Abstract

The research aims to identify the role of social networking sites (Facebook, Twitter and YouTube) in enhancing the trends of political participation among Iraqi youth through a field study on a sample of Iraqi university youth, the media survey method was used for a regular random sample of (150) for Kirkuk University students، In order to find out the most important issues that related to the nature of these trends and to know the reasons for using and sharing or abstaining from them, and studying its role in strengthening the trends of political participation, especially after the end of the war battles, the emancipation of the city of Mosul and the announcement of the military victory of Iraq against the terrorist organization ISIS, holding of the Iraqi parliamentary elections that led to the formation of a new Iraqi government that headed by Dr. Adel Abdul Mahdi. The study relied on the special descriptive approach to research media phenomena using the field study method for a sample of Iraqi youth and the methodological comparison method, where the study relied in its theoretical framework on the theory of the public domain and the study came out with a number of results and recommendations which revealed the following:1-The search results showed that Facebook came in the forefront of social media sites in terms of usage by 86%, followed by YouTube with 7.3% and Twitter site with 6.6%.2-It revealed that social media sites contribute to provide information on political issues at a rate of 88.6%.3-It showed that the (Facebook) website is concerned with the role of social media in deciding political participation or abstention with a ratio of 83.3%, followed by (Twitter) with a percentage of 12.6%, then (YouTube) with a rate of 4%.4-Finally, it confirmed the contribution of social media sites to presenting political issues and issues that are not raised by traditional media by 77.4%.