Another way to approach this is to look at the online profiles of leading political figures and parties. The Guardian has found that Reform gets fourteen times more engagement per post on TikTok than any of the other main political parties. Nigel Farage has as many followers on TikTok as all other MPs combined. (Less than a quarter of Labour MPs and only a handful of Tory MPs have TikTok accounts, in part due to the restriction on using the app on official devices.) The left isn’t completely out of the picture, but it is its anti-establishment figures who have gained a foothold: Zarah Sultana is the second most followed MP and Jeremy Corbyn the third, both of whom were recently ejected from the Labour Party. The fact that TikTok is a platform dominated by the young, and the young still tend to lean left in the UK (relative to their parents and grandparents) ought to make it tricky territory for Farage. Conversely, to the extent that Faragism is developing a youth wing, TikTok is likely to be playing a significant role in that.
William Davies London Review f Books 26th June 2025
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