The influence of social media on Turkish public opinion in relation to foreign affairs: A case study of the Russian plane crisis (2015)

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Tezin Türü: Yüksek Lisans

Tezin Yürütüldüğü Kurum: Orta Doğu Teknik Üniversitesi, İktisadi ve İdari Bilimler Fakültesi, Uluslararası İlişkiler Bölümü, Türkiye

Tezin Onay Tarihi: 2017

Öğrenci: ÖZGÜN ERSİN

Danışman: EBRU BOYAR

Özet:

This thesis focuses on explaining the influence of social media on public opinion in relation to foreign affairs and analyses the alternative consciousness, which is the confusion that social media and the internet create in people. With bans and other restrictions imposed by the Turkish government, the internet has increasingly been perceived as an effective field for opposition. Examining the reception, intepretation and dissemination of views and messages through Twitter about the shooting down the Russian fighter plane by the Turkish air forces near Syrian border in 2015, this thesis investigates to what extent the social media has become a novel platform to discuss various political issues and to produce alternative opinions and to what extent the social media merely has turned into another tool of propaganda to manipulate public opinion in Turkey