ABSTRACT
Research has shown that social media is a particularly well suited channel for distributing populist messages. However, the literature has yet to examine the kinds of reactions that populist messages trigger in social media and whether populist leaders garner more online support than political leaders who do not promote populist views or communicate in a populist manner. This chapter addresses these questions. This chapter defines populist communication, reviews recent research findings and describes the results of an analysis of Facebook posts and tweets of 36 political leaders in six countries.
