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Managing digital conversations: Municipal moderation on social platforms

The aim of this study is to examine how Swedish municipalities relate to moderation practices on social media. The study is based on qualitative interviews with ten communicators within nine Swedish municipalities, which varied in size and in geographical location. The empiricism has then been coded, themed and analyzed through a thematic analysis. The analysis is supported by a theoretical framework that consists of theories relating to the municipal sector, the communicative conditions of the municipality and the municipality on social media. 

The result shows that all municipalities use manual moderation, and in two cases a technical moderation tool has also been implemented. The moderation practices are affected by resources and by how the social media work is prioritized compared to other work tasks. The study also shows that the municipalities rely on similar guidelines in their moderation work, where comments that violate these guidelines can be deleted or hidden. However, in some cases the moderation is based on former experiences and “gut feeling” in what should be moderated. It also became clear that the municipalities mostly focuses on answering questions and reminding the commenters of keeping a good tone before applying strategies such as deleting or hiding comments. They emphasize the importance of not censoring criticism directed towards the municipality. Regarding the external and internal communication about the moderation practices, it is expressed how the internal communication consists of coordination between the communicators and other departments. This was shown in the bigger municipalities, where the responsibility for the moderation is divided. The external communication varies, in some cases the guidelines and the fact that the comment section has been moderated is communicated towards the citizens. However, in some cases it is not communicated. Further it also became clear that there are tensions between encouraging a dialogue with citizens and at the same time having control over it. In order to keep the control, the municipalities in the majority of cases adjust their social media content to precede eventual moderation. The adjustments are made according to time of publishing, tonality, place and the content in posts.