Elections Campaigns in an Era of Post-Truth Politics: Implications for Research & Policy

Over the last decade, the nature of election campaigns and political communication around the world has undergone a marked shift. Driving this shift has been the increasing use of new media technology by political parties and their growing reliance on the services of 'spin-doctors', political consulting firms, pollsters, and big data analysts. While these new techniques of electioneering have enabled politicians to target voters to an unprecedented level of precision, it has also given a fillip to the circulation of misinformation and conspiracy theories in the public sphere, promoted the ethically dubious practice of mining of voters' personal information, and led to declining perceptions of electoral fairness.

How do we understand these changes? Are they simply the result of technological change alone? Or, do they indicate a much deeper shift in the meaning and practice of democratic politics?

And, what implications do these changes have for the future of democracy? Answering these questions forms the central problématique of my research.

To address these questions, my research focuses on electoral and party politics in the world's largest democracy - India. While many scholars and commentators have analysed aforementioned changing nature of electioneering in advanced industrial democracies and have labelled it as the 'professionalisation of politics', hitherto little attention has been devoted to studying this phenomenon in the Global South.

My doctoral research is one of the first academic interventions in this debate in context of a developing country, and in doing so I challenge the assumption that the professionalisation of politics is the result of technological change and/or socio-political modernisation alone. Instead, I argue that the technologies and actors implicated in this process are part of a deeper shift in political culture through which democracies are rendered less participatory and more oligarchic.

To show this, my doctoral research takes the readers to the 'backstage' of democracy in India - the arena of planning, strategizing, and deliberations that takes place between political elites and their advisors and strategists. Paying attention to this 'backstage' and the people who control its reins of power reveals the organisational machinery that lies behind the circulation of conspiracy theories, targeted disinformation, and 'fake news' that has become ubiquitous in contemporary democracies.

During the course of my fellowship, I aim to consolidate my research by way of publications intended for both academic and non-academic audiences. A brief period of additional fieldwork will also enable me to better understand how the professionalisation of politics is unfolding at the sub-national level in India. I am particularly keen to explore how the findings from my research can be used to inform policy solutions on how election campaigns and the activities of political parties can be better regulated and monitored.

While many scholars have previously attempted to provide policy-based solutions on this topic, their primary focus has been on edifying the consumption of political propaganda by voters. Instead, I intend to explore how the production of political propaganda can be better regulated and monitored. Since the production of political communication by parties is sequentially prior to its consumption by voters, a focus on the former provides a better vantage point to guide regulatory solutions.

By further developing this strand of my research, I anticipate that my scholarship will be able to promote positive social and political change - in India and elsewhere.