POLITICIANS AND SOCIAL MEDIA

In the modern world, people live their lives both in the real world but also online: the World Wide Web has now become a large part of our lives. Since people need to communicate as well as read, do research and listen to videos, means of communication have also been created: social media. There are various ways people communicate online with anyone in the world such as Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat, Skype, Instagram and the like. These novel forms of communication have surpassed face to face contact in popularity, which means that anyone who wants to communicate directly with the public like businesses, universities and schools, public services and the like need to be active on social media. One group of people who depend on the public to be able to do their jobs is politicians and they use social media both during elections and after the elections.

Getting elected to office is the dream of every politician and what better way to do that than by reaching out to every single voter in a constituency? This is not physically possible but with correct use of social media the tables can be turned: Ted Cruz, for example, can address every single Republican voter in North Carolina on a regular basis: he can discuss policy, help the voters to get to know him as a person and help them grow close to him. Familiarity brings fondness, which in turn may bring votes if he is lucky. Correct use of all that social media has to offer enables politicians to get their message to the man on the street, which means that when they go to vote, they will be doing so consciously, with their eyes open. The conclusion to be drawn from all this is that social media has provided the means for a semi- direct form of democracy and by doing so, it is making the whole process more democratic in the real sense.

The role of social media does not stop with the elections. The newly elected politician needs to maintain contact with his supporters and try to win over new ones in order to get the job done. Barrack Obama is a modern day politician who successfully used social media to get in to office but he has continued to do so to inform democratic voters of what he is trying to do, what he intends to do and what problems he is coming across. Thus the electorate knows full well that he has been unable to carry out some of his promises due to a republican senate which blocks his every move. Social media helps bring the people on the one hand, and the elected politicians on the other into much closer contact than they have been for a long time. By doing so, social media guarantees that no one can claim not to have known about an unfolding event or a piece of legislation; everything is out there and the voters just need to keep up from the comfort of their living rooms.

All the above indicates that social media has made our system of government more democratic by bringing the public and elected politicians together in a virtual space where they can communicate directly, express concerns, voice grievances, make demands or promises, provide explanations and inform each other. Social media has made many countries where it is popularly used more truly democratic. No form of job which necessitates close contact with the public can be successfully done without social media and the business of politics is no exception. The more active politicians are on social media platforms, the more successful they will be.