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Tweeting Cheap Talk: Elites’ communication strategies during corruption scandals

Thu, September 15, 2:00 to 3:30pm, TBA

Abstract

Despite the importance of understanding politicians' communications online, there has been limited work to measure what issues draw sustained attention from elites. This paper seeks to use communication on political corruption to answer the question of the motivations for "cheap talk" versus "sustained attention" from elites. We argue that politicians' ability to engage in "cheap talk" is driven by two factors. First by the sentiment used in their communication, and second by the nature and duration of the public reactions.

To analyze how elites communicate during corruption scandals, we use Puerto Rico's elite communication during the period of 2014 to 2021 as a case study. This period creates an ideal scenario to test our hypotheses since the PPD party controlled the government from 2014 to 2017, while the PNP party was in power from 2017- to 2021. In addition, this year, Puerto Rico has a divided government, with the PNP controlling the Executive and the PPD controlling both legislative chambers. The variation in parties in power allows us to compare politicians' communication strategies when they are in power or as a minority.

We identified the names and dates of almost 40 politicians or high-profile public servants who were arrested during the period from 2014 to 2021. We collected the tweets of all the members of the Legislature and the governors of the two main parties addressing the corruption case, starting from the date that the news of the arrests came out. Furthermore, we also collect the tweets of the public relating to the corruption case. We first analyze how much traction politicians' tweets have to test our hypotheses by analyzing likes and retweets. Secondly, we also explore the sentiment used in their communications.

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