Valkampanjer, sociala medier och unga väljare : – En studie av hur Moderaterna och Socialdemokraterna ska nå de unga väljarna i valet2010Författare

AbstractTitle: Electoral campaigns, social media and young voters – a studie of how Moderaterna andSocialdemokraterna are going to reach out to the young voters in the electoral campaign of2010. (Valkampanjer, sociala medier och unga väljare- en studie av hur Moderaterna ochSocialdemokraterna ska nå de unga väljarna i valet 2010).Number of pages: 45Author: Sara RothmanTutor: Göran SvenssonCourse: Media and communication studies CPeriod: Autumn semester 2009University: Division of Media and Communication, Departement of Information Science,Uppsala University.Purpose/ Aim: The aim of this essay is to research how the two largest parties in Sweden,Moderaterna and Socialdemokraterna, are going to reach out to the young voters in theelectoral campaign of 2010. I will also find out how the young voters are going to collecttheir information before the election. That information will be compared to the strategies ofthe parties, in that way I can tell if their strategies match the young voters plans ofinformation search.Material/Method: In my eximination I chose to use two informant interviewes and fourdifferent groups of discussion. The informant interviewes were directed to the two peoplewho are in charge of the communication in the two largest parties in Sweden, Moderaternaand Socialdemokraterna. Two of the groups of discussion contained young people who aregoing to vote for the first time in the election of 2010, and two of the groups contained peoplewho will be voting for the second time. They were four people in every group. The people incharge of the communication in the parties were contacted thru e-mail and I met them on theirworkplaces. The young voters were partly friends of mine who brought people they knew tothe groups. In that way some of them knew each other, but not everybody.Main results: One important thing that I realised after the discussion with the young voterswas that there is a big difference between those who are going to vote for the first time andthose who will vote their second time in the election of 2010. It is impossible to characteriseyoung people as one group because they are all so different from each other. I also found outthat the young people use different media, and so will the parties in their campaigns. It is hardto satisfy all youth but my study shows that many needs will be satisfied because bothtraditional media and new media will be used in the electoral campaigns.Keywords: Electoral campaign, social media, young voters, strategic commnunication,Moderaterna, Socialdemokratern