(De)legitimizing Scottish independence on Twitter: A multimodal comparison of the main official campaigns

Abstract

The Scottish independence referendum in 2014 saw the breakthrough of online political campaigning in the UK. Despite the outcome, research and media alike concluded that the main pro-independence campaign, Yes Scotland (YS), outdid the main pro-union campaign, Better Together (BT), in the online battle. This article addresses this discrepancy by exploring how YS and BT used social media affordances in order to legitimize their own and de-legitimize their opponents’ positions. The material consists of multimodal tweets published by YS and BT in the run-up to the referendum. The article employs a model for multimodal legitimation that takes into consideration the construction of authority, moral evaluation and the construction and justifications of means and goals. The findings show that both campaigns made extensive use of de-legitimating strategies, although YS was more balanced. The article also shows that the campaigns’ communicative choices had implications for the construction and justification of goals and means, with YS running a more visionary campaign than BT.