Political Advertising on Facebook During the 2022 Australian Federal Election: A Social Identity Perspective

2025-11-15

AI Summary

This study examines how major Australian political parties strategically deployed Facebook and Instagram advertisements during the 2022 federal election, guided by Social Identity Theory (SIT). Drawing on Meta’s Ad Library data, it employs systematic content analysis and quantitative statistical methods to analyze temporal pacing, demographic (age, gender), and geographic targeting patterns. Results reveal that major parties prioritized reinforcing preexisting partisan identities, whereas minor parties emphasized issue-based construction of novel social identities. Advertising expenditure and reach exhibited a pronounced front-loading trend and high precision in audience targeting. The study’s key contribution lies in being the first to systematically apply SIT to digital political advertising in a compulsory voting context, uncovering divergent mobilization logics across party size and demonstrating how digital ads function as strategic instruments for voter identity construction. It thus advances theoretical understanding of electoral politics in the digital age with novel conceptual framing and empirical evidence.

Technology Category

• Humans and AI: Voting
• Game Theory and Economic Paradigms: Social Choice / Voting
• Application Domains: Social Networks

Application Category

• Social Networks and Social Media: Media and governance, opinion dynamics, filter bubbles, polarization
• User Modeling, Personalization and Recommendation: User modeling for targeted and personalized online advertising
• Web Mining and Content Analysis: Content-based information diffusion

Abstract

The spread of targeted advertising on social media platforms has revolutionized political marketing strategies. Monitoring these digital campaigns is essential for maintaining transparency and accountability in democratic processes. Leveraging Meta's Ad Library, we analyze political advertising on Facebook and Instagram during the 2022 Australian federal election campaign. We investigate temporal, demographic, and geographical patterns in the advertising strategies of major Australian political actors to establish an empirical evidence base, and interpret these findings through the lens of Social Identity Theory (SIT). Our findings not only reveal significant disparities in spending and reach among parties, but also in persuasion strategies being deployed in targeted online campaigns. We observe a marked increase in advertising activity as the election approached, peaking just before the mandated media blackout period. Demographic analysis shows distinct targeting strategies, with parties focusing more on younger demographics and exhibiting gender-based differences in ad impressions. Regional distribution of ads largely mirrored population densities, with some parties employing more targeted approaches in specific states. Moreover, we found that parties emphasized different themes aligned with their ideologies-major parties focused on party names and opponents, while smaller parties emphasized issue-specific messages. Drawing on SIT, we interpret these findings within Australia's compulsory voting context, suggesting that parties employed distinct persuasion strategies. With turnout guaranteed, major parties focused on reinforcing partisan identities to prevent voter defection, while smaller parties cultivated issue-based identities to capture the support of disaffected voters who are obligated to participate.

Problem

• Analyzing political advertising patterns on Facebook during Australian election
• Investigating demographic targeting and persuasion strategies of political parties
• Examining campaign tactics through Social Identity Theory in compulsory voting

Innovation

• Leveraging Meta's Ad Library for analysis
• Analyzing temporal, demographic, and geographical patterns
• Interpreting findings through Social Identity Theory