Politics in Digital Society
Politics in Digital Society Ph.D. thesis by Troels Runge IT University at Copenhagen Submitted May 17, 2021 i Examination Committee Bente Kalsnes, Associate Professor, School of Communication, Leadership and Management, Kristiania University College, Norway Ulrike Klinger, Junior Professor, Institute for Media and Communication Studies, Freie University, Berlin, Germany. Gitte Stald, Associate Professor, IT University of Copenhagen, Head of Committee. Supervisors Lisbeth Klastrup, Associate Professor, IT University of Copenhagen. Luca Rossi, Associate Professor, IT University of Copenhagen. ii English Summary This thesis departs from the fact, that the use of social media platforms has become a precondition for politicians and parties, where social media have been presented as new opportunities to reach and engage voters, bypassing mass media, and levelling the political playing field. Now, however, politicians and parties face the limitations and control of platforms, and must submit to new forms of media logic, increased mediatization of politics. To comprehend this transformative shift, we must understand that digital and social media permeate all aspects of society, that we now live in a digital society. Sociologist Deborah Lupton have noted that “... the very idea of ‘culture’ or ‘society’ cannot now be fully understood without the recognition that computer software and hardware devices not only underpin but actively constitute selfhood, embodiment, social life, social relations and social institutions” (Lupton, 2014). This is certainly true in politics too. This thesis is contextualized within the formal arena of national politics in Denmark, including the Danish media system and the specificity of Danish political culture. Throughout the thesis, I focus on how social media platforms are used by Danish politicians, as an illustration of how the transformative power of platforms impacts formal politics, i.e., how politics is exercised and performed by politicians and political parties in election campaigns as well as in agenda-setting in everyday politics.
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