Social Networks and political Actors: what political communication

CALL FOR PAPER, PARIS JUNE 17th AND 18th 2016 CONFERENCE IN
COMPARATIVE POLITICAL COMMUNICATION
On Friday, June 17th and Saturday, June 18th, 2016, the Institute for Communication Sciences of
the French National Research Center (ISCC, CNRS-Paris-Sorbonne-UPMC) organizes in Paris
an international conference with the help of the Center for Comparative Studies in Political and
Public Communication headed by Philippe J. Maarek on:
Social Networks and political Actors: what political communication today?
Scientific direction: Philippe J. Maarek, professor at Paris East – UPEC University, member of
ISCC
Scientific co-direction : Arnaud Mercier, professor at Paris 2 Panthéon-Assas Unviersity, member
of CARISM
The progressive integration of electronic social networks by political leaders and parties to their
repertoires requires scholars to revisit the traditional investigations of political communication.
The appropriation by the political sphere of digital technologies and the reconfiguration of
political behavior and habits to the Internet age have led to new research and renewed
questioning, with the idea of identifying the contours of a possible or potential "electronic
democracy".
The conference will particularly look into the specific use of electronic social networks like
Twitter, Facebook, etc., by institutional political forces (parties, leaders, elected officials ...). The
overall challenge is to understand what is changing because of the so-called "Web 2.0" apparatus.
Is it adopted by politician personnel as a plain additional tool among the range of what constitutes
the political Internet, or are we facing a new transformation of political communication, due to
the specificities of these new devices and to their mass appeal, particularly among the younger
audience?
We already know that these tools are powerful vehicles of social and political mobilization,
transforming the logic of "collective actions" to "connective actions" according to the useful
distinction advocated by Lance Bennett. Or how do staff and political institutions manage to
react, if not to put to use, these new vectors, which for the first time, stop their positional
monopoly of being the sole transmitters of political communication in the public sphere? This
has been obvious all over the world, from Occupy Wall Street to Los Indignados, via young
Chinese from Hong Kong, or the Iranians in 2009 and Tunisians or Egyptians two years later. A
kind of new militant ecosystem has developed, involving bloggers, citizens, aspirations for more
democracy, along the street protests that social networks and mobile telephony have often helped
coordinate and mobilize and against which staff and political institutions have been forced to
react, in order not to keep being on the run.
Are we therefore witnessing changes for staff and political institutions in their way of
communicating and acting on politics? Are these socio-technical devices already fully integrated,
digested by these actors, or still only being integrated? Are politicians exploiting all their
potential, which explains their massive success, or do they choose only certain aspects? What is
the role of these networks in the politicians’ communication? To what extent are these networks
now integrated into the campaign repertoire? How does political governance adjust to this
development? Do local political institutions manage to appropriate these networks that often
strengthen proximity? What changes do these networks induce on parliamentary work?
One of the many challenges that this conference intends to address is whether the participatory
and collaborative mythology associated with socio-technical features offered by social networks
is reflected in the facts: are political professionals borrowing these tools or not? If so, do they use
their potential or do they incorporate them minimally, as an additional communicational support,
without any intention to communicate collaboratively with citizens? Similarly, is the possibility
for the citizen of contacting politicians directly frequently put into use? Does it change the nature
of the relationship established by their candidates, their elected representatives, their activists,
with voters, citizens, sympathizers?
On the campaign level, the integration of these tools is both manifest and at the same time seems
incomplete. Some candidates still have no social network accounts, or hardly use them, and badly
at that. Amateurism sometimes seems to reign supreme. Is it because their usage is not quite
stabilized? Is it the nature of the tool itself to cause this lack of control? Or does the problem
come from the difficulty to articulate with the usual campaign techniques?
The same questions arise on the side of political institutions, including governments and local
institutions. Can social networks constitute an additional tool at their disposal, or is it already the
case? Are they integrated into public communications devices on a par with the other means?
Does the adoption of these devices form an opportunity for substantial transformation for these
institutions’ communication or for the elected politicians who run them?
Any or all of these major central interrogations will be on the floor of the debates during this
conference through different approaches. With the help of the Center for Comparative Studies in
Political and Public Communication, the CNRS Institute of Communication Sciences intends to
analyze this important part of the current evolution of political communication during the
conference on comparative political communication which will bring together researchers and
professionals from the field on June 17th and 18th 2016.
The conference will be bilingual French-English. Colleagues wishing to present a paper are
invited to send an application before March 15th to: [email protected]. Proposals should
include an abstract of 250-500 words (one or two pages) and short Vitae (one page).
SCIENTIFIC BOARD
The Scientific Board Members will be asked to do a « double blind review » of the paper
proposals.
Paul Baines, Cranfield University, Royaume-Uni
Donatella Campus, Università di Bologna, Italie
Maria-José Canel, Universidad Complutense Madrid, Espagne
Alexandre Coutant, UQAM, Montréal, Canada
Ann Crigler, University of Southern California, USA
David Deacon, University of Loughborough, Royaume-Uni
Alex Frame, université de Bourgogne, Dijon, France
Christina Holtz-Bacha, Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg, Germany
Darren Lilleker, Bournemouth University, RoyaumeUni
Philippe J. Maarek, Université Paris Est - UPEC, ISCC, France
Eric Maigret, Université Paris 3 Sorbonne Nouvelle, France
Anna Matušková, Charles University, Rép. Tchèque
Arnaud Mercier, Université Paris 2, France
Ralph Negrine, Sheffield University, Royaume-Uni
Lars Nord, Midwestern University, Suède
Nicolas Pelissier, Université de Nice-Sophia-Antipolis, France
Jordi Rodriguez Virgili, University of Navarra in Pamplona, Espagne
Brigitte Sebbah, Université Paris Est - UPEC, France
Jesper Strömbäck, Mid Sweden University, Suède.
Claes de Vreese, University of Amsterdam, Pays-Bas
Dominic Wring, University of Loughborough, Royaume-Uni
Dannagal Young, Delaware University, USA
The Organizing Committee of the Conference is composed of:
Philippe J. Maarek, ISCC / Ceccopop
Christophe Potier-Thomas, ISCC
Assisted by:
Marie-Laure Bonnet, ISCC
Marta Rebolledo de la Calle, Ceccopop
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