This study aim at providing an answer to the core research question “What is the role of Twitter in the conduct of public diplomacy in The Netherlands?” On the basis of qualitative interviews with...Show moreThis study aim at providing an answer to the core research question “What is the role of Twitter in the conduct of public diplomacy in The Netherlands?” On the basis of qualitative interviews with foreign diplomats and experts on public diplomacy in The Netherlands, it was discovered that they use Twitter as a tool for providing the local communities with information about the advocated countries and their foreign policies. The foreign officials also employ Twitter to address certain members of the Dutch general public, attract their attention to specific topics and engage in discussions with them to enhance their perceptions of the represented states. The conducted content analysis of the Tweets posted by diplomats from the Embassy of Ecuador, the Embassy of Poland, the Embassy of Sweden, and the Embassy of the USA to the Netherlands also demonstrated that they post direct Tweets and personal messages concerning important topics to engage with the foreign publics. However, it is also found that only a small number of them use the language of the local community members, namely Dutch, to disseminate information about their foreign policies. Some of the interviewees explained that they translate only content that is relevant to the Dutch audiences in Dutch. Nevertheless, to engage in more debates with the local communities and enhance their understanding and image of the represented countries, it is recommended that foreign diplomats should provide all messages on Twitter in the language of the host state. Thus, they can use it as an effective tool for accomplishing their public diplomacy goals.Show less
Trust in political parties is declining and with it the relevance of parties, or so the de-alignment hypothesis claims. Using data from recent World Values Surveys, this paper provides evidence...Show moreTrust in political parties is declining and with it the relevance of parties, or so the de-alignment hypothesis claims. Using data from recent World Values Surveys, this paper provides evidence that the assumption is rather problematic. Longitudinal data shows that confidence is neither increasing nor declining but languishing at high levels. Additionally, cross-sectional data from the 2005-2008 WVS was analyzed using statistical tests at the individual and country level. The results demonstrate that one important factor increasing distrust is electoral disproportionality. Regime durability, interpersonal trust, and perceived democraticness reduce such sentiments. Corruption perception notably has no effect on individual respondents but decreases distrust on the national level. The results pose the question whether distrust is a reason for concern or just a phenomenon natural to representative democracy.Show less
The main goal of this thesis is is to look for an answer to the question ”what motivates citizens to engage in politics using Facebook”. The thesis will discuss which benefits citizens are getting...Show moreThe main goal of this thesis is is to look for an answer to the question ”what motivates citizens to engage in politics using Facebook”. The thesis will discuss which benefits citizens are getting when they opt to political participation over social network sites, specifically Facebook. In order to answer this question so a survey was conducted, which examined the relationship between political participation on Facebook and three topics factors. The first was resources for political participation that citizens use or need to sacrifice if they want to engage with politics. The second was the sense of internal and external political efficacy, with which citizen estimate their ability to understand and discuss politics, along with the openesss of the political system for new idea. The third and last one was, self presentation of political impressions, how individuals presesnt their political identity to their peers. The survey found that Facebook does not overwhelmingly reduce costs of participation, and that citizens who engage in politics on Facebook would not necessarily assume that their activities would bring change in policy. However, citizens who do carry on political participation on Facebook may expect a high sense of internal political efficacy and would use Facebook not so much for changing government policy, but as a mobilizing tool, and as a stage for one’s display of an idealized political impression.Show less
The main aim of this research was to investigate if satirical impersonations on television influence viewers’ evaluations of the impersonated politician. The research studied the influence on...Show moreThe main aim of this research was to investigate if satirical impersonations on television influence viewers’ evaluations of the impersonated politician. The research studied the influence on overall evaluations and on the evaluations of ten traits (leadership, knowledgeable, intelligent, cares, inspiring, honest, trustworthy, compassionate, arrogant, and moral). A possible moderating effect of political knowledge was studied as well. An experiment was conducted at a high school in the Netherlands using four experimental groups. Three satirical clips of an impersonation of the Dutch Prime-Minister Mark Rutte were used as stimulus material and a clip of the real Mark Rutte was used as control material. Although there was little significant evidence, the evidence did support the expectation that exposure to a satirical impersonation results in lower overall and trait evaluations of Mark Rutte. Like previous research, this research did find trait dimensions as well: integrity and competence. Exposure to a satirical impersonation significantly influenced the ratings of these dimensions. The research did not find a moderating effect of political knowledge.Show less
The role of ideology and religion on voting behaviour has declined. But, what does then determine voting behaviour nowadays? New dimensions and (short-term) factors seem to play a role and there is...Show moreThe role of ideology and religion on voting behaviour has declined. But, what does then determine voting behaviour nowadays? New dimensions and (short-term) factors seem to play a role and there is more attention to the personalization thesis. Some politicians are treated as celebrities and image, appearance and also clothing are subjects considered to be important. The suits of Mark Rutte and Diederik Samsom have been widely discussed in the run-up to the 2012 Dutch parliamentary elections. Does fashion rule? The central question of this master thesis is: Does the clothing style of politicians influence trait perceptions and voting behaviour of Dutch voters? A quantitative analysis of data obtained by an experimental study will be the basis for this research. Unknown men will be photographed in different clothing styles, which randomly assigned groups of respondents will evaluate on the basis of six leadership traits. What will be analysed is if indeed the men in suits with ties are statistically significant more positively evaluated on the six leadership traits compared to, for example, men in jeans and a casual sweater. By testing four hypotheses, an answer to the research question can be given and the implications of the results will be discussed. This analysis distinguishes between the assessment by men and by women, by different age groups and by clothing style of respondents themselves. In a first step to discover the influence of clothing on the evaluation of Dutch politicians and voting behaviour, this study focuses only on male politicians, mainly because men still dominate among party leaders in national parliamentary elections. What seems to come out of the questionnaires overall, is the fact that it depends on the person what he has to wear. Faces are more important when evaluating unknown persons in pictures. Clothing style can in some way increase or decrease the evaluation scores of some traits, but no clear relationship is to be found between certain traits and a specific clothing style. Politicians’ clothing can reinforce certain leadership traits in the eyes of voters, however, it differs between politicians which clothing style enhances which leadership traits. In general, an in-between clothing style yields the most positive responses and the most votes. But when looking independently at each trait, quite different evaluations appear between different persons. Some small changes in methodology and recruitment of respondents will make the findings of further research stronger. In further research, women definitely have to be included as stimuli persons and possibly political attitude also.Show less
Newspapers in Greece have long been considered as mouthpieces for the parties. This connection between parties and press is typically described as "parallelism". Even though conventional wisdom...Show moreNewspapers in Greece have long been considered as mouthpieces for the parties. This connection between parties and press is typically described as "parallelism". Even though conventional wisdom agrees on the party preferences of newspapers, such claims have not been empirically tested. Based on a content analysis of newspaper front pages during two election campaigns, this study tests the validity of those claims, and assesses their nature. The findings support popular perceptions of newspaper party preferences. They also show that newspaper support is more likely to rely on negativity, by means of attacking the opponent party, rather than praising the affiliated party. This tendency towards negativity is higher when the newspaper's preferred party is the challenger during that campaign. Finally it is shown that, contrary to research on campaign ads, negative coverage in Greece is not more likely to address policy issues than positive coverage. Thus, it has poor contribution to the information environment available to voters. The findings cover a void in the literature and offer insight into the stance of partisan press during election campaigns. They can be tested in countries with similar, but also different, levels of parallelism in an effort to search for common patterns.Show less
My study focused on knowledge about the EU. It was my aim to explain the variance in this knowledge among Europeans and to answer the question: What explains the variance in the knowledge about...Show moreMy study focused on knowledge about the EU. It was my aim to explain the variance in this knowledge among Europeans and to answer the question: What explains the variance in the knowledge about European Union among European citizens?Show less
The European Union has become increasingly important in Dutch politics. The Dutch referendum on the Constitutional Treaty of 2005 marked a turning point, with a growing resistance to European...Show moreThe European Union has become increasingly important in Dutch politics. The Dutch referendum on the Constitutional Treaty of 2005 marked a turning point, with a growing resistance to European integration emerging. This study looks at the gap between Dutch MPs and Dutch voters in positions on European integration and finds that since the 2005 referendum the gap has all but closed.Show less
