Political Communication in Disaster: Analysis of Two Main Political Alliances’ Tweets After 2023 Great Earthquakes in Türkiye

Authors : Hayriye Nur Görkemli, Hatice Mine Yayla, Betül Çetinkaya

Pages : 111-132

Doi:10.26650/siyasal.2024.33.1387832

View : 64 | Download : 38

Publication Date : 2024-04-19

Article Type : Research Paper

Abstract :The presidential elections of 2023 in Türkiye witnessed the competition of two major alliance groups, comprising different parties, namely the People’s Alliance and National Alliance. This study aims to investigate and analyze these two main groups’ party and leader tweets after the two successive major earthquakes which occurred on February 6, 2023 and hit 11 cities in Türkiye and northern Syria, causing more than 50,000 deaths. Within the study, organizations’ and leaders’ tweets of both alliances during the first week after the earthquakes were manually gathered and categorized. They are grouped and analyzed under three main categories: information type, interaction numbers, and daily course of tweets. Despite the higher number of followers of leaders, it is observed that parties in both alliances preferred to post from party accounts rather than leader accounts. Parties of the People’s Alliance shared predominantly “informational” messages, whereas the parties under the National Alliance used social media extensively during the disaster mostly for “information” and “criticism” purposes. The study also found that the average interaction per tweet of the presidential candidates in both alliances was higher than all other accounts. Moreover, the daily flow of messages was roughly parallel across the two alliances.
Keywords : Kriz İletişimi, Afet İletişimi, Dijital Siyasal İletişim, İçerik Analizi, Siyasal İttifaklar