Multispeed in practice: Generating Linkage through membership and social media following

Scholars have posited that contemporary political parties are increasingly investing in multi-faceted organizational strategies for cultivating links with their closest supporters, supplementing investments in traditional membership organizations by offering supporters additional – and lower cost – affiliation options. One of the most widespread of the multispeed membership offerings is the option to sign up as a party’s social media follower. Up to now, however, there has been little attempt to establish whether it is fair to view parties’ social media followers (SMFs) as partisan affiliates, as opposed to (for instance) news junkies. This paper examines that question using a unique dataset from Denmark that allows us to compare the characteristics, attitudes, and behavior of party voters, SMFs, and members. Our findings make a strong case for the existence of the multispeed model in the parties that we study. We then ask how these new affiliates might change intra-party dynamics, examining whether the demographics, attitudes and behaviors of SMFs differ from those of party members in significant ways. We seem to find that SMFs can potentially have a positive effect on parties’ linkage with the electorate, especially when it comes to social representation, given that they tend to be younger, more female and less educated than both party members and other party voters.