The activity of party youth wings on Instagram during elections: Innovation or normalization?

Social media have brought new and exciting possibilities for political communication, potentially bringing politicians and voters closer together. However, there is no consensus on whether digital platforms have revolutionized campaigning or if they represent an extension of offline patterns. This article seeks to contribute to this debate by exploring party youth wings and Instagram; a political structure and social network that is understudied in political communication. A content analysis was carried out on the social media activity of the youth wings of Portuguese political parties during two elections: the 2021 Local Elections and the 2022 Legislative Election. The analysis was based on a sample of six hundred and eighty-one publications. Contrary to expectation, the results revealed that youth wings mainly communicate within a logic of normalization and did not take advantage of the potential of digital platforms for political communication.