Facebook and Network Polarity. Are There Echo Chambers in Talking Politics in CEE Countries?

Past researchers have produced contradictory findings on the role of the social media in the creation of the closed communication networks in which like-minded users interact with each other without confronting diverse opinions on public affairs. In this study we investigate how Facebook shapes the networked public space and allow the individuals to experience different political views. Our point of departure is that the density of interaction indicates whether distinctively separate bubbles have emerged as ideological segregation or not. Conceptually, interaction polarity in Facebook can be considered as the architectural feature of the platforms that are created by the connections between social media users. Methodologically, such connections are the best to study with the leading-eigenvector modularity maximization metric. We focus on the users’ likes and comments that were collected from political parties’ and their leaders’ Facebook pages during the parliamentary election campaigns in Poland (2015) and Hungary (2018). The two countries are considered as excellent illustrative cases for deeply polarised societies in Europe. Computer-aided comparative research which is complemented by the sociocentric approach of network analysis is provided to assess the exposure to ideologically diverse news and opinions on Facebook. We also test under what conditions interactions on politics create polarised structures of social networks. The findings on Poland support the hypothesis of the emerging cliques (considered as echo chambers) along partisan lines. The Hungarian case is also expected to provide such evidence.