Abstract

Television debates during electoral campaigns constitute a central element within the political communication sphere. This research examines the digital conversation on Twitter on the broadcast of two television debates during the general elections campaign in Spain in April 2019: #ElDebateDecisivo of Atresmedia (among male presidential candidates) and #L6Neldebate of La Sexta (among female political candidates). The research provides a renovated perspective regarding the progressive feminisation of politics, establishing a correlation among key variables, such as the gender of the political leaders participating in the debates, the role of television as the main means during elections, and the influence of the public interaction on Twitter. Methodologically, the study pays attention to 313,343 impacts generated by 101,510 users or nodes. As pointed out in the conclusions, in the masculine debate (#ElDebateDecisivo) the active audience’s contribution to the public and political debate is defined in a more banal way, in contrast with the women’s debate (#L6Neldebate), in which a more political consciousness is perceived.

Abstract

Television electoral debates are considered one of the most relevant events during the election period due to their high audience and also because of the power they generate to direct the media agendas. The present research examines the transmission of this format in front the proliferation of screens, diffusion on the social networks, introduction of on demand services, and on the go consumption together with the emergence of new television performers. This quantitative study analyses the debates issued during the parliamentary elections in Spain, which took place on the 28th of April 2019, in order to learn about their impact further than traditional television consumption and the engagement achieved. The methodology employed combined the monitoring of different platforms. The conclusions obtained support that the emission of this kind of debates takes place through new distribution channels, generating a high tracking rate on Twitter. The broadcasting strategies of the television chains differ.