Tweeting through a Public Health Crisis: Communication Strategies of Right-Wing Populist Leaders during the COVID-19 Pandemic

Abstract

How do right-wing populist leaders address a public health crisis? This article addresses the evolution of right-wing populist leaders' communication tone and style during the COVID-19 pandemic. By analysing the Twitter accounts of Boris Johnson, Donald Trump and Narendra Modi, we explore how right-wing populist leaders control the portrayal of a health crisis from above, shift blame and consolidate support. We argue that while all three leaders initially downplay the pandemic, once they acknowledge the severity of the crisis, they vary in the extent to which they give importance to the coronavirus and shift blame. While Trump uses Twitter to praise himself and his policies, and to polarize the electorate, Modi and Johnson employ Twitter to inform the public and deliver solidarity messages. The frequency of Twitter use and the tone of the language leaders employ depend on the domestic context of that country. Our findings contribute to the scholarship on populist communication.

Prosociality and health: Identification with all humanity is a replicable predictor of prosocial motivation for health behaviors

“…We acknowledge that in the U.S. context of our samples, the pandemic has been highly politicized ( Gollwitzer et al, 2020 ) with those who identify as conservatives generally more opposed to health mandates than those identifying as liberals ( DeMora et al, 2021 ; Baxter-King et al, 2022 ). This is probably not a cultural universal, given that conservative officials in some countries, e.g., Britain, played a role in enhancing their conservative constituents’ compliance with COVID-19 health recommendations ( Taraktaş et al, 2022 ), which suggests that an association between identification with all humanity and political ideology may be sensitive to cultural context and/or influenced by other as yet unidentified factors. Nonetheless, a (potential) association may be worth pursuing (cf.…”

The Demand and Supply of Pandemic Populism: A Global Overview

“…Many populist parties and leaders in power initially engaged in denial before shifting to blame-avoidance and blame-shifting. Populist leaders try to avoid personal responsibility and accountability by shifting blame onto experts, cabinet members, the media or the opposition (see also Roberts 2022;Taraktaş et al 2022). Context and responsiveness to popular attitudes is a hallmark of populist leaders and helps to explain variation across time and countries in adopting or lifting restrictions.…”

“…Unlike in a manufactured crisis (Moffitt 2015), in a pandemic, most populists in power engage in blame-avoiding and blame-shifting. Research on this shows that the key for a populist leader in power during the pandemic was to avoid personal blame by shifting blame onto experts, cabinet members, the media or the opposition (Batory 2022;Burni and Tamaki 2021;Guasti and Bílek 2022;Renteria and Arellano-Gault 2021;Ringe and Rennó 2023;Roberts 2022;Taraktaş et al 2022;Von Bülow and Abers 2022). The consequences of blame-avoidance and blameshifting are catastrophic for public healthin a pandemic, the failure of political leadership and public policy can lead to loss of life (Roberts 2022).…”

“…Right-wing populist leaders initially engaged in denial, tending to downplay the pandemic for as long as possible (Kaltwasser and Taggart 2022;Taraktaş et al 2022) before shifting to minimizing health risks and effects while highlighting the negative economic impacts of restrictive measures (Burni and Tamaki 2021; Renteria and Arellano-Gault 2021) and searching for scapegoatsexperts, minorities, refugees, media, opposition (see also Prasad 2020; Renteria and Arellano-Gault 2021; Rutledge 2020). Furthermore, populists in power tended to be 'slow to adopt any strategy to face the crisis' and adopted strategies tended to 'reinforce prior beliefs and agendas of political and administrative reforms' (Renteria and Arellano-Gault 2021: 192).…”

Magyar kormányzati szereplők digitális diplomáciai tevékenysége a Twitteren (2021-2022)

“…A digitalizáció két, egymással párhuzamos fejlődési pályán zajlott le, amelyek közül az első a diplomáciai munka, a második inkább a nyilvános diplomácia digitalizálódását takarta. Az első esetben a külügyminisztériumokkal történő kapcsolattartás, a konzuli feladatok egy része, és -ahogyan a pandémia alatt láttuk -bizonyos esetekben a diplomaták közötti tárgyalások is a digitális átállás részévé váltak (Bjola -Manor, 2022;Taraktaş et al, 2022). Ezeket a digitális fejlesztéseket a külügyminisztériumok némely esetben a költséghatékonyság, más esetben az effektivitás növelése érdekében hajtották végre (Görömbölyi, 2022).…”