Electoral propaganda in digital space: profiling Facebook use in the Italian general election of 2018

Abstract The use of social media in electoral contexts has garnered substantial attention in the social sciences over the past decade, as these platforms have transformed the landscape of political communication, enabling the proliferation of propaganda strategies. This study aims to analyse the different ways Italian political parties and movements used Facebook during the 2018 general election. Focusing on content and network structure, this research highlights three main aspects: identifying the semantic areas that define political propaganda in posts and comments, reconstructing the Facebook page networks associated with various political groups, and classifying the nodes in these networks to profile each party’s use of Facebook. Methodologically, the study consists of three analytical phases: a semantic analysis of content from candidates’ and political parties’ official Facebook pages using text mining techniques, a structural analysis of the network of like links between these pages and others, and a functional analysis classifying network nodes to establish different communication profiles. The study ultimately proposes a typological definition of Facebook use by Italian movements and parties, resulting from the combined insights of these analyses. The findings reveal four distinct types of networks in the political landscape: Echo, Broadcast, Netcast, and Showcase networks, each illustrating the varied strategies in social media use by different political entities.