#NewNews is a research project

funded by an ERC Consolidator Grant

based at Royal Holloway, University of London

In recent decades, many new political parties have assumed positions of power in mature democracies. This signals voter demand for fresh faces, new voices, and novel political ideas. On the one hand, openness to new ideas is a necessary condition for democracy and enhances democratic responsiveness. On the other hand, new parties often prove unstable as they emerge and disappear without establishing meaningful ties with voters, thus threatening the quality of representation and of policy output.

New parties face an uphill battle. While most of them die, some survive by attracting voter attention through traditional and new media. Visibility in the media is one of the most influential factors in determining the perceived effectiveness and legitimacy of political parties for voters. It is especially critical for new parties, who often lack the political capital and established rapport with voters. Unfortunately, little is known of the relationship between new parties, media, and voters. The small number of studies on new parties pay little attention to news media, while studies on news media pay little attention to new parties.

#NewNews addresses this literature gap by examining media portrayals of new parties, how these portrayals vary, and how they matter for the election outcomes. Recent advances in computational social science make it possible to study entire populations of (often tiny) new parties and their (often scarce) media visibility in several countries over time. The project studies 19 Western democracies since 1950, seeking to answer four research questions: