Digital campaigning: Empirical research and normative implications

Existing research on the tensions between contemporary election campaigns and democracy and political trust has primarily taken campaign outputs as its objects of study. Far less studied are the moral dimensions of the inputs concerning the role that the attitudes, beliefs and motivations of key electoral actors play in influencing their conduct and how their moral decision-making is affected by institutions and regulations. Neglect of this input perspective leaves major knowledge gaps that limits our ability to accurately diagnose normative problems with campaigning and prescribe effective solutions. In this paper, we specifically focus on the role of citizens as democratic moral agents in the campaign context, attempting to understand what their normative expectations are of themselves as participants in election campaigns, as well as their normative expectations of campaigns and the conduct of key actors including candidates, parties and journalists. We report preliminary results from an original mass survey in four countries - Germany, Italy, the UK and the US - that seeks to probe citizens’ normative attitudes towards election campaigns. As we are well into the fourth era of election campaigns, characterised by big data and developing uses of AI, our survey will cast light on the normative expectations, challenges and anxieties citizens are experiencing as they attempt to play their (democratic) role in election and navigate the evolving communicative landscape.