COPYRIGHT AND CITATION CONSIDERATIONS FOR THIS THESIS/ DISSERTATION o Attribution — You must give appropriate credit, provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made. You may do so in any reasonable manner, but not in any way that suggests the licensor endorses you or your use. o NonCommercial — You may not use the material for commercial purposes. o ShareAlike — If you remix, transform, or build upon the material, you must distribute your contributions under the same license as the original. How to cite this thesis Surname, Initial(s). (2012). Title of the thesis or dissertation (Doctoral Thesis / Master’s Dissertation). Johannesburg: University of Johannesburg. Available from: http://hdl.handle.net/102000/0002 (Accessed: 22 August 2017). Political Parties and Organisational Reputation: Analysing Discourse on Twitter about Scandals Relating to the Democratic Alliance (DA) by Elzanne Amao 217090626 Submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree Coursework Masters in Strategic Communication in the Department of Strategic Communication of the Faculty of Humanities at the University of Johannesburg supervised by Dr Elizabeth Lubinga January 2019 ii Acknowledgements It is with great humility, having completed this mini-dissertation with the support of many that I wish to express thanks to the people below in helping me accomplish this milestone. First, I wish to thank God for enabling me to persevere, for His blessings over my life and for carrying me through this time where life, work and studies collided. To my supervisor, Dr Elizabeth Lubinga, I wish to extend my thanks for your guidance and advice. I especially wish to thank you for improving my technical ability through your sound academic experience. Elaine Ainsworth, my fellow student, who walked this journey with me. Through many coffee dates and endless WhatsApp conversations you were my sounding board and often encouraged me. You taught me so much about the academic process and for this, I am truly grateful. My brother, Werner, thank you so much for reading my dissertation with so much attention. I know it must have been very boring for you considering your field, but your input was so helpful and I appreciate that. My mom, Alta, without your constant sacrifices I would have never been able to start studying – talk less of achieving my Master’s Degree! I owe so much to you. You have raised us selflessly and with so much love. I am very blessed to have you. Finally, my husband Deji. It’s your fault I started this and it’s because of you I could finish. Thank you for your understanding, your encouragement, for brainstorming with me, for listening, for all the meals you cooked, for your prayers over me and your endless love. I am grateful for you and promise to be there with you every step of the way when you pursue future studies. iii Abstract The increased use of social network sites, such as Twitter, has led to a shift in power dynamics between political organisations as newsmakers and citizens as consumers of news. With so many stakeholders active online, watching and engaging with matters concerning citizens, political figures and their affiliated political organisations have fallen victim to the fast-moving spread of information when saying/doing/posting material that is perceived to be politically incorrect or not in the best interests of the public (Ott, 2016:61). The aim of this research was to examine how public discourse on Twitter amongst stakeholders influences the reputation of the Democratic Alliance following two political scandals within the party. Strategic communication was used as the paradigmatic approach to the research using stakeholder theory, as the research concerned itself with the online discourse amongst citizens who are primary stakeholders in the political organisation. Consideration was given to the concepts of online discourse, co-creation, agenda-building, citizen participation, conversational valence and organisational reputation in order to contextualise political scandals within the online space. The qualitative research methodology employed was a netnographic study to review online discourse amongst Twitter users engaging in salient conversations relating to the scandals. The data was analysed using manual coding. The study revealed that public online discourse amongst stakeholders on Twitter can negatively impact the reputation of political organisations during times of political scandals. Based on the public’s perception of the politician, the discourse relating to the scandal can either hurt the politician’s reputation and brand (as was the case with Zille) or it can lead to an increase support of the politician (as was the case with De Lille), which in turn, harmed the DA. Keywords: reputation, online discourse, co-creation, agenda-building, citizen participation, conversational valence iv List of Abbreviations ANC African National Congress DA Democratic Alliance EFF Economic Freedom Fighters ID Independent Democrats PAC Pan Africanist Congress of Azania v Table of Contents Page number INTRODUCTION ........................................................................................... 1 1.1. Background and Introduction .............................................................................. 1 1.2. Political Scandals Relating to the Democratic Alliance ..................................... 3 1.2.1. Helen Zille’s Tweets about Colonial Legacies ............................................ 3 1.2.2. Patricia de Lille’s Public Conflict with the DA .............................................. 6 1.3. Problem Statement ............................................................................................... 9 1.4. Research Aim ........................................................................................................ 9 1.5. Research Questions ............................................................................................. 9 1.5.1. Main Research Question ............................................................................ 9 1.5.2. Sub-Research Questions ......................................................................... 10 1.6. Research Objectives ........................................................................................... 10 1.6.1. Main Research Objective ......................................................................... 10 1.6.2. Sub-research Objectives .......................................................................... 10 1.7. Theoretical Perspective of the Study ................................................................ 10 1.8. Definitions of Key Constructs and Theoretical Assumptions ......................... 11 1.8.1. Online Discourse ...................................................................................... 11 1.8.2. Co-creation ............................................................................................... 11 1.8.3. Agenda-building........................................................................................ 12 1.8.4. Citizen Participation .................................................................................. 12 1.8.5. Conversational Valence ............................................................................ 12 1.8.6. Organisational Reputation ........................................................................ 13 1.9. Relation between Research Questions and Constructs .................................. 14 1.10. Research Methodology ....................................................................................... 15 1.11. Ethical Considerations ....................................................................................... 15 1.12. Structure of Study ............................................................................................... 15 LITERATURE REVIEW AND THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK .................. 17 2.1. Introduction ......................................................................................................... 17 2.2. Strategic Communication: A Conceptual and Theoretical Overview ............. 18 2.2.1. An Emerging Paradigm Empowered by Technology ................................ 18 2.2.2. A Stakeholder-centric Approach ............................................................... 20 2.3. Discourse in the Digital Age ............................................................................... 22 2.3.1. Political Communication in the Digital Age ............................................... 23 2.3.2. Influential Opinions through Public Engagement ...................................... 24 2.3.3. Stakeholders and Organisations Shaping Meaning .................................. 25 2.3.4. Shaping a Nation through Public Participation ......................................... 26 2.3.5. Conversational Valence of Online Discourse ........................................... 29 2.4. Organisational Reputation ................................................................................. 31 2.4.1. Reputation: Reflecting the Stature of the Brand ....................................... 31 vi 2.4.2. Bi-Directional Online and Offline Communication ..................................... 33 2.5. Summary .............................................................................................................. 34 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY ................................................................... 35 3.1. Introduction ........................................................................................................