Patrones fenológicos

Introduction

In the last two decades, the fields of political communication and media studies have renovated their research interests in the use of social media35_{as a means for novel forms of political participation (Gibson} and Ward, 2012; Scammell, 2014, p25; Vaccari, 2013; Wilson et al., 2012). Events such as Arab Spring, or the 2008 Obama campaign were considered a milestone in the use of digital media for political communication (Fuchs, 2014a, p2, p83-4; Gaffney, 2010; Gillespie, 2013). They enriched previous discussions around the production of information and political activities in digital economies and networked societies (Benkler, 2006; Castells, 1996; Jenkins, 2006). Social media have been queried as channel for high hopes (Engesser et al., 2017, p1283) and delusions in relation to the possibilities of mobilising disengaged and unvoiced groups and the strengthening or threatening democratic values with populist communicational styles followed by highly controversial leaders such as Donald Trump.

By conducting a literature review on academic debates, this chapter provides the thesis with analytical tools to unfold the research questions on how Facebook became a valuable space for productive publics in the 2014 FA political campaign. Those debates have been strongly enhanced by the conceptualisation of social media as the materialisation of a paradigm change which brought novel possibilities for public’s direct participation in the production, circulation and co-creation of content considered as valuable assets in an informational economy (Arvidsson and Peitersen, 2013; Benkler, 2006; Bruns, 2006; Jenkins, 2006; Levenshus, 2010). As a result of this review, the chapter locates the thesis in the intersection of three broad academic fields that organised the material in three sections related 1) online media studies and value production, 2) political communications and online media, and 3) the review of specific theories on value provided by Dewey (1939), Goffman (1986) and Boltanski and Thévenot (2006).

In the first section, different conceptualisations of social media and the metrification of online interactions are considered in relation to the analysis of value creation. Not only does the section aim to recognise a set of useful analytical tools, but it also engages with existing debates and humbly tries to contribute with a critical review and specification of widely used concepts such as big data, Social Networking Sites and social media itself. Without losing the thesis’ objective, the section provides the reasons for discarding some of those definitions and considering Arvidsson and Peitersen’s (2013) conceptualisation of productive publics

and boyd and Ellison’s (2008) definition of Social Network Site (SNS) as the preliminary most suitable options for conducting this research.

The second section considers political communication debates around specific political events raised by the 2008 Obama campaign and what has been called a renewed wave of populism (Gerbaudo, 2015; Engesser et al., 2016; 2017; Groshek and Koc-Michalska, 2017). Here, a distinctive dynamic of content production and circulation is described in relation to the capacities provided to networked users by social media. The change from a centralised and vertical model of communication to a collaborative a multisite form of communication with the possibility of immediateness and sense of direct connection are discussed in relation to the two different concepts of branding and populist style of communication. To describe this dynamic and focus on the topic of online participation as a source for value production, the concept of productive publics

(Arvidsson and Peitersen, 2013) and Espeland and Sauder’s (2007) analysis on the audit culture are introduced.

A brief subsection related to this distinctive form of political communications brought by digital technologies introduces the academic debates around populism and social media. This provide an opportunity to cover the notion of productive publics in relation a new wave of social protest and denouncements usingsocial media. Here, Melucci’s (1996) procedural approach to collective identity used by scholars analysing social movements online (Aguiar, 2012;Gerbaudo, 2015; Gerbaudo and Treré, 2015; Kavada, 2015; Milan, 2015) is recognised as a useful and term to study collective action in political groups.

The final section pays especial attention to the conceptualisation for an empirical analysis of value creation provided by Dewey (1939), Boltanski and Thévenot (2006) and Goffman (1986). Their views on value as part of a relational and open process is considered as especially useful for an ethnographic exploration and understanding of multiple forms of valuations enacted by the diverse actors who participate on the FA’s Facebook campaign. Dewey’s general theory provides the basis to consider the different practices as subject to different form of values that need to be understood in relation to certain logic of actions and thinking. Similarly, Boltanski and Thévenot suggest a form for making the logics behind valuation visible by looking conflicts between actors and who they put in action and enact rationalisations that justify their actions. Goffman analysis on framing is also considered as a useful approach to o analyse the content and discourse on Facebook as form of enacting certain forms of value and relationships among the intervening actors.

The vast number of studies and article on Facebook and political activities shows the interest and relevance of the thesis’ object for inside and outside academy. However, the chapter shows that the ethnographic study of metrics and valuation process in online political campaign remains mostly unexplored with a few exception – Gerbaudo (2014a; 2016); Milan (2015) – and has no academic studies ethnographically conducted in the specific context of Uruguay. By reviewing the existing literature, this chapter provides the thesis with analytical tools for finding and analysing a specific topic and case of study to expand the academic debate on the value of the participation of Facebook’s publics in political campaigns. Similarly, the effort made in leasing with three different fields of study can be considered as part of the distinctive approach of this thesis.