Two political science professors at Bentley College, a business college in Waltham, Massachusetts, have examined Facebook as a campaign tool and come up with fascinating results.

Christine Williams and Jeff Gulati analyzed the way Facebook helps candidates reach college students, who constitute a "longstanding recruiting pool for campaign workers."

The goal of the study is to "determine whether candidate postings on the site are a useful viral marketing tool for generating publicity, campaign contributions, and ultimately votes."

Facebook has made it easy for candidates to create profiles; in fact, for the 2006 election Facebook created a profile for every congressional and gubernatorial candidate; they left it up to the campaigns to personalize the profiles with pictures and background information.

Likewise, it's easy to for users of Facebook to find candidates:

Facebook members find candidates' entries and register support by going to a section of the site called Election Pulse and then searching for the candidate by name, party, or geographic location. Facebook displays the number of supporters for each candidate and calculates the percentage of "votes" that candidate has in their race. Members also have the opportunity to post comments on the candidate's "wall" and invite their friends to become supporters.

It's all pretty straightforward, and the goal isn't just to get students to view the profiles. "It is not a matter of simply reaching this demographic; that same demographic must be mobilized to act on the information by volunteering, contributing financially, and ultimately registering and casting a vote," Williams says. This is social networking, so the goal is not to reach individuals, but networks of friends who might not be immediately interested in politics. Says Gulati,

Facebook members who are undecided or not very interested in politics can become engaged by viewing a friend's or classmate's profile that prominently displays support for various candidates and causes, right along with their list of favorite bands and sports teams."

So how many candidates -- who had profiles created for them -- have taken advantage of Facebook? According to the study,

36 or 25% of candidates for U.S. Senate have posted their own profiles: 17 Democrats, 11 Republicans, 8 minor party candidates and independents;

139 or 12% of candidates for U.S. House of Representative have posted their own profiles: 74 Democrats, 54 Republicans, 11 minor party candidates and independents;

52 or 43% of candidates for state Governor have posted their own profiles: 32 Democrats, 14 Republicans, 6 minor party candidates and independents;

10 or 36% of Senate incumbents running for reelection have posted a profile; 51 or 13% of incumbents from the U.S. House; and

16 or 64% of the listed candidates for Governor have personalized their profile.

Senate candidates with the largest number of supporters are: Hillary Clinton, NY, Democrat (6,971); Bob Casey, PA, Democrat (5,328); and Ned Lamont, CT, Democrat (4,093).

The House candidates with the largest number of supporters are: Tammy Baldwin, WI, Democrat (913); Dennis Moore, KS, Democrat (863); and Patty Wetterling, MN, Democrat (693). The Republican with the most support and ranked 9th overall is Speaker Dennis Hastert, IL, with 580 supporters.

Candidates for Governor with the largest number of supporters are: Kinky Friedman, TX, Independent (9,363), Dick DeVos, MI, Republican (5,732), and Ted Strickland, O, Democrat (5,092).

We look forward to more reports from Williams and Gulati, who plan to interview and conduct a survey of candidates and supporters who use Facebook and other social networking sites.

Tags: campaigns, dennis hastert, facebook, hillary clinton, kinky friedman

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