This article explores the significance of perceived threats about dismemberment in Turkish politics, also called the Sèvres syndrome. Relying on a qualitative content analysis of Turkish ...parliamentary records, it scrutinises how the syndrome influences the debates about Armenians between 1983 and 2018. It demonstrates that Turkish politicians refer to the syndrome in three manners: (1) Armenians had tried to dismember; (2) Armenians could create conditions to dismember again and (3) Armenians are actively attempting to dismember. The study concludes that the syndrome presents an obstacle to a peaceful Turkish–Armenian relationship by recalling Turkish victimhood in the past and relating it to contemporary contexts.
Is oppositional behaviour in legislatures gendered? Despite a growing literature on gender and legislative behaviour, there is a conspicuous absence of research on differences between female and male ...members of parliament (MPs) when it comes to one of the key aspects of parliamentary debates: the voicing of opposition. This article connects the literature on gender and legislative behaviour with opposition scholarship. We examine the role of gender for oppositional behaviour in four legislatures with a focus on debates concerning European Union affairs. Our results show that female MPs generally are equally likely to express opposition as their male colleagues. This result, however, is conditioned by government status. Whilst there is no significant difference between the proportion of opposition expressed by female and male MPs from opposition parties, we find that male MPs representing government parties express more than twice as much opposition as their female colleagues.
Persistently alive but unaware, vegetative state patients are stuck in the transition between life and death - that is, in a liminal hotspot. This condition raises complex ethical and legal dilemmas ...concerning end-of-life action. Drawing on social representations (SRs) and the liminality framework, our research investigated how the vegetative state was constructed within the Italian parliamentary debates discussing end-of-life bills (2009-2017). We aimed to understand (1) how political groups represented the vegetative state, (2) how they legitimised different end-of-life bills and (3) came to terms with the issue of liminal hotspots. By dialogically analysing three debates (No. of interventions = 98), we identified six themes and discursive aims allowing parliamentarians to differently represent the vegetative state and support different courses of action. In turn, we identified new features of the psycho-social processes generating SRs: the dialogical tensions between anchoring and de-anchoring. Results corroborated the idea that de-paradoxifying liminality relies on group sense-making and, thus, different political leanings differently addressed the liminality of the vegetative state. We also reveal a novel feature of dealing with liminal hotspots informing the psycho-social literature that applies when a decision needs to be taken, such as in the case of crafting a law: moving from the paradox.
The success and longevity of coalition governments depends on the ability to keep conflicts between coalition members at bay. The risk of such conflicts is often assessed by drawing on proxy ...measures, such as the ideological heterogeneity among government parties. This article presents a new approach to measuring the atmosphere between government parties. The ‘coalition mood’ is a time-varying measure that draws on applause patterns between coalition partners during legislative debates. The article exemplifies the measurement approach based on automated analyses of over 105,000 plenary debates in Germany and Austria. The article then assesses the measure's face, concurrent and predictive validity. It finds the measure well aligned with qualitative evidence, shows that the coalition mood is correlated with poll ratings of the government parties and helps to predict the duration of legislative processes. The conclusion highlights future applications of the coalition mood for research on coalition politics and public policy.
Radical right populist parties have often been treated as “pariahs,” being excluded from coalition politics in parliamentary democracies. We argue that negative rhetoric targeted at radical right ...populist parties in legislative debates is used by the established parties to distance themselves from such parties and that the incentives to do so depend on the political context. Using sentiment analysis of speeches in the Swedish Riksdag from 2010 to 2022, we find that rhetoric targeted toward the radical right Sweden Democrats is more negative than speech concerning other parties on average. We also find that this negative rhetoric declined over time, particularly from the center-right parties, as the formerly marginal Sweden Democrats gained more seats and became a potential partner for cooperation. Our analysis demonstrates how tracking parliamentary discourse provides insights into changing party dynamics. Our findings suggest that, as the prospects for populists' pariah status change, rhetoric from established parties reflects this shifting role in party politics, with enduring negativity accompanied by reduced hostility among the center-right parties with the greatest potential for cooperation.
Organizations far beyond traditional academic institutions have become prolific science producers, with many now providing evidence‐based advice for national governments and policy‐makers. ...Neo‐institutional sociology explains organizations' growing investment in research activities and research‐based policy advice by the all‐embracing scientization and the expansion of the educated population, phenomena observable throughout the world. There is, however, considerably less knowledge about how the organizations' increased knowledge production and the supply of science‐based policy advice are reflected in national policy‐making, including the legislative work of parliaments, and to what extent distinct organizations are deemed authoritative in different countries. In this paper, we examine how different organizations are used as scientific authorities in parliamentary debates over new legislation. Drawing on analyses of 576 parliamentary debates from Australia, Finland, Kenya, and the United Kingdom, we study what organizations are acknowledged as scientific authorities and the relative weight of different organization types in the context of political debates over new legislation. The results reveal that while organizations in general are frequently evoked as scientific authorities in all four countries, there is remarkable variation in the types of organizations considered authoritative in different national contexts. We elaborate these findings by analysing ways in which politicians evaluate organizations as sources of scientific authority. While the same set of evaluative schemas are used in all four countries, each is typically applied to certain types of organization. The results suggest that both the supply of scientific policy advice and political culture shape legislators' rhetorical practices when drawing on organizations' scientific authority.
Abstract
While the public image of legislative debates is often less than favourable, parliamentary deliberations can be an important indicator of policy preferences, issue saliency and cohesion ...within political parties. We consider the case of a parliamentary debate that had a considerable long-term political legacy, forging a party system that endured for almost a century. The debates in the Irish parliament over the 1921 Anglo-Irish Treaty were a critical juncture that split a dominant party, resulting in, first, a civil war and, later, a new mode of party competition. We analyse the text of the debates from this period to see if they contribute to a greater understanding of the ensuing split. Few differences between the two sides in parliament are found, which might explain why few were the differences between the key actors in the party system that evolved.
•Energy policy debates include claims on desirable futures made amidst uncertainty over expected developments in energy.•Carbon neutrality is identified as a sociotechnical imaginary that unites ...political actors across governance scales.•Differences lie in the proposed means for attaining carbon neutrality.•Parliamentarians stress the predictability and stability of policy, while city councilors favor adaptive policy measures.•Analysis shows relevance of distinguishing between sociotechnical imaginaries and proposed policy paths to attain them.
This article examines how political actors at different scales present desirable governance options for reaching carbon neutrality in Finland. The analysis is based on documentary materials and speeches in the national parliament of Finland and the city council of Helsinki in the years 2011–2015. I show how in Finland carbon neutrality serves as a broad sociotechnical imaginary that unites political actors across scales. Due to its interpretative flexibility, this imaginary accommodates different pathways to attain it. While politicians in the national parliament call for a stable and predictable policy environment, politicians on the city council demand adaptive and flexible policy measures for reaching carbon neutrality. What is presented as “good policy” for carbon neutrality differs significantly across the two levels of governance. This demonstrates the importance of distinguishing between sociotechnical imaginaries and the proposed policy means to attain them.
This article will explore the differing attitudes among British parliamentarians towards the use of German soldiers in 1756 and 1776. Utilising speech act theory, it will be shown that German ...soldiers were constructed as mercenaries in 1776 because they were being employed to fight against British subjects - the North American colonists. However, when nearly identical German soldiers were employed to fight against a French adversary in 1756, they were not constructed as mercenaries. It will be concluded that the mercenary as a figure of war is not a static, transhistorical concept with universal characteristics. Rather, the mercenary is socially constructed, and, as such, is only made possible in specific historical and socio-political contexts.
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