External-Facing Communication on Social Media During the Russia-Ukraine Conflict of 2014

Although communication with audiences abroad is important for movements based in regions with complicated geopolitical contexts, it has received limited research attention. To address this gap, we collected and analyzed English-language tweets posted during the Russia-Ukraine conflict of 2014, focusing on understanding the content and practices associated with external-facing communication on social media. Based on the political alignment of tweets and users, determined by hashtag projection, we divided the data into discourses associated with the opposing pro-Ukrainian and pro-separatist movements, along with a neutral discourse. Through topic modeling and qualitative coding, we identified 21 diverse themes across the three discourses, suggesting that users could benefit from more targeted ways of engaging with social media content that enable focused participation. We observed that the pro-Ukrainian movement struggled to sustain long-term participation and compete with inauthentic content. Our findings could be useful for investigating external-facing communication of other online social movements, which have become increasingly prevalent.