Supported by the Digital Ecosystem Research Challenge
At glance
In this last weekly report, we present a synthesis of the highlights from the tweets of political party candidates on Indigenous issues throughout the election campaign. First, we note that the most popular words are crise in French and reconciliation in English. With regard to these two words, in particular reconciliation, it must be said that it is a term that has really grown gradually over the past few weeks. From the third week on, for example, we saw how this word appeared in both French and English tweets. So it is not surprising that at the end of the campaign this word became the most popular. It is worth noting that from one week to another the popularity of words has changed, except for the words enfants and communities which have been able to maintain their popularity over two consecutive weeks, in this case the third and fourth week. As for hashtags, from the beginning of the campaign to the end polcan in French and elxn43 in English remain the most popular. This reality in relation to hashtags also reflects a certain stability since the beginning of the campaign in relation to themes that are really predominant.
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Number of Tweets
The New Democratic Party (NDP) has maintained its unwavering leadership by positioning itself at the forefront in the production of its candidates’ tweets from the beginning to the end of the campaign. For the Liberal Party and the Green Party, we have seen a somewhat elbow-to-elbow evolution, but with a rise in the Liberal Party, especially at the end of the campaign. So, overall, the Liberal Party and the Green Party shared second place by exchanging positions from one week to the next. As for the Conservative Party, there was never much interest from its candidates on Indigneous issues throughout the campaign. Further analyses will then be conducted to determine whether this is a strategic choice or a real lack of interest in these issues. The Bloc Québécois is the one with the lowest number of candidates in these elections, which could explain, to some extent, its position, which has not changed too much during the five weeks. In fact, the Bloc ran in only 78 of the ridings. Nevertheless, we can see, especially towards the end of the campaign, a rise of the Bloc that does not place it too far from the Conservative Party.
By analyzing the number of tweets per day and per political party, we see that the NDP was able to achieve its predominance gradually, starting at the end of the first week and taking off completely during the third week. The diagram below shows that left parties such as the NDP and the Green Party have generally given more importance to Indigenous issues than right and centre parties such as the Conservative and Liberal Parties. It must be said here that this is a trend that has been confirmed during the five weeks. Moreover, when we look at the daily trend, we see that candidates seem to align themselves with the positions taken by their party leaders. Thus, on the day following an important debate or statement by a party leader on Indigenous issues, there is an almost systematic increase in the number of tweets.
On the diagram related to the number of tweets per day, we see that this is a gradual evolution. While at the beginning of the campaign, candidates seemed more shy in producing tweets, as the campaign progressed, they showed greater interest in Indigenous issues. The other aspect that we would also like to recall concerns the days following the debates. The figure below shows that there is a peak in the number of tweets the day after a debate or the day of a major event such as a major media announcement. This corroborates the remark previously made regarding the positioning of candidates in relation to their party leader’s strategy. Further analysis subsequent to this report will allow these observations to be further developed.
Number of Tweets by Province
At the provincial level, there is more stability in the number of tweets. Ontario continues to lead week after week, followed by British Columbia. However, a new fact during the last week that we have noted concerns Quebec, which ranks third in the number of tweets and is placed in the 100-200 tweets category, whereas before it was in the 0-100 tweets category. Apart from this aspect, there is consistency in the position of the other provinces with respect to their number of tweets. The majority of provinces still fall into the 0-100 tweets category.
Number of Tweets by Riding
Since the beginning of the campaign and as shown on the map below, it seems that the candidates in the northern ridings of the provinces and the country have published the largest number of tweets. This makes some sense when we consider that the largest proportion of Indigenous people live in these areas. However, as we zoom in the map, we notice that urban ridings are among those with more tweets, such as Hamilton East-Stoney Creek, Winnipeg and Ottawa Centre. At this time, it is difficult for us to explain why municipalities such as Hamilton East-Stoney Creek, Timmins-James Bay, Churchill-Keewatinook Aski and Ottawa Centre are among the most prolific municipalities in terms of tweets. Thus, we refute the initial hypothesis that the proportion of the Indigenous population in the ridings would explain the number of tweets related to Indigenous issues. As part of our upcoming more in-depth analyses, we will be able to delve further into these aspects.