Issue
Date Log
Facebooking the Tanzanian Elections: Citizen and Party Campaigners in the Social Media Ecosystem
Journal of Humanities & Social Science (JHSS),
Vol. 5 No. 1 (2016)
Abstract
The 2015 presidential election cycle in Tanzania featured social media networks in
electoral campaigning. Citizen and party campaigners emerged and used Facebook,
Twitter, YouTube, Instagram and WhatsApp mobile instant-messaging application to
recruit and mobilise voters. This article attempts to examine the most recent
explosion of citizen and party election campaigners on Facebook. The analysis focuses
on their engagement with Facebook campaigns, and whether the use of this social
media platform amplified the promotion of presidential candidates. The findings
indicate that some presidential candidates were hardly visible on Facebook and could
not get citizen and party campaign-initiated support. Some were actively social
networkers and had support via a networked model of Facebook campaign.
Nevertheless, a simple empirical test indicates a lack of a strong association between
Facebook election campaigns activities and shares of votes garnered by candidates.
This discards the notion that citizens and party group supporters are the agents of
electoral votes on the Facebook platform in Tanzania. Despite the fact that there is a
lack of strong association, it is reasonable to conclude that the use of social networks
in electoral campaigns is becoming a more of desired strategies and tactics among
aspirants and supporters in modern electioneering. Thus, this offers ample evidence
and opportunities for aspirants, citizen and party campaigners engagement on social
media strategically to be used to recruit and mobilise potential voters.
Keywords
Download Citation
Endnote/Zotero/Mendeley (RIS)BibTeX
- Abbott, J. 2012. Social Media. In N. Kersting (ed.) Electronic Democracy. Barbara Budrich: Opladen):
- –102. Adibe, N.K., C.C. Odoemelam & A. Chibuwe. 2012. Social Media, Electioneering and Sustenance of
- Democracy in Africa: A ‘SWOT’ Analysis. Africa Media and Democracy Journal, 1(1): 47-58.. Anderson, L. 2011. Demystifying the Arab Spring: Parsing the differences between Tunisia, Egypt
- and Libya. Foreign Affairs 90(4): 2–7. Asghar, H. M. 2015. Measuring Information Seeking through Facebook: Scale Development and
- Initial Evidence of Information Seeking in Facebook Scale (ISFS). Computers in Human Behavior
- : 259–270.
- Balling, M., D.V. Poel & M. Bogaert. 2015. Social Media Optimization: Identifying an Optimal
- Strategy for Increasing Network Size on Facebook. Omage published online http://dx.doi. org/10.1016/j.omega (in-press). Bellin, E. 2012. Reconsidering the Robustness of Authoritarianism in the Middle East: Lessons
- from the Arab Spring. Comparative Politics 44(2): 127–149. Bimber, B., C. M. Cantijoch, L. Copeland & R. Gibson. 2015. Digital Media and Political
- Participation: The Moderating role of political interest across acts and over Time. Social Science
- Computer Review, 33(1): 21–42. Cantijoch, M., R. Gibson & D. Cutts. 2013. Engagement in the Online Campaign in the United
- States and France: A comparative Analysis. General Conference of the ECPR, Bordeaux, France,
- September 4–7.
- Chen, P. 2010. Adoption and Use of Digital Media in Election Campaigns: Australia, Canada and
- New Zealand. Public Administration Review, 1: 3–26. Gerodimos, R. & J. Justinussen. 2015. Obama’s 2012 Facebook Campaign: Political Communication
- in the Age of the Like Button. Journal of Information Technology and Politics, 12: 113–132. Gibson, R. K. 2015. Party Change, Social Media and the Rise of ‘Citizen-Initiated’ Campaigning.
- Party Politics, 21(2): 183–197. —. 2009. New Media and the Revitalisation of Politics. Representation 45(3): 289–299. Gibson, R.K., W. Lusoli & S. Ward. 2005. Online Participation in the UK. Testing a “Contextualised”
- Model of the Internet Effect. Political Studies Association, 7: 561–583. Gibson, R.K., Williamson, A., and Ward, S. 2010. ‘Introduction: Whatever Happened to the
- Internet?’ In R.K Gibson., A. Williamson and S. Ward (eds.) The Internet and the 2010 Election
- Putting the Small ‘p’ back in Politics? London: Hansard Society): 1–4. Grömping, M. 2014. ‘Echo Chambers’: Partisan Facebook Groups during the 2014 Thai Election.
- Asia Pacific Media Educator, 24(1): 39–59 . Hall, T. 2012. ‘Electronic Voting’. In N. Kersting (ed.) Electronic Democracy. Barbara Budrich:
- Opladen, pp. 153–176. Haynes, A.A. & B. Pitts. 2009. Making an Impression: New Media in the 2008 Presidential
- Nomination Campaigns. Political Science and Politics, 42(1): 53–58. Hermet, G. 1978. The State Controlled Elections: A Framework. In G. Hermet., R. Rose & A.
- Rouquié (eds.). Elections Without Choice. London: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 1–18. Howard, P. 2011. The Digital Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy: Information Technology and
- Political Islam. Oxford University Press.
- Ifukor, P. 2010. Elections or Selections? Blogging and Twittering the Nigerian 2007 General
- Elections. Bulletin of Science, Technology and Society, 30(6): 398–414.
- Internet World Stats. 2016. Internet Usage Statistics for Africa. Available at:
- http://www.internetworldstats.com/stats1.htm [Accessed: 19.07.2016].
- Jungherr, A. 2016. Four Functions of Digital Tools in Election Campaigns: The Germany Case. The
- International Journal of Press/Politics published online. doi: 10.1177/1940161216642597 (in-press). Kalyango, Y. & B. Adu-Kumi. 2013. Impact of Social Media on Political Mobilization in East and
- West Africa. Global Media Journal: American Edition Spring 2013, 22: 1–20. Kersting, N. 2005. The Quality of Political Discourse: Can E-Discussion be Deliberative? Paper
- presented at the Conference of Political Science Association (PSA), LeedsKersting, N. 2012. The Future of Electronic Democracy. In N. Kersting (ed.) Electronic Democracy. Barbara Budrich: Opladen, pp. 11–54. Kersting, N. 2013. Online Participation: From ‘Invited’ to ‘Invented’ Spaces. International Journal of
- Electronic Governance, 6(4): 270–280.
- Ladner, A. & J. Fivaz. 2012. ‘Voting Advice Applications’. In N. Kersting (ed.) Electronic Democracy. Barbara Budrich: Opladen): 177–198. Mair, P. 2006. Ruling the Void? The Hollowing of Western Democracy. New Left Review, 42: 25–51. Miller, W.J. 2013. We Can’t All Be Obama: The Use of New Media in Modern Political
- Campaigning. Journal of Political Marketing, 12: 326–347. Moses, J.W. & T.L. Knutsen. 2012. Ways of Knowing: Competing Methodologies in Social and Political
- Research. 2nd Edition. London: Palgrave Macmillan. National Electoral Commission (NEC). 2015a. Presidential Election Results. Available at:
- http://www.nec.go.tz/trend-categories/results [Accessed: 24.12.2015]. —. 2015b. Idadi ya Wapiga Kura Kwa Makundi ya Miaka. Available at:
- http://www.nec.go.tz/uploads/trends/1445096196-IDADI%20YA% 20WAPIGA%2 0KURA% 20KWA%
- UMRI_2015.pdf [Accessed: 05.05.2016]. Nielsen, R.K. & C. Vaccari. 2013. Do People “Like” Politicians on Facebook? Not Really. Large-Scale
- Direct Candidate-to-Voter Online Communication as an Outlier Phenomenon. International
- Journal of Communication, 7: 2333–2356. Norris, P. 2012. ‘Political Mobilization and Social Networks: The Example of the Arab Spring’. In N.
- Kersting (ed.) Electronic Democracy. Barbara Budrich: Opladen, pp. 55–76. Oeldorf-Hirch, A. & S. S. Sundar. 2014. Posting, Commenting, and Tagging: Effects of Sharing
- News Stories on Facebook. Computers in Human Behavior, 44: 240–249. Okoro, N. & K.A. Nwafor. 2013. Social Media and Political Participation in Nigeria During the 2011
- General Elections: The Lapses and the Lessons. Global Journal of Arts Humanities and Social
- Sciences, 1(3): 29–46. Patten, S. 2013. Assessing the Potential of New Social Media. Canadian Parliamentary Review, 36(2):
- –26. Pattie, C., D. Denver, R. Johns & J. MitchellJ. 2013. Raising the Tone? The Impact of ‘Positive’ and
- ‘Negative’ Campaigning on Voting in the 2007 Scottish Parliament Election. Electoral Studies, 30: 333–343. Pennington, N., K.L. Winfrey, B. R. Warner & M. W. Kearney. 2015. Liking Obama and Romney (on
- Facebook): An Experimental Evaluation of Political Engagement and Efficacy During the 2012
- General Election. Computer in Human Behavior, 44: 279–283. Pew Research Center. 2014: Cell Phones in Africa: Communication Lifeline. Available at:
- http://www.pewglobal.org/2015/04/15/cell-phones-in-africa-communication-lifeline/ [Accesses:
- 11.2015]. —. 2016. Smartphone Ownership and Internet Usage Continues to Climb in Emerging Economies.
- Pew Research Center (PEW). Available at: http://www.pewglobal.org/2016/02/22/smartphone- ownership-and-internet-usage-continues-to-climb-in-emerging-economies/ [Accessed:
- 06.2016]Römmele, A. 2012. Electronic Political Campaigning. In N. Kersting (ed.). Electronic Democracy. Barbara Budrich: Opladen, pp. 103-124. Ross, K. & T. Bürger. 2014. Face to Face(book): Social Media, Political Campaigning and the
- Unbearable Lightness of Being There. Political Science, 66(1): 46–62. Sæbø, Ø. & T. Päivärinta. n.d. Defining the “E” in E-Democracy: A genre Lens of IT Artefacts. Agder
- University College: Kristiansand, Norway. Sandberg, S. 2016. Facebook Stats. Available at: http://newsroom.fb.com/company-info/ [Accessed:
- 04.2016]. Scarrow, S. 2015. Beyond Party Members: Changing Approaches to Partisan Mobilization. Oxford
- University Press. Shayo, D.P. & N. Kersting. 2016. An Examination of Online Electoral Campaigning in Tanzania.
- Paper presented at the International Conference for E-Democracy and Open Government
- (CeDEM), Danube University, Krems: Austria, 18-20 May 2016. Statista. 2016. Number of Monthly Active Twitter Users Worldwide. Available at:
- http://www.statista.com/statistics/282087/number-of-monthly-active-twitter-users/ [Accessed:
- 07.2016]. Sullivan, J. & E. V. Sapir. 2012. Modelling Negative Campaign Advertising: Evidence From Taiwan.
- Asian Journal of Communication, 22(3): 289–303. TCRA. 2015. Quarterly Communication Statistics Report. Tanzania Communications Regulatory
- Authority, Dar es Salaam: Tanzania. United Republic of Tanzania (URT). 2016. National Information and Communications Technology
- Policy. United Republic of Tanzania, Ministry of Works, Transport and Communication, May
- Vaccari, C. & A. Valeriani. 2016. Party Campaigners or Citizen Campaigners? How Social Media
- Deepen and Broaden Party-Related Engagement. The International Journal of Press/Politics
- published online doi: 10.1177/1940161216642152 (in-press). Vergeer, M. & L. Hermans. 2012. Web Campaigning in the 2009 European Parliament Elections: A
- Cross-National Comparative Analysis. New Media and Society, 15(1): 128-148. Wagner, K. M. & J. Gainous. 2009. Electronic Grassroots: Does Online Campaigning Work? The
- Journal of Legislative Studies,15(4): 502-520
References
Abbott, J. 2012. Social Media. In N. Kersting (ed.) Electronic Democracy. Barbara Budrich: Opladen):
–102. Adibe, N.K., C.C. Odoemelam & A. Chibuwe. 2012. Social Media, Electioneering and Sustenance of
Democracy in Africa: A ‘SWOT’ Analysis. Africa Media and Democracy Journal, 1(1): 47-58.. Anderson, L. 2011. Demystifying the Arab Spring: Parsing the differences between Tunisia, Egypt
and Libya. Foreign Affairs 90(4): 2–7. Asghar, H. M. 2015. Measuring Information Seeking through Facebook: Scale Development and
Initial Evidence of Information Seeking in Facebook Scale (ISFS). Computers in Human Behavior
: 259–270.
Balling, M., D.V. Poel & M. Bogaert. 2015. Social Media Optimization: Identifying an Optimal
Strategy for Increasing Network Size on Facebook. Omage published online http://dx.doi. org/10.1016/j.omega (in-press). Bellin, E. 2012. Reconsidering the Robustness of Authoritarianism in the Middle East: Lessons
from the Arab Spring. Comparative Politics 44(2): 127–149. Bimber, B., C. M. Cantijoch, L. Copeland & R. Gibson. 2015. Digital Media and Political
Participation: The Moderating role of political interest across acts and over Time. Social Science
Computer Review, 33(1): 21–42. Cantijoch, M., R. Gibson & D. Cutts. 2013. Engagement in the Online Campaign in the United
States and France: A comparative Analysis. General Conference of the ECPR, Bordeaux, France,
September 4–7.
Chen, P. 2010. Adoption and Use of Digital Media in Election Campaigns: Australia, Canada and
New Zealand. Public Administration Review, 1: 3–26. Gerodimos, R. & J. Justinussen. 2015. Obama’s 2012 Facebook Campaign: Political Communication
in the Age of the Like Button. Journal of Information Technology and Politics, 12: 113–132. Gibson, R. K. 2015. Party Change, Social Media and the Rise of ‘Citizen-Initiated’ Campaigning.
Party Politics, 21(2): 183–197. —. 2009. New Media and the Revitalisation of Politics. Representation 45(3): 289–299. Gibson, R.K., W. Lusoli & S. Ward. 2005. Online Participation in the UK. Testing a “Contextualised”
Model of the Internet Effect. Political Studies Association, 7: 561–583. Gibson, R.K., Williamson, A., and Ward, S. 2010. ‘Introduction: Whatever Happened to the
Internet?’ In R.K Gibson., A. Williamson and S. Ward (eds.) The Internet and the 2010 Election
Putting the Small ‘p’ back in Politics? London: Hansard Society): 1–4. Grömping, M. 2014. ‘Echo Chambers’: Partisan Facebook Groups during the 2014 Thai Election.
Asia Pacific Media Educator, 24(1): 39–59 . Hall, T. 2012. ‘Electronic Voting’. In N. Kersting (ed.) Electronic Democracy. Barbara Budrich:
Opladen, pp. 153–176. Haynes, A.A. & B. Pitts. 2009. Making an Impression: New Media in the 2008 Presidential
Nomination Campaigns. Political Science and Politics, 42(1): 53–58. Hermet, G. 1978. The State Controlled Elections: A Framework. In G. Hermet., R. Rose & A.
Rouquié (eds.). Elections Without Choice. London: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 1–18. Howard, P. 2011. The Digital Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy: Information Technology and
Political Islam. Oxford University Press.
Ifukor, P. 2010. Elections or Selections? Blogging and Twittering the Nigerian 2007 General
Elections. Bulletin of Science, Technology and Society, 30(6): 398–414.
Internet World Stats. 2016. Internet Usage Statistics for Africa. Available at:
http://www.internetworldstats.com/stats1.htm [Accessed: 19.07.2016].
Jungherr, A. 2016. Four Functions of Digital Tools in Election Campaigns: The Germany Case. The
International Journal of Press/Politics published online. doi: 10.1177/1940161216642597 (in-press). Kalyango, Y. & B. Adu-Kumi. 2013. Impact of Social Media on Political Mobilization in East and
West Africa. Global Media Journal: American Edition Spring 2013, 22: 1–20. Kersting, N. 2005. The Quality of Political Discourse: Can E-Discussion be Deliberative? Paper
presented at the Conference of Political Science Association (PSA), LeedsKersting, N. 2012. The Future of Electronic Democracy. In N. Kersting (ed.) Electronic Democracy. Barbara Budrich: Opladen, pp. 11–54. Kersting, N. 2013. Online Participation: From ‘Invited’ to ‘Invented’ Spaces. International Journal of
Electronic Governance, 6(4): 270–280.
Ladner, A. & J. Fivaz. 2012. ‘Voting Advice Applications’. In N. Kersting (ed.) Electronic Democracy. Barbara Budrich: Opladen): 177–198. Mair, P. 2006. Ruling the Void? The Hollowing of Western Democracy. New Left Review, 42: 25–51. Miller, W.J. 2013. We Can’t All Be Obama: The Use of New Media in Modern Political
Campaigning. Journal of Political Marketing, 12: 326–347. Moses, J.W. & T.L. Knutsen. 2012. Ways of Knowing: Competing Methodologies in Social and Political
Research. 2nd Edition. London: Palgrave Macmillan. National Electoral Commission (NEC). 2015a. Presidential Election Results. Available at:
http://www.nec.go.tz/trend-categories/results [Accessed: 24.12.2015]. —. 2015b. Idadi ya Wapiga Kura Kwa Makundi ya Miaka. Available at:
http://www.nec.go.tz/uploads/trends/1445096196-IDADI%20YA% 20WAPIGA%2 0KURA% 20KWA%
UMRI_2015.pdf [Accessed: 05.05.2016]. Nielsen, R.K. & C. Vaccari. 2013. Do People “Like” Politicians on Facebook? Not Really. Large-Scale
Direct Candidate-to-Voter Online Communication as an Outlier Phenomenon. International
Journal of Communication, 7: 2333–2356. Norris, P. 2012. ‘Political Mobilization and Social Networks: The Example of the Arab Spring’. In N.
Kersting (ed.) Electronic Democracy. Barbara Budrich: Opladen, pp. 55–76. Oeldorf-Hirch, A. & S. S. Sundar. 2014. Posting, Commenting, and Tagging: Effects of Sharing
News Stories on Facebook. Computers in Human Behavior, 44: 240–249. Okoro, N. & K.A. Nwafor. 2013. Social Media and Political Participation in Nigeria During the 2011
General Elections: The Lapses and the Lessons. Global Journal of Arts Humanities and Social
Sciences, 1(3): 29–46. Patten, S. 2013. Assessing the Potential of New Social Media. Canadian Parliamentary Review, 36(2):
–26. Pattie, C., D. Denver, R. Johns & J. MitchellJ. 2013. Raising the Tone? The Impact of ‘Positive’ and
‘Negative’ Campaigning on Voting in the 2007 Scottish Parliament Election. Electoral Studies, 30: 333–343. Pennington, N., K.L. Winfrey, B. R. Warner & M. W. Kearney. 2015. Liking Obama and Romney (on
Facebook): An Experimental Evaluation of Political Engagement and Efficacy During the 2012
General Election. Computer in Human Behavior, 44: 279–283. Pew Research Center. 2014: Cell Phones in Africa: Communication Lifeline. Available at:
http://www.pewglobal.org/2015/04/15/cell-phones-in-africa-communication-lifeline/ [Accesses:
11.2015]. —. 2016. Smartphone Ownership and Internet Usage Continues to Climb in Emerging Economies.
Pew Research Center (PEW). Available at: http://www.pewglobal.org/2016/02/22/smartphone- ownership-and-internet-usage-continues-to-climb-in-emerging-economies/ [Accessed:
06.2016]Römmele, A. 2012. Electronic Political Campaigning. In N. Kersting (ed.). Electronic Democracy. Barbara Budrich: Opladen, pp. 103-124. Ross, K. & T. Bürger. 2014. Face to Face(book): Social Media, Political Campaigning and the
Unbearable Lightness of Being There. Political Science, 66(1): 46–62. Sæbø, Ø. & T. Päivärinta. n.d. Defining the “E” in E-Democracy: A genre Lens of IT Artefacts. Agder
University College: Kristiansand, Norway. Sandberg, S. 2016. Facebook Stats. Available at: http://newsroom.fb.com/company-info/ [Accessed:
04.2016]. Scarrow, S. 2015. Beyond Party Members: Changing Approaches to Partisan Mobilization. Oxford
University Press. Shayo, D.P. & N. Kersting. 2016. An Examination of Online Electoral Campaigning in Tanzania.
Paper presented at the International Conference for E-Democracy and Open Government
(CeDEM), Danube University, Krems: Austria, 18-20 May 2016. Statista. 2016. Number of Monthly Active Twitter Users Worldwide. Available at:
http://www.statista.com/statistics/282087/number-of-monthly-active-twitter-users/ [Accessed:
07.2016]. Sullivan, J. & E. V. Sapir. 2012. Modelling Negative Campaign Advertising: Evidence From Taiwan.
Asian Journal of Communication, 22(3): 289–303. TCRA. 2015. Quarterly Communication Statistics Report. Tanzania Communications Regulatory
Authority, Dar es Salaam: Tanzania. United Republic of Tanzania (URT). 2016. National Information and Communications Technology
Policy. United Republic of Tanzania, Ministry of Works, Transport and Communication, May
Vaccari, C. & A. Valeriani. 2016. Party Campaigners or Citizen Campaigners? How Social Media
Deepen and Broaden Party-Related Engagement. The International Journal of Press/Politics
published online doi: 10.1177/1940161216642152 (in-press). Vergeer, M. & L. Hermans. 2012. Web Campaigning in the 2009 European Parliament Elections: A
Cross-National Comparative Analysis. New Media and Society, 15(1): 128-148. Wagner, K. M. & J. Gainous. 2009. Electronic Grassroots: Does Online Campaigning Work? The
Journal of Legislative Studies,15(4): 502-520