Political Communication and European Parties in EU Election 2024

The 2024 European elections took place in a complex and uncertain scenario, with multiple crises (economic, migration, pandemic, war) affecting citizens' daily lives in the EU. This, coupled with rising support for anti-European populist parties and a nationalist identitarian backlash, has led to a public debate where the pro-/anti-EU cleavage is a key factor in determining party competition and citizen engagement. Pre-election polls show that anti-European populists will gain the top position in Italy and eight other member states (Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, France, Hungary, Netherlands, Poland, Slovakia), and come in second or third in nine countries (Bulgaria, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Latvia, Portugal, Romania, Spain, Sweden) (Europe Elects, 2024). The election results have confirmed a shift to the right in the European Parliament, marked by the growth of nationalist parties and those critical of certain European policies. Nevertheless, the growing importance of EU policies and the relevance of European-level issues in national political and media systems suggest that the phase of European Parliament elections as "second-order" elections (Reif and Schmitt 1980) has eroded. The impact of the European elections on internal political equilibrium and the European political configuration is significant. The primary objective of the present research study is to respond to the following research questions: what kind of Europe is portrayed in the election campaigns of European parties? What are the main topics discussed? Are policies or values discussed in general terms? The analysis was based on data from 1712 posts on X platform from two months prior to the election. Despite the loss of a significant number of users following the change of ownership, the social network continues to serve as a pivotal medium for communication among political actors and the media, playing a crucial role in shaping the discourse surrounding the European election campaign. This underscores the importance of its role and influence in the context of political communication (Prior 2024, Burson 2023, Mazzoleni, Bracciale 2018). A standardized code was employed to categorize social media posts based on the following criteria: type of content (images, videos, news articles, etc.); source (self-produced, provided by the party, EU organization, journalistic content, scientific/expert sources, others); external links; hashtags used for cross-referencing.