The document analyzes the Twitter presence and behavior of Belgian political figures from January to August 2015. It finds that 82% of the 70 figures analyzed have a Twitter account, with most joining when taking a ministerial position. The most active tweet in Dutch and French. Theo Francken, Didier Reynders, and Bart Tommelein tweeted most frequently, often around controversial events. Charles Michel, Theo Francken, and Johan Van Overtveldt were the most mentioned on Twitter, correlating with their level of responsibility.

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Methodology
The aim ofthis study wasto analyse the Twitter presenceand behaviourof political figuresfrom the
different Belgian governments.
It shouldbe noted that the sample chosenwasrestricted to Belgian figuresworking in oneof the
governments (atFederal, regional orcommunity level). Asa result, the studydoes not present a full
and representative pictureof the entire Belgian political communityon Twitter. Some opposition
parties (suchasGroen) are extremely active on Twitter but obviouslythis is notreflected in the
study.Likewise, certain political figures(suchasVincent Van Quickenborn,Open-VLD[Open
FlemishLiberalsand Democrats],forexample) werenot includedin the sample because they do not
or nolonger have a government mandate. The objective ofthe study wasto examine the behaviour
ofthe Twittersphere in relation to the actionsor positions ofgovernment members. This studyalso
included Partyand Assembly presidents.
We choseto focusonthe socialnetworkTwitterforthisstudy fortworeasons: the API ofthis social
networkmakes it possible to requestpublished tweets, whichis more complicatedon other social
networkssuchas Facebook.In addition, a few years ago Twitter became a real political tool,
particularly during election campaigns.It therefore seemed particularly interesting to analyse this
channel.
The period analysed in the first part ofthe study was from 22 May 2015 to 20 August 2015; focusing
ona three-monthperiod allowed usto carry outa more detailed qualitative analysis ofthe tweets,
withoutthere being toohigh a volume. We make several comparisonswitha longerperiod (1
Januaryto 31 July) in order to identify behavioural trends/changes.
Inthe secondpart, we concentratedoninteractions between the political personalities analysed. To
do this, wefocusedonanalysing their retweets: whoretweets whom?Retweets allow us to identify
those figureswhoappear in the ecosystem ofthe people weare analysing (toput it simply, those
whoare likely to appear in their timeline and capturetheir attention).Forthis part ofthe study,the
period was extended from1January 2015 to 31 July 2015 in order to make the most important hubs
stand outin the diagrams.
This study wascarried out using Auguresolutionsand in collaboration with the Augureresearch
department, AugureLab
Overview of political figures on Twitter

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Who is on Twitter?
Ofthe 70 political figures analysed, 58 have a Twitteraccount,i.e.82%.
Those whohave been on the social networkthe longest are:
 ElioDi Rupo, accountcreatedon 16 April 2007
 Hervé Jamar,accountcreatedon13May2007
 André Antoine,accountcreatedon8November 2008
2007wasmarked by a historic defeat forthe PS (Socialist Party) in the Federal elections and it was
then that Elio Di Rupodecided toconcentrateon managing the party. Hervé Jamar and André
Antoineboth occupieda Ministerial position in the governmentin 2007.The early appearance of
these politicians onTwitter (asa reminder, the social networkwas foundedin the United States in
2006) canbeexplained bythe seniority of their positions.
By contrast,those whosigned upto the social networkmost recently are:
 Cécile Jodogne,accountcreatedon 4 December 2014
 DidierGosuin, accountcreatedon 18November 2014
 DanielBacquelaine,accountcreatedon13November 2014
In2014,Cécile Jodognewasappointed Secretary of State of the BrusselsRegion and Minister for
COCOF (theFrenchCommunityCommission) and Didier Gosuin wasappointed Brussels Minister for
Employment, the Economy,Firefightingand Emergency Medical Assistance.Daniel Bacquelaine
became Federal Minister for Pensionswhenthe government wasformed on11 October 2014.The
factthat these three people joinedthe social network in 2014canbeseen as coincidingwiththem
taking up their new positions.
There seems to be a correlation between joiningTwitter andthe position ofMinister, as the profiles
analysed joinedthe network whenthey became Ministers. Today, this is of courseduein large part
to the social network’s reputation,as it has become vital for political figuresto have a Twitter
presence.
Who analysedfromthe panel is noton Twitter?
 AntonioAntoniadis
 Karl-HeinzLambertz
 RachidMadrane
We foundTwitter profiles correspondingto these three people, butunfortunatelythere was no
identification (photo,description, etc.) andthey were not active.
Example showingthe profile of Karl-HeinzLambertz:

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This "vagueness" on certain accountshighlightsthe importance of completingyour Twitter profile
(photo,description,link to yourParty,geolocation, etc.) and havingit verified. It is important for
public figures to have their Twitter accountsverified,as they have a tendencyto be parodied.
The example ofElioDiRupo:
Ofall the accountsanalysed, only sevenwere verified(comparedwith 51 not verified). This practice
does notseem particularly widespread, even thoughit offersa guarantee ofquality for"official"
accounts.
Otherpoliticalfiguresnot on Twitter:

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 Benoît Lutgen
 Marie-Christine Marghem
 Joëlle Miquet
 HaraldMollers
 OlivierPaasch
 Jan Peumans
 CharlesPicqué
 Isabelle Weykmans
We couldnot findany Twitter accountsforthese people. We did, however,find discussionsin which
they were mentioned via hashtags.This showshow important it is for political figures to be on
Twitter, as it allows them to checkwhat is being said about them.
Example ofBenoît Lutgen:
What are the most commonly used languages in tweets by the people
analysed on Twitter?

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Politicians tweet in their ownlanguage. Asthere are fewer members ofFlemish governments (just
one regional government in Flanders apart than the Brusselsgovernment, comparedwith one
regional government and one governmentfor the French-speakingcommunity),wecanassume
that activity is even more intense on the Dutch-speakingside, a fact corroboratedbyother recent
studies.
Women vs Men
16women onTwitter, 15 ofthem active, outofthe 19womenamong the political figuresanalysed.
84% of womenon Twitter,94%ofthemactive
42 men on Twitter, 38ofthem active, outof the 51 men analysed
82% of menon Twitter,90%ofthemactive
The most active women onTwitter were Hilde Crevits(343tweetsduring the period studied),
ZakiaKhattabi(326tweets) andGwendolynRutten(225).
The least active were Eliane Tillieux(23tweets),Elke Sleurs(53tweets) andIsabelle Simonis(57
tweets).
Politicians’ Twitter activity
Flemish- 56%French - 32%
English- 9%
Other - 3%

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The mostactive over the period studied
1. ThéoFrancken(averageof 9tweets a day)
2. DidierReynders (average of7 tweets a day)
3. Bart Tommelein(averageof6.2 tweets a day)
To have an idea of behavioural trends duringthe period analysed, wetried to assess the average
number oftweets per day by the political figuresanalysed (relationship between the number of
tweets and the date they created their account).Usingthisapproach,the three most active
personalities were:
1. DidierReynders (approximately 5.6tweetsaday)
2. FadilaLaanan(approximately4.9tweetsaday)
3. SvenGatz(approximately4.7tweetsaday)
Bart Tommelein was in 5th
position with anaverage of4.2 tweets a day and Théo Franckenwasin 8th
position with anaverage of3.3tweets a day.
To try and understandthe origin ofthese different tweeting frequencies,we examined whichdays
had seen a publication peak duringthe period studied (from22 May 2015to20 August2015):
We observed a peak in the activity ofTheo Franckenaroundlate July/early August.Thispeak
correspondedtothe controversy(ongoing,incidentally) regarding the hosting ofrefugees in
Belgium. The Minister's declarations prompted a great deal ofresponse, particularly on Twitter. He
considered that there wastoo muchemotion surroundingthe drowningofthe refugees.
0
10
20
30
40
50
Tweetsby Theo Francken
Tweets
27 July 2015
6 August2015

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Asregards Bart Tommelein, the activity peak correspondedtothe Secretary ofState’s proposal to
impose fines if privacy rules were breached.
Conversely, those least active onTwitter were Maxime Prévot,Bart de Wever and Jean-Claude
Marcourt.
0
10
20
30
40
Tweetsby Bart Tommelein
Total
8 June 2015

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References to politicians on Twitter
Which politicians were mentioned the most?
1. CharlesMichel
2. TheoFrancken
3. Johan VanOvertveldt
The high numberof references toTheo Francken mirrored his activity peak and the controversy
surroundinghiscomments onthe refugees.
Charles Michel is Prime Minister. We noted that the level ofresponsibility is correlated with the
number ofreferences: thosepolitical figures with the most powerare mentioned the most often.
Moreover, Charles Michel has been the first one announcingtheagreement foundwithGreece…on
Twitter!
Inthird position was JohanVan Overtveldt. This result is not surprisingin view of the period studied.
The government validated its tax shift on23July; the subjectwasdiscussedextensively on Twitter
and the FinanceMinister wasmentioned a great deal.
CHARLES MICHEL(evolutionofhis mentionson Twitter)
0
500
1000
1500
2000
2500
July 13,2015: Grexit

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THEOFRANCKEN(evolutionofhismentionson Twitter)
JOHANVANOVERTVELDT(evolutionofhis mentionson Twitter)
Those mentionedthe least
1. Maxime Prévot
2. Pieterde Crem
3. René Collin
There is a certain degree of correlation between the numberof referencesto people andtheir
activity level: those whoare notvery active are mentioned less thanthose whoare active.
Followers – who has the most followers?
0
200
400
600
800
1000
1200
August 6, 2015: politcal refugees
0
100
200
300
400
July 23, 2015: tax shift

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Average number of followers
Top three accountswiththe most followers (thenumberof followersstated isthatof 20 August)
1. ElioDi Rupo 187,319
2. DidierReynders 64,077
3. AlexanderDe Croo 58,613
Politicianshave anaverage of13,855 followers.
However the medianis 4,389followers.
Elio Di Rupowasthe clear leader with regard to the number offollowers.As wesaw at the beginning
ofthis study,the President ofthe PS is one of the figureswhohave been on Twitter the longest and,
as a result, he has gained a great deal of experience in usingthe network.Butit is primarily his
position as Prime Minister (beforebeing replaced by Charles Michel) that explains his large number
offollowers. AsCharles Michel "only" has around48,000 followers, it will be interesting to see how
this number increases over the nextfew months.
Didier Reyndersand Alexander De Crooalso have a great deal of Twitter experience (they have been
present since 2009).Furthermore,AlexanderDeCroois responsible fordigital technologyin the
government;all (oralmost all) digital fanatics are on Twitter and logically wantto follow the
Minister responsible forthis subject!
Numberof followers of official parties:
When welook at the breakdownin the number offollowers of each political party, wecan see that
the PS is nowherenear in the lead. Elio Di Rupocurrentlyseems tobe the Party'srepresentative on
Twitter.
PS
6%
OpenVLD
15%
CD&V
12%
N-VA
18%
MR
8%
Groen
13%
Vl.Belang
4%
cdH
2%
Ecolo
8%
sp.a
13%
FDF
1%
Party followers

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The hashtags used in their tweets
Are the mostactive figures those who use the mosthashtags?
Accountsthat use the most hashtags:
1. TheoFrancken
2. DidierReynders
3. Bart Tommelein
Here, we cansee the correlation between activity levels and the use ofhashtags. The most active
figures are those whoembrace Twitter codes andadd hashtags to their tweets.
Hashtags – Tagcloud
The hashtags politicians use in their discussionsshow that these discussionsdo indeed centre on
politics! The subjectofthe Tax Shift also comesup, as wehave already mentioned, as do Greece and
the Third International Conferenceon FinancingforDevelopment whichtook place in Ethiopia from
13to 16July 2015.
The hashtag 11juliindicates that there were several conversationson the subjectofthe festival of
the Flemish community.

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Relationships between Twitter accounts
Aswe mentioned in the introduction,in this study we focusedona longer period (1January to 31
July) in orderto bring to light thekey discussion hubs.To analyse the relationships between
accounts,wefocusedprimarily on retweets.
The diagram below showsthe key conversationhubs.These hubs wereidentified by analysing
retweets by people fromthe analysed panel and those whoretweeted them. The more important
the hub,the more the accountwasretweeted.
Why retweets? Retweets allow usto see whopeople sourcetheir information from;we retweet
people whoappear in ourtimeline andthus reveal relationships between people.
Inthe chart below,we used an algorithm that showscommunities (highlighted by colour),i.e.
groupsofpeople andTwitter accountswithhighlevels of interaction.

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Ifwe now use colourtohighlight Twitter accountsaccordingtotheir membership ofa political party,
we noticethat wefind the same communities. Interactions are therefore more intense between
people from the same political party.

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APPENDICES
The most followed
The most active
1. ElioDi Rupo
1. Theo Francken
2. Didier Reynder
2. Didier Reynders
3. Alexander De Croo
3. Bart Tommelein
4. Charles Michel
4. Charles Bourgeois
5. Kris Peeters
5. Tom Van Grieken
6. Paul Magnette
6. Hilde Crevits
7. Gwendolyn Rutten
7. Zakia Khattabi
8. Annemie
Turtelboom
8. SvenGatz
9. SiegfriedBracke
9. Michel Charles
10. Hilde Crevits
10. Alexander De Croo
11. Wouter Beke
11. Gwendolyn Rutten
12. Rudy Demotte
12. Fadila Laanan
13. Johan Van
Overtveldt
13. Wouter Beke
14. SvenGatz
14. SiegfriedBracke
15. Fadila Laanan
15. ElioDi Rupo
16. Olivier Chastel
16. Meyrem Almaci
17. Charles Bourgeois
17. Patrick Dupriez
18. Jean-Claude
Marcourt
18. JoVandeurzen
19. Joke Schauvliege
19. Christine Defraigne
20. Koen Geens
20. Willy Borsus
21. JanJambon
21. Bianca Debaets
22. Ben Weyts
22. Joke Schauvliege
23. Bart Tommelein
23. André Flahaut
24. Philippe Muyters
24. JanJambon
25. JoVandeurzen
25. Philippe Courard
26. Theo Francken
26. Jacqueline Galant

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27. Paul Furlan
27. Paul Magnette
28. Meyrem Almaci
28. Johan Van
Overtveldt
29. Rudi Vervoort
29. Annemie
Turtelboom
30. Jacqueline Galant
30. Didier Gosuin
31. Pieter De Crem
31. Céline Frémault
32. Céline Frémault
32. Philippe Muyters
33. Tom Van Grieken
33. Pascal Smet
34. StevenVandeput
34. Daniel Bacquelaine
35. Zakia Khattabi
35. Cécile Jodogne
36. Carlo Di Antonio
36. Kris Peeters
37. André Flahaut
37. Isabelle Simonis
38. Willy Borsus
38. Elke Sleurs
39. Hervé Jamar
39. Olivier Chastel
40. Eliane Tillieux
40. Rudi Vervoort
41. Bianca Debaets
41. Christophe Lacroix
42. Maxime Prévot
42. Ben Weyts
43. Philippe Courard
43. Rudy Demotte
44. Olivier Maingain
44. Olivier Maingain
45. Pascal Smet
45. Koen Geens
46. Christophe Lacroix
46. StevenVandeput
47. Elke Sleurs
47. Hervé Jamar
48. Daniel Bacquelaine
48. Eliane Tillieux
49. Patrick Dupriez
49. Carlo Di Antonio
50. René Collin
50. Pieter De Crem
51. Isabelle Simonis
51. Jean-Claude
Marcourt
52. Didier Gosuin
52. Paul Furlan
53. Cécile Jodogne
53. Maxime Prévot
54. Christine Defraigne
54. René Collin

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