POLITICAL RHETORIC
INTRODUCTION .............................................................................................................................................. 5
RHETORIC WAS CENTRAL TO ANCIENT DEMOCRACY .......................................................................................................... 5
CLASSICAL RHETORIC: DISCOVERY & ARRANGEMENT ................................................................................... 12
ANCIENT RHETORICAL CLASSIFICATIONS AND TECHNIQUES:.............................................................................................. 12
CLASSICAL RHETORIC: STYLE & DELIVERY ...................................................................................................... 21
CLASSICAL RHETORIC ............................................................................................................................................... 21
ANCIENT RHETORIC – CONCLUSION ............................................................................................................................ 30
MASS MEDIA & RHETORIC ............................................................................................................................ 31
THE MEDIATIZATION OF RHETORIC ............................................................................................................................. 31
THE RHETORIC OF POLITICIANS .................................................................................................................................. 36
THE RHETORIC OF MASS MEDIA ................................................................................................................................. 39
MEDIA: CURSE OR BLESSING FOR POLITICAL RHETORIC? .................................................................................................. 44
RESEARCH METHODS IN POLITICAL RHETORIC .............................................................................................. 45
RHETORICAL POLITICAL ANALYSIS (RPA) ....................................................................................................................... 45
QUANTITATIVE CONTENT ANALYSIS (QCA) .................................................................................................................. 49
EXPERIMENTAL RESEARCH ........................................................................................................................................ 51
OTHER METHODS ................................................................................................................................................... 53
EMOTIONS AND INCIVILITY ........................................................................................................................... 54
PERSPECTIVES ON EMOTIONS IN RHETORIC................................................................................................................... 54
INCIVILITY IN POLITICS .............................................................................................................................................. 59
EMOTIONAL RHETORIC: CURSE OR BLESSING................................................................................................................. 61
THE RHETORIC OF POPULIST LEADERS AND PARTIES ..................................................................................... 62
WHAT IS POPULISM ................................................................................................................................................ 62
ELEMENTS OF POPULIST RHETORIC ............................................................................................................................. 64
USE OF POPULIST RHETORIC ...................................................................................................................................... 68
GENDER EN RHETORIC .................................................................................................................................. 69
GENDER INEQUALITY IN POLITICAL RHETORIC ................................................................................................................ 69
FEMINISM AND RHETORIC ........................................................................................................................................ 72
GENDER ROLES AS A RHETORICAL MEANS TO PERSUADE .................................................................................................. 73
VISUAL ......................................................................................................................................................... 74
VOX POP ............................................................................................................................................................... 74
THE IMPORTANT OF VISUALS ..................................................................................................................................... 74
THE IMPORTANCE OF VISUALS ................................................................................................................................... 75
VISUALS & MEDIA ACCES.......................................................................................................................................... 75
VISUALS & MEDIA CONTROL ..................................................................................................................................... 76
IMAGE AS ARGUMENT ............................................................................................................................................. 76
CONVEYING LOGOS ................................................................................................................................................. 77
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, CONVEYING ETHOS ................................................................................................................................................. 78
CONVEYING PATHOS ................................................................................................................................................ 78
THE PSYCHOLOGY IF VISUALS ..................................................................................................................................... 79
JOURNALISTIC BIAS: IN THE VISUALS? .......................................................................................................................... 79
GUEST LECTURE: HOW PERSUASIVE IS SIMPLE ELITE COMMUNICATION? EFFECTS ON LIKE-MINDED AND
POLARIZED AUDIENCES – INTEGRATIVE COMPLEXITY ................................................................................... 80
CONTEXT: A CHANGING POLITICAL RHETORIC ................................................................................................................ 80
FRAMEWORK: INTEGRATIVE COMPLEXITY .................................................................................................................... 81
THEORETICAL MODEL .............................................................................................................................................. 82
EXPERIMENTAL TESTS OF THE MODEL .......................................................................................................................... 83
CONCLUSION ......................................................................................................................................................... 87
GUESTLECTURE: DELIBERATIVE DEMOCRACY ................................................................................................ 88
WHAT’S THE DEMOCRATIC PUZZLE ............................................................................................................................. 88
WHAT ANSWERS DO WE HAVE NOW AND WHAT MIGHT BE SOME AILMENTS WITH IT? .......................................................... 88
A GAME................................................................................................................................................................ 92
WHAT COULD BE AN ADDITION TO WHAT WE HAVE?...................................................................................................... 93
IF IT WORKS, HOW CAN WE “CLICK” IT INTO OUR EXISTING INSTITUTIONS? ......................................................................... 94
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,POLITICAL RHETORIC
The importance of political rhetoric
● No politics without persuasion
o Political parties are trying to persuade voters, but also each other (implement certain
policy plan) à full of actors trying to persuade each other
▪ We are also trying to persuade politicians e.g., a protest for climate change
▪ Politics is full of actors trying to persuade each other
● Reason: uncertainty so there need to be guidelines, legislations, rules, …
o = if everything would be clear, what our policy goals are and what the best means are
to reach these goals, then we don’t need politics
o
● Different types of persuasion
o By force (put someone in prison)
o By speech à somehow more powerful form of persuasion (ex. in totalitarian regimes
as China/ Russia)
● The fundamental political skill
What is rhetoric?
● < Greek ‘retoriketekhne’
o Rhetor = speaker
o Tekhne = art
o = the art of speaking
Studying rhetoric = learning the practical skill of persuasion
Studying rhetoric = studying the persuasiveness of speech
● Not limited to spoken words (oratory)
o Written word
o Visuals
Political rhetoric
● Many areas of rhetorical studies
o Law, organization studies, …
● Persuasion in the political realm
● Not limited to politicians but also activists (ex. Emma Watson – speech about gender equality
for the United Nations but also the media!)
● “What makes a political speech persuasive (or not)?”
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,Warm-up exercise
● “Most famous persuasive speech in history” à Martin Luther King – I have a dream
o = Activist leader of civil rights movement
o August 1963
o March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom
o 100 years after Emancipation Proclamation (Lincoln)
● Elements that make the speech persuasive
o He is reminding the audience of the past – historical facts
o It’s authentic & is close to his audience, he himself is black (he calls it ‘my people’)
o He’s referring to the policy that has failed, the signing of the Declaration of
Independence
o He is hopeful for the future & is reflecting that on his audience (he uses words as
hope, a new begin, together, justice, freedom)
o He is not offensive against the white people; he calls them ‘white brothers’ – he
strives for an equal world
o He is tackling the issues in society by giving examples as police brutality, children that
are not safe on the street, black people that can’t vote in Mississippi
o Repetition of his words ‘I have a dream’ – people will keep it in mind
o He speaks for the whole country; he is describing the situation in a lot of American
states – so it is recognizable for everyone
o He’s very convincing; good intonation, he learned his speech by heart
Answer:
● Credibility as a person:
o Who he is
o Displaying eloquence expertise
● Arousal of emotion
● Use of rhetorical devices
o Repetitions
o Allusions
o Rhyme
o Methaphors
● Convincing arguments
● How he speaks (loud, clearly, intonation, rhythm, rich vocabulary)
A diverse research field?
● Different background, different questions
o Linguistics (e.g. rhetorical figures)
o Psychology (e.g. emotions vs. the cognitive)
o Political science (e.g. questions of power)
o Communication science (e.g. mass media)
● Each with their own terminology & research methods
● Difficulty: they don’t always talk to each other
● This course: eclectic approach
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,INTRODUCTION
Rhetoric, a contested notion – een omstreden begrip
● Words often associated with rhetoric: “mere”, “empty”
o Rhetoric is contrasted with reality
▪ Politicians don’t keep their promises
▪ E.g.: article big tech’s pro-climate rhetoric is not matched by policy action,
report finds – although many of these big companies like Facebook and
Apple make promises about climate. But when it comes to their actual lobby
expenses only 4-6% goes to lobbying about climate.
o Association with danger - Can people be persuaded of anything? (Violence,
misinformation)
▪ E.g.: Article divisive political rhetoric a danger to the world, Amnesty says -
Trump
▪ E.g.: YouTube to remove all anti-vaccine misinformation
● At the same time: no democracy without free speech
RHETORIC WAS CENTRAL TO ANCIENT DEMOCRACY
● Greece, 500 BC à from an aristocracy to democracy
(In the democracy also farmers could now enter the debate)
o Demos = people (the rule of the people)
o Ekklesia = the assembly where all citizens gathered to discuss issues of public interest
● Highly participation system
o Status of being citizen comes with status but also with obligations
à It was not acceptable in ancient Greece if u wouldn’t take your responsibilities to
participate indeed actively
Quote: “Here each individual is interested not only in his own affairs but in the affairs
of the state as well: even those who are mostly occupied with their own business are
extremely well-informed on general politics – this is a peculiarity of ours: we do not
say that a man who takes no interest in politics is a man who minds his own
business; we say that he has no business here at all.” - Pericles
● Rhetorical skills were important to ordinary citizens
● There were special teachers to teach citizens to use rhetorical techniques: Sophists
o Sophos = wisdom
o E.g., Gorgias, Protagoras
● Culture of oral transmission
à In Greece people went to see comedians and to hear them speak, and there was respect
for a person that speaks well.
● Different views of classical thinkers
5
, PLATO
● The biggest critic against this all came from Plato – he doesn’t like the democracy ‘shit’
● Classical thinker/ philosopher
● He beliefs in one moral “truth” and people are not able to see this
o Allegory of the cave à we (the people) only see the shadows of the real things that
are outside the cave. Only those who are very smart and wise can go out the cave
and can see the real nature of things and can see what the truth is
o Only a small elite can see it
o Only the intelligent one’s amongst us can go out the cave
● Rhetoric is empty and dangerous
à if we can’t see the truth then this practice of just let everyone speak and persuade each
other can lead to dangerous things
o It can persuade most people of anything; a “rudderless boat”; “sophistries”
o Can do bad instead of good (death of his mentor Socrates)
▪ Contempt to death: he spoke to youth and educate them à the people
thought he was a danger to society (what does he do, they didn’t trust
them)à he had to drink some poison
▪ Plato was very touched by this, so he became very skeptical of public rhetoric
(that they could decide on such a bad thing as killing)
● “The Republic”: ideal society
o Society should be based on reason
o Strict division: philosopher-kings should be involved in rhetoric, but all the other
people shouldn’t like guardians and traders (they just had to do in what they were
good at namely either being in the military or as guardians or dealing with trade and
minding their business)
o He hated the Ekklesia because this could lead to bad decisions
● Ideas were later criticized (e.g. Popper)
à totalitarian society: a small elite have all the power to decide (anti-democratic)
● More sympathetic reading: argument for alternative type of rhetoric (dialect)
o Dialectic: not 1 person giving a speech (1 point of view and trying to persuade) à all
the points of view that you can take and then making a reasoned decision considering
all the different arguments who has the best argument
Less strange: in the economic crisis some say that we should leave it to technocrats
instead of to political actors e.g., climate change experts à long term decisions/policy
(political actors will be punished during elections)
o Cf. technocracy today
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