An Ambidextrous Communication Strategy: Policy Makers vs Citizens

Abstract

This paper is a qualitative research, deals with studying which communication strategy is used by politicians, whether explorational, exploitative, or ambidextrous communication and how citizens, instead, view such strategy choices carried out by politicians. Moreover, the study analyzes whether ambidextrous communication strategies allow citizens to achieve greater knowledge and awareness regarding sustainability issues (SDGs), compared to what occurs if the politician uses a different communication strategy.

The Study 1 was conducted through a semi-structured interview to Italian parliamentarians (senators and deputies) of the XVII and XVIII legislatures. The number of parliamentarians who agreed to the interview was 24 parliamentarians.

In the study 2 a survey was conducted on a sample of Italian citizens through various communication channels, mainly through Whastapp and Facebook. The final aim of survey to identify whether the joint use of both communication channels may reinforce citizens’ awareness about sustainable development goals. The citizens what responded to the survey were 289.

The results of the two studies show that the use of ambidextrous communication strategy, ie the joint use of the exploitative and explorational communications, is preferred by politicians to the use of only one of the strategies and that there is a positive correlation between the ambidextrous communication strategy of politicians and greater awareness of citizens about sustainability issues (SDGs). These results demonstrate that the hypotheses identified are supported.

Although this study has significant implications for how politicians should communicate, it also has different limits.