The Politics of Facebook How social-networking is reshaping campaigning nationally and at Middlebury

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This past Friday Sept. 26 marked the anniversary of the first televised presidential debate.

On that day in 1960, presidential hopefuls John F. Kennedy and Richard M. Nixon took the stage to debate domestic policy. It was the first time in U.S. history that the majority of Americans owned a television set. It was the first time American families were permitted the luxury of judging candidates not only aurally - but also visually.

Both candidates refused stage make-up. Vice President Nixon, still recovering from a knee injury, looked sallow, unable to shed his perpetual five o'clock shadow. Kennedy, on the other hand, was fresh off a campaign circuit in sunny California. And while he was not nearly as well known as Nixon, Kennedy's television debut would launch the handsome Harvard grad onto the national scene - and, well, we all know the rest.

If the televised "great debates" of 1960 whetted the American appetite for image and sound bite, the voting constituencies for the 2008 presidential election may find themselves in a state of sensory overload. Indeed, more than stage presence, the next president of the United States may be the candidate who is most apt to tap into the social-networking power of a generation that is accustomed to interacting, thinking, and even meeting over the internet.



Digitizing the Political Campaign

In early October of 2007, staff members of the popular social-networking site www.facebook.com held a series of workshops and information sessions in Washington D.C. Their aim was to demonstrate ways in which politicians could leverage Facebook's networking capabilities as part of their campaign strategy.

"Our goal is to make you win," offered Josh Rahn, Facebook's director of sales, who explained to various attendees that of some 45 million active users, 80 percent were of the voting age. Spending an average of 22 minutes logged in each day, users had ample time to get the campaign low-down.

This past week Facebook reached the milestone of 100 million active users: among them, presidential hopefuls John McCain and Barack Obama.

They're not alone. In the past year many political candidates have joined Facebook and similar networking sites in an effort to reel in voters. Launching themselves onto the virtual scene was not without pitfalls. In Hilary Clinton's own Facebook jaunt, a manager of her site accidentally accepted a relationship request from a lucky supporter.

But if there's been one candidate to embrace new media capabilities it is democratic hopeful Barack Obama, currently boasting nearly two million supporters on Facebook.

"One of my fundamental beliefs from my days as a community organizer is that real change comes from the bottom up," Obama said in a statement. "And there's no more powerful tool for grass-roots organizing than the Internet."

Doesn't hurt having Chris Hughes on your side. Hughes, one of the four founders of Facebook, left the company in early 2007 to work on Senator Obama's new media campaign in Chicago. In an unprecedented fundraising initiative, Hughes helped raise millions of dollars through thousands of $200 donations over the internet and also founded the wildly successful www.mybarackobama.com.

But Obama's not the only candidate employing digital social-networking as part of his campaign strategem. Despite the generation gap, McCain is no slouch when it comes to digitizing his campaign. While he lacks Obama's extensive grouping network and has only gathered slightly more than 500,000 supporters on Facebook, his live video feed of McCain-Palin events is reaching constituents across the country.



Facebook goes Political

Over the past year Facebook has made several political applications available to its users, most notably, the U.S. Politics application. An informational blurb on the site reads, "This application allows you to see which politicians you and your friends support, take part in Debate Groups about the hottest topics in politics today,…see which politicians have the most support on Facebook, and get the latest political news from ABC News."

The application also includes results from what Facebook has deemed "Election Pulses," Facebook polls about various political topics. Candidates can post notes and various external links with regards to vote registration, absentee ballots, and community gatherings.

Beyond personal pages of the candidates, swims a whole web of super cyber groups.



Networking in Middlebury, Vermont

Even in rural Vermont the new politically-savvy Facebook is touching down.

"We're living in an age where popular media is no longer concentrated in the hands of a few people," remarked Stefan Claypool '09. "Bloggers are reaching out across cyberspace and building communities of like-minded individuals in order to promote a cause in which they believe."

Claypool attended the Republican National Convention and became an accredited blogger over this past summer. For Claypool, blogging is revolutionizing the presidential elections and changing politics for the better.

Professor of Political Science, Matt Dickinson, is a renowned presidential scholar and a self-proclaimed non-partisan. While he admits that he is not a huge consumer of Facebook, like Claypool, Dickinson is an avid blogger

"With the interest level so high among students, this is an ideal opportunity to teach them about the presidency and presidential elections."

Dickinson cites the logistical benefits of sites like Facebook.

"I think they are useful in reminding students about registration requirements, deadlines and general voting procedures." Yet in terms of a persuasive tool, adds Dickinson, Facebook has little clout.

"Facebook, Myspace and similar sites tend to reinforce preexisting political dispositions, rather than expose people to new ideas. For most students, it's a vast echo chamber."

Sarah Tucker '09.5, organizer for MiddVote and a college coordinator for the Obama campaign, agrees. "It feels that these online sites and pages are for 'members-only' and are in a lot of ways meant to encourage supporters and fire up the base." Other sites might foster partisan discussions, but Tucker does not include Facebook among them.

But as Claypool points out, one of the beauties of Facebook is its ability to foster what social scientists have deemed "ambient awareness," or incessant web contact with others.

"It is impossible to log on without seeing videos and articles that friends have posted," asserts Claypool, "by using Facebook to propagate information concerning the election, individual users are having a greater impact on the election than ever before."

From Affiliation to Action

Tucker worked for Obama in both the New Hampshire and Massachusetts primaries. For Tucker, "one of the strengths of the Obama campaign is that it recognizes that different forms of communication work best for different groups. It recognized this early on," explained Tucker, "and in my work organizing college campuses I was encouraged to use Facebook and college blogs as a medium to reach people and get students interested and active."

But for Tucker, it's the connection between affiliation and action that Facebook really lacks. "As for increasing awareness, it's the job of on-campus groups and the campaigns to channel this online interest into action."

While as of yet there is no Middlebury for McCain group on the Facebook, there is a Middlebury for Obama, and it currently has 263 supporters. Last week, the Middlebury College Democrats hosted a kickoff event in Dana Auditorium, advertised through - you guessed it - Facebook.

Co-president of the Middlebury College Democrats, George Altshuler '10.5 is the contact for the Facebook gro
up. Altshuler is himself an example of the power of media proliferation. In his profile picture, Altshuler appears with a cartoon bubble just above his left shoulder shouting the word "VOTE!"

"We're really excited about how we're using Facebook to help the campaign," explained Altshuler, who described the group as "mostly a communication device."

Altshuler was enrolled in Media Technology and Cultural Change this past Spring, a course which examined Facebook in terms of "social capital." According to Altshuler, Facebook's primary success lies in its ability to draw upon the "strength of weak ties."

And it's those "weak ties" that the Middlebury Democrats are angling to tap into. "We're using Facebook as a tool to get people to mobilize their social connections in order to get people voting for Obama," asserted Altshuler. Indeed, it may be grass-roots mobilization through social-networking connections that will make the difference in swing states.

48 years ago, Nixon and Kennedy mounted their respective podiums to face off in televised debate. This November, candidates John McCain and Barack Obama will be facing off in a variety of venues, including Facebook. The age of television revolutionized presidential elections. In 2008, we've entered into a whole new domain.