In the digital age, student politics has moved onto screens, instead of poster races on corridors and packed out rooms for hustings , it's become a battle for followers, likes, and story views. A change that has brought about both opportunities and unseen consequences for student democracy at UCD.

By Grainne Glynn | Feb 23 2026

Traditional campaigning, handing out flyers, canvassing face-to-face and hanging posters, is now only one part of how student election campaigns operate, and is a slowly dying performance. Voters now spend much of their social life online. Platforms like Instagram have been seen as the primary channel for engaging with targeted audiences, with candidates using posts, stories, reels and Q&A sessions to broadcast their messages. At UCD, the Student’s Union (UCDSU) itself encourages candidates to connect through its official Instagram handle, showing how important the platform has become in election visibility.

Yet this use of social media has exposed a fundamental disconnect between candidates and students. Our campus is not alone in this popular campaigning strategy. As seen in other colleges, the development of Instagram pages with hundreds of followers to reach students highlights how social platforms can become the central playground for attention while in-person interaction diminishes. Similar in the UCDSU elections, the trend is shown. Campaigns gain a decent digital engagement, shares, likes, mentions, often see far lower actual voter turnout. This result is where online visibility does not move into real-world participation, leading to elections decided by a small dedicated group of voters (most commonly the campaign team and their friends).

This brings about the question of apathy in student politics, that familiar phrase “lack of student engagement” and the historic complaint of that many students feel detached from SU events and governance, even when they see these campaigns on their algorithm. A common thought on campus may even be; what does the Student’s Union actually do, a problem that social media alone can not fix.

There are a few factors to consider when looking at this disconnect.

The Algorithmic engagement, as social platforms rewards content that draws attention, humour, visuals, quick soundbites, rather than deep policy discussion. Instagram features like reels and stories were designed to maximise whatever short moments of engagement they can, rather than sustained attention to manifesto details that may or may not be acted on once the position has been achieved. This can mean that campaign content ends up competing with memes, cat videos, and entertainment driven posts, impacting its influence to inform decision making.

Students often consume social media passively, allowing whatever news the algorithm decides is important to find them instead of actively seeking it out, a trend that’s been well documented. This passive engagement may create awareness without any political efficacy, that feeling that one’s vote or voice truly matters.

Platforms like Instagram divide audiences by their interests and interactions, reducing the chance that any single campaign message reaches a broad range of students. Online platforms often reinforce existing preferences rather than broaden them and combined, these factors can result in campaigns where follow counts and likes feel like support, even when the actual turnout remains remarkably low.

At UCD, this digital focus has led to Instagram followings taking a major role in how candidates promote themselves. A candidate who posts stories every day with snippets and Q&A sessions may attract hundreds of digital followers creating the perception of a wide appeal. However, when the election day arrives those same followers might not show up.

On Instagram, the promises appear polished and emphatic, large commitments to change student life, challenge university spending, and a push for affordability. Graphics declare “real change” in bold colors, captions speak of action. But when the term finishes, the most visible achievement online can sometimes be a well-executed seasonal event rather than the structural shifts once implied. It suggests that a platform built on optics and followers the algorithm may reward what photographs well over what decisions were well made, and in the economy of likes and shares, hosting an event can end up standing stronger than the harder, quieter work students were told to expect.

This trend also carries risks. Social media changing political debates into soundbite-driven exchanges instead of sustained complex policy discussions. Superficial or performative campaigning can put off students, and the most common one the assumption of a large following to electoral visibility. These are some challenges that appear in every student election in the digital age, as evidenced by recent controversies at other universities where social media usage, and even guidelines about what platforms may be used with election purposes, become points of debate.

For student politics to remain meaningful in an age dominated by screens, student unions and candidates may need to think beyond their Instagram follow counts. That may mean integrating offline engagement with in-person meet ups, debates, and community events, it may mean helping students discern meaningful political content from soundbites, or embracing multiple platforms while pushing for a deeper discussion that a single post allows.

Social media isn’t just a tool, it’s shaping how students understand, digest, and relate to politics. For UCDSU and other student representative bodies, the challenge isn’t whether to use Instagram, but how to use digital platforms without letting them replace the human engagement student politics so desperately needs.