著者

上ノ原 秀晃

出版者

文教大学

雑誌

人間科学研究 = Bulletin of Human Science (ISSN:03882152)

巻号頁・発行日

no.40, pp.45-59, 2019-03-01

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The 2017 House of Representatives Election was the fourth national-level election after the introduction of the Internet-based election campaigning in Japan. Some studies have indicated that this change in campaigning rules had some impact on voters' attitudes or behaviors while other studies have contended that it has not changed election results. This paper examined how candidates utilized social media, rather than its effect on voting behavior or electoral outcomes. This paper focused on the type of candidates who tended to use Twitter, the frequency of tweeting, and what candidates tweeted about; 42,854 tweets from 619 candidates over a 12-day period of campaigning were collected and analyzed using the text mining software KH coder. Results revealed that incumbent candidates, candidates in toss-up districts, and long-shot candidates were more likely to use Twitter than favored candidates and candidates in SMDs, while candidates in some opposition parties were more likely to tweet quite often. The computerized content analysis of candidates' tweets revealed that most candidates used Twitter to post information on their campaign activities while few tweets discussed policy issues. Candidates from some opposition parties, and especially those from the JCP(Kyôsantô), used RTs to communicate with their constituencies and they posted tweets to discuss policy issues. A trend analysis of hashtags has revealed a change in strategy for the JCP and other members of the opposition coalition and greater online prominence for two new parties—the Party of Hope(Kibô-no-Tô)and the CDP(Rikken Minshutô).2017年衆院選において候補者がどのようにソーシャルメディアを活用したのかに注目し、どのような候補者がツイッターの利用に積極的であったのか、どのような内容が投稿されたのかを分析した。619人の候補者の選挙期間中の投稿42,854件のツイートを収集し、テキスト分析を行った。利用の有無に対しては、現職と新人の差、選挙区と比例代表の違い、当選の見通しの違い、政党の違いが影響しているが、投稿量に対しては政党の違いのみが影響していることがわかった。投稿内容を分析すると、全体として告知や報告が中心で政策論争は低調であったが、一部の野党は政策論争やRTによるコミュニケーションに積極的であった。これらは概して諸外国と共通する傾向である。また、ハッシュタグのトレンドを分析したところ、選挙期間中の共産党の選挙戦略の変化や、2つの新党の党勢の推移も読み取れた。