Fear Management as a Communication Strategy of the Civic Platform in the 2023 Election Campaign: An Analysis of Posts Published on the X Platform

Abstract

This article examines the strategic use of fear in the political communication of Civic Platform (CP) during the 2023 parliamentary election campaign in Poland. The analysis focuses on posts published on CP's official account on the social media platform X (formerly Twitter). The study draws on theoretical frameworks related to the culture of fear (Bauman, Furedi), social systems theory (Luhmann), and Martha Nussbaum’s typology of fear. The primary objective is to identify the thematic focal points and discursive strategies employed to construct perceptions of threat and to articulate representations of the political enemy. The findings demonstrate that CP systematically employed oppositional “us–them” narratives, using fear as a tool for electoral mobilization. The analyzed content was predominantly affective in tone, emphasizing the alleged incompetence, hypocrisy, and systemic destructiveness of the ruling party. Fear was not confined to a single domain of social life but was instead framed as a pervasive and multidimensional phenomenon.