Belgium’s most radical parties spend the most on social media campaigns

With Belgians set to vote in several key elections this year, the country’s most radical parties had most significantly increased their budgets for political campaign advertising on social media over the past year, a recently published study has found.

Belgians have a busy election year ahead of them as they head to the polls on 9 June for the EU and federal elections, followed by the municipal and provincial elections four months later.

However, according to a study that compares spending on targeted advertising on Meta-owned social media, Facebook and Instagram, far-right parties spent the most on social media campaigns.

For instance, the far-right Flemish party Vlaams Belang (ID group) increased its spending the most as increased spending by 50.6% between the first and last quarters of 2023 – with the party increasing campaign ad spending for its chairman, Tom Van Grieken, by 13.1%.

Of the 13 main parties currently active in Belgium, the six highest spenders over the past three months were – quite unsurprisingly – all Dutch-speaking parties.

Vlaams Belang was indeed followed by right-wing party NVA (ECR), far-left bilingual party PVdA PTB (The Left), the Flemish Socialist Party Vooruit (S&D), Prime Minister Alexander De Croo’s liberal Open VLD (Renew) and the Flemish Christian Democratic Party (CDNV, EPP).

Ranked only after the French-speaking Liberal Party MR (Renew) and Christian Democratic party Les Engagés (EPP), before the last Dutch-speaking party in the ranking, Groen (Les Verts/ALE).

However, while the study noted a 4% drop in overall spending on Meta-based social media by political parties, it also said that the most significant overall spender was the Flemish branch of the Belgian far-left party, which recorded a 48.2% increase.

The NVA, on the other hand, reduced its spending by 47%, even though it remained the second-highest spender.

But most interestingly, the study shows that Dutch-speaking parties spent 87% of the overall money spent by Belgian parties on social media campaigns between October and December of last year.

While Flemish parties continue to invest far more than their French-speaking counterparts, with spending being the highest among radical parties across Europe, it remains unclear whether targeted social media advertising has any real impact, as a series of studies published in July 2023 failed to prove any long-term changes in voting behaviour as a result of such advertising, according to US media CNBC.

(Claire Lemaire | Euractiv.com)