Friendship and politics don’t mix? The role of sociability for online political talk

ABSTRACT

Political talk is valuable for citizens in democracy – particularly cross-cutting talk to heterogeneous others. Yet the role played by sociability in relation to political talk has not been sufficiently understood. When we talk politics with people with whom we have social relationships, does this promote open political talk by creating mutual understanding and intimacy? Or is candid political expression hindered by attempts to maintain harmony? This paper examines the role of sociability for online political talk, through a unique opportunity to compare two naturally occurring groups on the mobile instant-messaging application WhatsApp. Both groups engage in informal political talk, but while one group is devoted to political talk solely, the other mixes politics with social chit-chat, enabling social interaction and friendships among participants. A comparison of the groups based on in-depth interviews with 20 members and the groups’ administrator, complemented by excerpts of discussion content, allows to trace the role of sociability for political talk in online groups. Findings point to an increased personal and emotional dimension to the group combining politics and sociability. This kind of political talk was perceived as riskier and more challenging. At the same time, it is in this group that cross-cutting exposure had a stronger potential to persuade participants to see and understand ‘the other side.’ These findings highlight how not only certain social media – but even certain groups within the same platform – can afford different kinds of political talk.

KEYWORDS:

• Affordances
• cross-cutting exposure
• political talk
• sociability
• social media
• WhatsApp

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes on contributor

Neta Kligler-Vilenchik is Assistant Professor of Communication at the Department of Communication and Journalism at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Her research revolves around civic and political expression and participation in the digital age.

Notes

1 The names of the groups are nick-names given by the author to denote the key difference between the groups. The original names in Hebrew are ‘Poalot’ (‘workers’) for PoliOnly, and ‘Haluzot’ (‘pioneers’) for PoliSocial.

2 The concept of charging for participation in journalistic WhatsApp groups is unique to Schneider and, to the best of the author’s knowledge, has not been replicated in Israel.

3 In August 2017, group administrator Schneider took a full-time position in a mainstream newspaper. She then stopped charging a participation fee for the WhatsApp groups, though they are still active. This shift also changed the group’s participation structure with implications for research ethics – for this reason, I focus here on 2016 data.

4 This research has been approved by the IRB. Group participants and the group administrator have consented to the research, including the collection of group conversation logs. In addition to confirming this consent at the beginning of the research, periodical reminders were posted in the groups every few months.

5 This happened much more in PoliSocial, and indeed most conversation excerpts come from that group. PoliOnly members rarely recounted specific discussion incidents.

6 Schneider requested to be named.

7 Hebrew slang for overloading others with excessive talk.

8 To distinguish WhatsApp conversation from interview quotes, the former are not italicized.

9 Hebrew/Yiddish slang for ‘nag.’