What Do Citizens Expect from Web Campaigns? The Cases of the 2012 France and Quebec Elections

Résumé En

The academic literature on digital campaigning is dominated by the analysis of the “supply side” of parties and candidates’ online campaigns (Gibson & Ward, 2012), and the assessment of the functions of information, interaction and mobilization performed by their websites. This paper will explore the “demand side” of Web campaigns and, more specifically, examine what do citizens expect from parties and candidates’ online campaigns. Are they looking for information, interaction or tools for mobilization? What are the motivations of web-users visiting the websites, Facebook pages or Twitter accounts of parties and candidates? Finally, do citizens consider the use of Internet by parties and candidates as an opportunity to improve electoral communication? To answer these questions, we rely on data from two online surveys conducted after the second round of the 2012 French presidential election and the 2012 Quebec general election among citizens who had used Internet to follow the campaign in each case. This analysis is complemented with qualitative data collected through focus groups. The results showed that these highly politically active citizens were primarily using the Internet to get information and that they were very critical of how parties and candidates had used the Internet and online social media during these campaigns.