Notes

This paper will be analyzed using the concept of Soft Power, but it will focus on Twitter Diplomacy or Twiplomacy. As explained by Nye (2008), Soft power is the opposite of hard power, which generally prioritizes military efforts that tend to suppress and coerce. Besides, soft power will create a discourse to attract the public, and thus, it will affect specific output. Even though there are many types of execution of soft power, the most common one is diplomacy. Yet, in fact, diplomacy also has numerous variations, such as public diplomacy. But these days, traditional diplomacy or public diplomacy has slowly shifted due to the development of technology and cyber. For example, Twitter is not merely a social media platform anymore as it has turned into a powerful political tool, it now became one of digital diplomacy, which is also known as Twitter Diplomacy or Twiplomacy.

The process of Twiplomacy is basically as simple as using Twitter as a social media to tweet and share one's thoughts, but the person who shares these tweets are state actors; the president and vice president, the ministry, diplomats, or other politicians. And the content of the tweet would talk about politics, such as current world events or new policy frameworks. This kind of strategy could provide a free and online space for discussion as it is open to the public, which means anyone from any place will be able to jump into the discussion and share their opinion.

More interestingly, this Twiplomacy was used by two candidates in US Presidential Election in 2016; Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton. Both of them were actively sharing their policies, strategies, and campaigns on Twitter to gather more supporters during the election process. Hence, we use this concept to analyze in-depth the role of Twitter in supporting the US Presidential Election in 2016.

Chhabra, R. (2020). Twitter Diplomacy: A Brief Analysis. ORF Issue Brief No. 335. Observer Research Foundation. https://www.orfonline.org/research/twitter-diplomacy-a-brief-analysis-60462/
Nye, J. S. (2008). Public Diplomacy and Soft Power. The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 616(1), 94–109. https://doi.org/10.1177/0002716207311699