Presentation for DEL Colloque 'Online Political Participations and Its Critics', Paris, June 2013.

1. Twitter and Australian
political debates
Tim Highfield
ARC Centre of Excellence for Creative Industries and Innovation
Queensland University of Technology
Brisbane, Australia
t.highfield @ qut.edu.au
@timhighfield
http://mappingonlinepublics.net/ | http://timhighfield.net/

2. POLITICAL DEBATE ONLINE
• The potential for online platforms (individually and
collectively) to reshape and/or revitalise political debate
is a long-standing question
• An evolving continuum of online political discussions,
developed through blogs, citizen journalism projects,
social media
• Platforms not used in isolation; people discussing politics
online tweet about it, blog, share links, comment on
statuses…

3. TWITTER AND POLITICAL DEBATE
• While not used in isolation, Twitter is a particularly
noteworthy platform for political discussion online:
– Public medium (mostly)
– Brevity of messages
– Associated features: retweets, hashtags, @mentions
• Adoption of Twitter as a popular and primary medium for
live commentary accompanying (media) events,
breaking news, activism (and combinations of these
approaches, taking place in same space).

4. POLITICAL DISCUSSION ON TWITTER
• Potential for political debate to involve wider population
than just journalists and politicians?
• New gatekeepers?
• Follow and respond directly to people creating news/shaping
politics
• To what extent, though, are these different participants in
political discussions interacting – or even contributing to
the same conversations?

5. METHODS
• Comparative analysis of three
Australian political hashtags; data
collected between January and
December 2012
– #auspol – Federal
– #qldpol – Queensland
– #wapol – Western Australia
• Methods
– yourTwapperkeeper captures
tweets with specified hashtags from
Twitter API
– Gawk scripts for processing large
datasets (Bruns & Burgess, 2011),
Gephi for network visualisation

6. AUSTRALIAN POLITICS
• Federal politics: currently led by centre-left Australian
Labor Party (ALP), Prime Minister Julia Gillard; next
election due in September 2013, expected to be won by
centre-right (conservative) Liberal/National coalition, led
by Tony Abbott. Voting is compulsory (93% turnout in
2010).
• State politics:
– Six states, all bicameral systems except Queensland
(unicameral)
– Start of 2012: three states ALP in power, three Liberal.
(Liberal-National Party took power in Queensland in March
2012).

7. AUSTRALIAN POLITICS AND TWITTER
• Twitter more widely taken up – by politicians and general
public – than previous technologies such as blogging.
• Accounts established for sitting politicians
– At Federal level, 146 of 226 members of Lower and Upper
Houses present on Twitter (July 2012)
• Hashtags for different political events/broadcasts:
– #ausvotes, #ausdecides, #qldvotes – election campaigns
– #qt, #waqt – Parliamentary Question Time
– #qanda, #insiders – Q & A, Insiders political panel shows

8. #AUSPOL
• Popularised around 2010 Federal election (alongside election-
specific hashtags such as #ausvotes) as overarching label for
Australian political topics
• Endured post-election; however, rather than a space for
political debate, seen as increasingly polarised and
frequented by trolls:
Viewing and participating in 'discussions' on the Twitter stream of
#auspol is to immerse yourself in a political cesspit. It is the dark
alley in Twitter you walk down when you wonder if you have told
anyone where you were going that night.
(Jericho, 2012)
• State-based hashtags less afflicted by this development (in
general)?

9. #AUSPOL
– 1,002,451 tweets (15/01-04/07), 50,622 users
– 19.8 tweets per user, 5,828 tweets per day
0
2000
4000
6000
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12000
14000
2012-Jan-15
2012-Jan-19
2012-Jan-23
2012-Jan-27
2012-Jan-31
2012-Feb-04
2012-Feb-08
2012-Feb-12
2012-Feb-16
2012-Feb-20
2012-Feb-24
2012-Feb-28
2012-Mar-03
2012-Mar-07
2012-Mar-11
2012-Mar-15
2012-Mar-19
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2012-Mar-27
2012-Mar-31
2012-Apr-04
2012-Apr-08
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2012-May-02
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2012-Jun-03
2012-Jun-07
2012-Jun-11
2012-Jun-15
2012-Jun-19
2012-Jun-23
2012-Jun-27
2012-Jul-01Carbontax
Asylumseekerdebate
ALPleadershipspill
Budget
CraigThomson
CraigThomson

10. #QLDPOL
– 49,300 tweets (15/01-04/07), 5,668 users
– 8.7 tweets per user, 286.6 tweets per day
State election Civil partnerships bill amended
0
200
400
600
800
1000
1200
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2012-Jan-15
2012-Jan-19
2012-Jan-23
2012-Jan-27
2012-Jan-31
2012-Feb-04
2012-Feb-08
2012-Feb-12
2012-Feb-16
2012-Feb-20
2012-Feb-24
2012-Feb-28
2012-Mar-03
2012-Mar-07
2012-Mar-11
2012-Mar-15
2012-Mar-19
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2012-Mar-27
2012-Mar-31
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2012-May-02
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2012-May-14
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2012-May-26
2012-May-30
2012-Jun-03
2012-Jun-07
2012-Jun-11
2012-Jun-15
2012-Jun-19
2012-Jun-23
2012-Jun-27
2012-Jul-01
Tweets
Date

11. #WAPOL
– 21,261 tweets (15/01-26/12), 2,855 users
– 7.4 tweets per user, 61 tweets per day
Opposition leadership change
Treasurer resigns
Cabinet reshuffle
Budget
0
50
100
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2012/01/15
2012/01/22
2012/01/29
2012/02/05
2012/02/12
2012/02/19
2012/02/26
2012/03/04
2012/03/11
2012/03/18
2012/03/25
2012/04/01
2012/04/08
2012/04/15
2012/04/22
2012/04/29
2012/05/06
2012/05/13
2012/05/20
2012/05/27
2012/06/03
2012/06/10
2012/06/17
2012/06/24
2012/07/01
2012/07/08
2012/07/15
2012/07/22
2012/07/29
2012/08/05
2012/08/12
2012/08/19
2012/08/26
2012/09/02
2012/09/09
2012/09/16
2012/09/23
2012/09/30
2012/10/07
2012/10/14
2012/10/21
2012/10/28
2012/11/04
2012/11/11
2012/11/18
2012/11/25
2012/12/02
2012/12/09
2012/12/16
2012/12/23
Tweets
Date
Pre-election

12. WHO IS TWEETING?
– Highly active group of users within #auspol hashtag:
• Top 1% users contribute 64% of tweets
• 6 users responsible for 87,696 tweets
0
200000
400000
600000
800000
1000000
1200000
all 50662 users users > 0% (>= 0
tweets; 45514 of
50662 users)
users > 90% (>= 14
tweets; 4639 of 50662
users)
users > 99% (>= 297
tweets; 510 of 50662
users)
Sum of original tweets
Sum of genuine @replies
Sum of retweets

13. WHO IS TWEETING? #AUSPOL
– Highly active group of users within #auspol hashtag:
• These especially active users not elected parliamentarians or
journalists
• Instead, politically engaged citizens (or automated accounts)
– Fit Coleman’s (2006) description of “political junkies”,
who treat political issues as major topics of interest and
actively seek out relevant news and opinion pieces?
– MPs, journalists, media organisations mentioned often in
tweets
• However, these accounts (especially politicians) do not
contribute many tweets to the #auspol discussion

14. WHO IS TWEETING? #QLDPOL
– Tweeting patterns also show a core group of users
contributing the majority of hashtagged tweets
• Some overlap with the prominent #auspol users.
– The users that are most mentioned are a mixture of these
frequent contributors and key state political actors, who do
not necessarily participate in these discussions
themselves.
• Limits to this analysis due to election in first half of 2012; user
names, and affiliations, changed (including
@TheQldPremier)
• Further analysis required to establish on-going patterns
beyond the election context.

15. WHO IS TWEETING? #WAPOL
– A lower level of activity, but greater representation
amongst most mentioned and also most active accounts
by journalists and politicians
• A more even spread of – and comparable contributions from
– citizens (including the “political junkies”), journalists, and
politicians alike.
– Changing patterns towards end of year as election
campaigns are readied
• Party strategies regarding social media have some impact on
the developing shape of tweeted political debates

16. WHO IS TWEETING?
– Politicians in particular often mentioned a lot, but rarely
contribute to hashtagged debates
• @mentions as a shorthand for discussing politicians, creating
a link to their account, rather than necessarily expecting
conversation
– Presence of core group of “political junkies” leading (in
volume if not in topic) these discussions
• Framing of politics around personalities (individual
politicians) rather than parties?
• Tweeting patterns still follow major news stories, debates
around party leaders (particularly in hung parliament
situation, in build-up to election).

17. LIMITATIONS AND FURTHER OUTLOOK
• Caveats:
– Not all voters on Twitter - not representative of entire electorate
– No requirement to use hashtag/engage with others using it
• Active choice by user to connect to wider discussion
• Users replying to hashtagged comments might not include it in their
tweets
• Intentions of hashtags, functions of use
• Future directions
– Case studies within the different political contexts
– Replies and retweets, information flows, across party affiliation,
between different user groups (journalists, politicians), regions,
themes
• Ongoing tracking, comparing non-election and election periods
(QLD 2012; WA and AUS 2013).