and shares. The video ends with a call to vote and was posted to Twitter with emojis, links and a “(wait for it)” format as if sharing a simple funny video and not a political advert (@PeoplesMomentum, 2017). This all goes to further exemplify Momentum’s aptitude for engaging the youth as “young people are at the heart of Momentum” (Pickard, 2017).
Donald Trump vs Hillary Clinton: “Lamestream Media”, Twitter and Alt-Right Memes
Former US President Donald Trump campaigned to become US President unlike anybody before him. Declaring himself an enemy of the mainstream media, Trump fought a one-man campaign on his personal Twitter and captured global attention. A simple search of Trump’s Tweets containing the word “media” in 2016 shows adjectives such as “dishonest”, “bias” “distorted” and “corrupt” (@realDonaldTrump, 2016). Indeed, Trump’s first line of offence seems to have been to distance himself from the mainstream coverage. As a non-politician he could effectively play the role of an outsider, a man of the people who has the power to step in and sort things out once and for all.
To his credit, the media did take an immediate dislike to his brash ways of communication which refused to fit into the established symbiotic relationship between politician and media outlet. A study by Ballotpedia found that the majority of Trump’s media coverage had been negative in tone. This seemed to be almost advantageous to Trump however, who adopted a view that he had “gotten so much free advertising” from the cable news networks (Coyle, 2015). Trump also took to denying certain news outlets access to his campaign events (Tom Kludt, 2016), an act which played harmoniously into his primary form of communication: Twitter.
Having handily made the media circus his enemy, Trump was then able to direct all those wanting to hear his thoughts to his Twitter account on which he was constantly active. Trump’s tweets were then reported on en-masse by the media, with much of the coverage being outrage at his new insult of the week. Trump utilised his skills developed as a reality-television star in his political career, making his brand of politics entertaining from one standpoint or another. For the groups within America sick of the perceived liberal, politically correct agenda, they had a candidate who spoke plainly in line with them. For those staunchly opposed to Trump’s politics there was an almost car crash-esque effect that kept people watching to see what he had said now. And for those without a strong leaning, Trump’s tweets were often genuinely entertaining to watch without stakes in the game. Even the negative and undecided eyes upon Trump were able to be converted into attention and thus relevance within the political sphere.
In fact, Trump’s style of communication was, either coincidentally or cunningly, perfectly crafted to fit Twitter. As a platform with only a certain number of characters per tweet, Trump’s colloquial language made him the perfect Twitter communicator compared to the more complex tweets of typical politicians. His use of capital letters, exclamations, and simple monosyllables such as “sad” “good” and “bad” made his tweets that much more accessible to the everyman that Trump aimed to appeal to (Ott, 2016). Twitter’s textbox opens with the line “What’s happening?” (Twitter, n.d.), promoting a sense of impulsivity that Trump’s Twitter game builds upon, sending out provocative questions such as “Mainstream media never covered Hillary’s massive ‘hacking’ or coughing attack, yet it is #1 trending. What’s up?” (@realDonaldTrump, Trump Twitter Archive V2, 2016). These tweets spark impulsive replies and draw yet more attention to his account (Ott, 2016). Trump never engaged with these replies outside of retweeting his supporters, instead simply allowing them to signal boost his initial point.
When former Prime Minister Harold Macmillan was asked about any potential challenges in his tenureship, he simply responded “Events, dear boy, events” (Cooke, 2011). Contrary to Macmillan’s experience, however, Trump managed to turn events into an effortless way to attract the world’s eyes. Twitter allowed Trump to respond to events instantaneously without need for the usually appropriate media sit downs. During and following the first presidential debate Trump’s Twitter account was incredibly active, tweeting out polling claims, news promoting his success in the debate and more insults to Hillary Clinton, who he claimed “failed all over the world” (@realDonaldTrump, Trump Twitter Archive V2, 2016). Getting on top of these events immediately made Trump’s own Twitter account the first place to look for his responses and takeaways.
Trump’s use and understanding of digital technology also had deep ties to the alt-right. In October of 2015 Trump shared an image of himself drawn as the cartoon character Pepe the Frog on his Twitter page. This character was known to have been used by the alt-right and was presumably made as a gloating celebration of Trump and his politics from said political movement (Laura Glitsos, 2020). By banding behind such an absurdist character, the alt-right have a built-in defence to social commentators attempting to point out the significance of posting the character in political contexts. It is, after all, a comical frog drawing. It is not inherently threatening but rather absurd.
However, behind this is an understanding that the absurdity is a shield from which to protect the existence of their politics upon a platform. Trump likely understood this and so by retweeting such a symbol, gave a nod to the alt-right. Those with alt-right or white nationalist leanings would understand this dog whistle for what it is and rally behind Trump even harder, knowing that he covertly embraces their politics (Laura Glitsos, 2020). Those that do not understand will simply see Trump’s embracing of Pepe as another odd, somewhat laughable tweet. Those that understand and are upset by this will inevitably fall into the trappings of being offended at what is, on a surface level, just a cartoon frog. Pepe and Trump’s usage of it makes the parts of his opposition that are aware of the dog whistle look ridiculous, hysterical and censorship mad. At the same time, he is able to signal to the fringes of his political base that he recognises and supports their views, bringing the alt-right and the political power that they possess into his fold in one fell swoop. He would build upon this during his tenure as President with mentions of “very fine people on both sides” of the Unite The Right Rally in which the phrase “Jews will not replace us!” was chanted (Holan, 2019).
Comparisons and Success
The key difference between Corbyn and Trump’s uses of digital technology is the intent. Labour’s 2017 campaign put a decided emphasis on positive politics. His digital campaigns aimed to focus on Labour’s own policies, meant to inspire hope and a way out of the reality of Britain under the Conservatives. Celebrity endorsements, interviews with working people and positive policy support were the lynchpins of Labour’s digital campaign. Their choice to work within platforms such as Instagram and Snapchat further cemented this. Momentum did some of Labour’s necessary dirty work, working sometimes in attacks and satire, but this approach was certainly not the core structure of Labour’s campaign.
Donald Trump’s Presidential bid, however, focused largely on extreme negativity. Portraying himself as the anti-establishment everyman, he channelled the anger of the general populace towards the traditional structures of politics. His digital strategy involved catchy and insulting nicknames for his opposition, notably “crooked” Hillary Clinton (@realDonaldTrump, Trump Twitter Archive V2, n.d.). Trump’s use of Twitter provided him the perfect farm for the negativity which he so effectively directed into attention for himself. Taking advantage of Twitter, Trump would be able to publish deliberately provocative statements in hopes of sparking conversation in his replies, which would then make his tweet appear on the feed of those replying, inadvertently promoting the original tweet.
Trump also allowed and embraced the media’s negative view of him, using them as regular targets for his tweets. He understood his tweets would be featured and linked in television or online reports.
The other key difference is Corbyn’s willingness to work within the traditional system. Whilst his campaign spoke of change and was extreme for the standards of British politics, it also played by the rules of the established political system. There was not much grey area in which Corbyn operated, instead using his digital technology to share traditional political advertisements.
Trump, on the other hand, used his digital technology to bolster his rejection of the political system. His tweets flew in the face of the established order and his online winks and nods towards the alt-right danced closer to open extremism than his peers had dared. He was willing to engage with groups that had been considered political suicide to ally with prior, and yet managed to win the election.
I ultimately believe that this decisive point is how Trump used his digital technology to win whilst Corbyn failed to do so. Corbyn was a man only willing to do so much and although using a new political weapon at his disposal, he refused to go as far as Trump with it. Trump’s total willingness to do what it takes to win at the cost of the stability of the nation helped him to use the technology at his disposal in far more cynical ways than Corbyn’s by-the-books political advertising.
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