Monetization of politics: the new frontier of equality in digital electoral campaigns
Monetization. Social Media. Political speech. Election campaigns. Electoral propaganda. Internet. Isonomy. Abuse.
Money is essential for the development of electoral campaigns. It enables advertising media, including digital media. However, voting, a right made possible by the electoral process, is a non-negotiable value. In the digital world, where political actors have access to a variety of advertising and marketing tools on social media platforms, many of which used to generate profit, maintaining a balance between the use of money in campaigns and constitutional protection against the undue influence of economic power in the electoral process presents itself as a major challenge today. In this context, would it be lawful to gain an economic advantage through the political discourse inherent to electoral campaigns? This work seeks to demonstrate the relationship between money and speech in electoral campaigns, as well as the mechanisms for containing abuse and guaranteeing equality contained in Brazilian electoral legislation. It then addresses the methods and tools for monetizing content on social networks to, in the end, demonstrate the legal implications of monetizing political-electoral content in electoral campaigns carried out in digital media.