Different Groups, Same Dislike? Ingroup Favoritism, Outgroup Derogation amongst Elite Discourse of Populist and Mainstream Parties on Social Media

Ingroup favoritism and outgroup derogation are two central concepts in Social Identity Theory (SIT) (Bornschier et al., 2021; Tajfel & Turner, 1986). While ingroup favoritism refers to a tendency to ascribe favorable characteristics to ingroup members, outgroup derogation denotes a tendency to associate outgroup members with unfavorable traits (Adorno et al., 2019; Allport, 1954; Rooduijn et al., 2019). Various scholars have observed a link between populism and SIT, especially for populism that is grounded in nativism and/or nationalism. Still, it remains unclear to what extent vertical (people vs. elites) and horizontal opposition (between different groups in society) of populism is cultivated by different types of parties. Nowadays, affective polarization seems to be on the rise in which divisions are being created between supporters of various parties (Harteveld et al., 2021). Hence, this study aims to systematically analyze whether and to what extent parties create antagonisms and adopt ‘us’ versus ‘them’ frames, taking into account party traits (i.e., level of populism, ideology, incumbency). Theoretically, we expect negative references to outgroups and positive references to ingroups to be present mostly in social media messages of populist parties compared to mainstream parties. We anticipate that in their discourse mainstream parties will be more likely to refer to horizontal opposition while populist parties will –in addition to the horizontal dimension –refer more frequently to the vertical dimension of people versus the elite. Still, we argue that parties with distinct ideologies –including mainstream parties— will adopt an image of outgroups and ingroups that is conditional upon their respective ideology. Finally, we also expect differences in the discourse on ingroups and outgroups in function of incumbency status with non-incumbent parties invoking more vertical than horizontal opposition. We apply a broad typology –informed by categorizations in social psychology—of ingroups and outgroups ranging from a classification based on social, economic, political, cultural, ethnic, linguistic and/or religious grounds. To this end, we conduct a longitudinal, quantitative content analysis of 6 months of elite discourse on social media (Twitter) in Belgium in which we systematically examine which ingroups and outgroups elites associate or disassociate with in their digital communication. We focus on the permanent campaign during a non-election period. The full population of Twitter communication by political parties, party presidents and key leaders will be examined. In this way, we intend to develop a typology which can be applied to study ramifications of exposure to this discourse via exploring dynamics in affective polarization, ingroup favoritism, outgroup derogation and division in society. Preliminary results indicate that populist parties –both left-wing and right-wing—are more likely to make references to ingroups and outgroups, although left-wing populists mostly refer to vertical, while right-wing populists mostly target horizontal outgroups. Parties’ ideological orientation is also reflected in their discourse.