Internal democracy of political parties in the age of political communication 2.0: the case of the 2018 primary elections of the Partido Popular

Abstract

In the summer of 2018, the Popular Party (Spanish: Partido Popular, PP) held its first national primaries to elect its president. This study aims to analyse, both quantitatively and qualitatively, the Twitter campaign of the two main candidates in the two stages of this process of internal democracy: from 23 June to 5 July, and from 6 to 21 July. The results show that social networks are a necessary instrument in candidates' political communication strategy, as they encourage citizen participation and instant communication, and they allow interaction as well. Nevertheless, the findings also point out that this social network has not fully capitalized on its potential, as the one-way transmission of content has taken centre stage.