An Awkward Tool: Social Media as a Dispruptive Factor in Intra-Party Competition

In recent years, a growing body of research has studied the effects of social network sites on various aspects of politics. However, little attention has been spent on how social network sites are used internally in political parties, and how they affect the perceived tension between the hierarchical structure of the political party and the network-based communication becoming more common and technically feasible. For the present study, members of the social democratic party group in the Swedish Riksdag were interviewed about which channels they used for communication with other party members in and whithout the party group. The results show that although hierarchical patterns remain, individual party members are able to build up a strong position in the party outside of the hierarchical structure.