Use and Utilisation of Instagram as a Method of Institutional Communication, Transparency and Citizen Participation: The Case of Alicante City Council

The digital era has transformed political and institutional communication, and with it the use of social networks in this process. A revolution that has been accelerated by the Covid-19 pandemic and that is transforming the communicative relations between local institutions and citizens into a bidirectional one where transparency, participation and the channelling of citizen demands become important. In this context, it is essential to study and understand what communicational methods and tools institutions use in social networks and under what communication strategies, stories and narratives. To this end, this study analyses the Instagram social network profiles of Alicante City Council and its mayor through multimedia content analysis of the publications of the first half of 2021. In addition, the Instagram elements used by the accounts, the communicative strategies and stories and their media impact are analysed. Through this study case is possible to observe the communicative errors of local institutions in the use of social networks, as they are still in a process of adaptation, and the discursive and strategic differences between institutional social networks and those of political representatives.