Political storytelling of Ekrem İmamoğlu on Instagram during 2019 Istanbul mayoral elections in Turkey

Abstract

This study aims to shed light on the visual aspect of digital storytelling during elections and its effects on a candidate’s overall campaign narrative. Focusing on Turkey’s 2019 mayoral elections, the study examines how Ekrem İmamoğlu from the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), who was elected mayor of Istanbul used visual imagery in terms of political storytelling on Instagram.The study utilises an image type analysis and reports findings from 261 Instagram posts shared on İmamoğlu’s verified Instagram account during the last month of the initial election on 31 March 2019 (n = 167) and the rerun election on 23 June 2019 (n = 94). This approach reveals that İmamoğlu mostly adopted campaign works, contact with public, and positioning image types. Utilising these image types, he mainly pursued unifying and personal/biographical political storytelling narratives through visuals on Instagram. During the re-election period, he also pursued an incumbent strategy in addition to existing storytelling strategies.

DISCLOSURE STATEMENT

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

[1] The term press-party parallelism was first coined by Seymour-Ure (1974) to explain the degree of partisanship in the media. Later, Hallin and Mancini (2004) identified press-party parallelism as one of the most important elements in their typology of media systems, alongside the development of the newspaper industry, professionalisation of journalism, and the involvement of the state. New research on the Turkish media indicates deepening polarisation in news coverage, with news outlets clustering into distinct socio-political camps (see Melek and İşeri 2021).

[2] Populism has been used to describe various ideologies (e.g., left-wing, right-wing, progressive, authoritarian) in various geographies and settings. Moffitt and Tormey (2014) criticise popular definitions of populism, such as ideology, logic, discourse, and strategy/organisation. Instead, they propose the idea of ‘political style’ as a new way of thinking about the concept. They claim that this new category captures a key aspect of populism that other approaches overlook. By emphasising populism’s performative elements, they present an inductive model of populism as a political style and contextualise it within the increasingly stylised and mediatised environment of modern politics [see Moffitt and Tormey (2014)].

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Gİzem Melek

Gizem Melek is an Assistant Professor at the Faculty of Communication, Yaşar University. Her main academic research areas include political communication and climate change communication. In addition to her academic work, she is an experienced journalist who worked both in Turkey and in the UK for six years. The places she worked include Izmir Life news magazine, NTV-nationwide Turkish news network, ITV-British TV network and the British Museum’s Broadcast Unit.

Ezgİ Müyesseroğlu

Ezgi Müyesseroğlu is a graduate student in the Master Communication Programme, Yaşar University. She is also a minor student at the Department of Radio, Television, and Cinema. Ezgi graduated with honors from Yaşar University with majors in Public Relations and Advertising. Her research interests include media studies, consumer behaviors, brand strategies and consumer culture. She is also interested in political communication, especially the visual dimension of political communication.