While the recent UK election might’ve fallen short of being a political social media revolution, British politicians aren’t done with social media experiments yet. It’s clear that UK political leaders are hoping to line themselves up as social media leaders, at least in the political space, and the impact of social media on this past election was just a first step. And, as is to be expected, some of these first steps will be shaky – but they appear to be headed in the right direction.
Forming a coalition government is usually a rocky path to begin with, but it certainly doesn’t make it any smoother when certain key members vent their frustrations on Facebook. According to the Telegraph, one of the Liberal Democrats’ coalition negotiators repeatedly attacked his party’s coalition partners, the Tories, on his Facebook page prior to May 6th’s election.
David Alexander used his Facebook to claim that, “The Tories won’t make life better for ordinary people. Their manifesto offers only fake change not the real change this country desperately needs. The truth is that you cannot trust the Conservatives.” His harsh words were apparently on his Facebook wall during March and April, but as of May 12th they have been removed.
It is inevitable that some politicians will be caught up in a digital “paper trail” of sorts if they don’t watch what they type. Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Youtube… all of these social networks act as a personal brand. Alexander is certainly not the first, nor the last, politician to regret venting his frustration on a virtual public forum.
However, all is not bleak for the UK political elite’s use of social networking as a whole. The new Prime Minister, David Cameron, has completely revamped his government’s social media strategy upon being accepted by the Queen as Britain’s leader. Before appointing his cabinet or even fully moving into 10 Downing Street, Cameron and his team have streamlined the government’s social media offerings.
They have changed their accounts to have a single, shared username: Number10Gov. The UK government can now be easily found on their home webpage, Flickr, Twitter, and Youtube using this name. And the changes appear to be more than simply superficial: they have updated their Twitter with a link to their Flickr account for photos of the Prime Minister’s first full day in office, and they are in the process of combining their news feeds onto their iPhone app as well.
The UK government appears poised to follow the Obama administration into the realm of heavy-hitting political social networking. Consolidating everything into a single username and actively using Twitter and other social media channels to keep the public in the loop are two steps in the right direction for Cameron’s newly formed coalition. While there may be some bumps along the way with rogue politicians or social media fumbles, it is clear that UK politicians want to more actively engage their citizenry in the online political arena. And any additional transparency, whether through photos on Flickr or a Twitter campaign, only bodes well for the mixture of politics and social media.
