Social Media – A Vehicle for Personalisation in Politics? Political communication before the 2017 parliamentary elections in Iceland

• Main Authors: Birgir Guðmundsson, Baldur Sverrisson
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: The University of Akureyri 2019
• Subjects: Elections; Iceland; Personalization; Politics; scipo; hist
• Online Access: https://doaj.org/article/dea5aef2d5aa438fa7b14b1a0fd90278

This paper focuses on political communication prior to the 2017 parliamentary elections in Iceland. By means of content analysis and interviews with party officials the extent of central party control and the extent to which social media are a vehicle for personalisation are explored. The findings suggest a relatively low level of central party control and that social media, in particular Facebook is indeed a vehicle for personalisation. The analysis furthermore shows a difference in the social media use of plain candidates and party leaders, parties, and regions/constituencies. Finally, Facebook is more of a tool for personalization while Twitter is a more political platform.