If I could be convinced then I would have a lot of questions about our society, specie and civilization.
Isn't it more likely Facebook is just the designated scapegoat for everything going wrong in elections and politics ?
Of course there are also hundreds of other factors deciding the outcome, so Facebook isn't special in any way.
So it's perfectly possible to feed 10000 voters their personally crafted propaganda and have nobody else even aware that it is happening.
1. You'd have to know that 10 000 votes is missing.
2. You'd have to know how to target those 10 000 missing voters (criteria).
3. You'd have to craft very specific messages based on your criteria to determine who they are.
4. Now, hoping that those criteria are fit you have to hope that the message you crafted is going to be seen and noticed by your prospects.
5. Message noticed ? Good, how did you craft a message that would make up many voter's mind without being obvious ?
6. Who cares, you just have to convince the team running the campaign that social network marketing converts. That's the real skill.
For me the answer is yes and yes, and I would be surprised if Facebook does not have a major effect on elections.
Newspapers, radio and TV believe they have that power (we have been studying that since the 30's) but it's really not that simple. Last I checked it's still word-of-mouth and close IRL peer influence that works.
> And do you understand microtargeting?
Unfortunately, yes.
It works, and it probably has the largest effect, but that doesn't prevent other things from working. If you factor in that IRL influence is hard to manufacture, whereas you can just buy ads on various platforms and show them to lots of people, mass advertising can easily come out ahead in terms of cost.
Now, don't get me wrong. Selling cigarettes or other things through influencers, social network ad campaigns and social network campaigns work for some products. Elections ? I'd like to see the numbers and I'd be happy (and scared) to change my opinion.