Trump’s Rhetoric on Social Networks and the Dominance of Computerized Propaganda

Abstract

In the digital age, the Internet is the dominant tool for realizing political strategies. The potential of computerized propaganda was made possible, especially by social networks, through which it is possible to network contacts on a global level. Given that billions of people around the world are active on social networks every day, political strategies must be implemented through them to achieve political interests. The term political manipulation takes on a new dimension in the digital environment, taking technological advantages and ubiquity of internet users on networks. One of the world's most famous politicians who has intensively used digital platforms to propagate political views is Donald Trump. The main goal of this paper was to investigate the dominant patterns of use of social networks for political propaganda, primarily Twitter, from Trump's official Twitter account. The paper pays special attention to Trump's rhetoric, apropos his language and style of expression on social networks, with special reference to the 2016th year during the election campaign. The results of the analysis show that the use of social networks by Donald Trump, his PR management, and Facebook and Twitter analysts, largely contributed to Trump's campaign to become the 45th president of the United States. Dominant patterns of Trump's use of social networks were based on attacks on political opponents, as well as on self-promotion. The analysis found that Trump's rhetoric was based mostly on insults, criticism, inappropriate vocabulary, and lies to achieve dominance over opponents.