Vox populi, Vox Băsescu. Strategii argumentative şi de manipulare în discursul preşedintelui Traian Băsescu din 25 ianuarie 2012
Vox populi, Vox Băsescu. Argumentation and Manipulation Strategies in the Speech of President Traian Băsescu on the 25th of January 2012

Summary/Abstract: Political life is structured in political discourses, ideological and electoral platforms, political doctrines and symbols, in order to convince and attract adhesions. The political discourse is closely related to a certain event and its purpose is to take over or legitimize political power. The essay focuses on the speech of president Traian Băsescu of the 25th of January 2012, thirteen days after a series of street manifestations held in Bucharest and all around the country. “The intervention with the Romanian people” is the consequence of people’s protests and tries to justify the president’s role as a mediator in solving group conflicts. Besides the theoretical section in which political discourse, political communication and argumentation are defined, the paper aims at describing and interpreting political discourse and the means used to create argumentation. In order to identify the main features of the discourse and of the argumentation and manipulation strategies, a method is used which relies on three levels of the discourse: the morpho-syntactical level, the lexical level and the rhetorical level. As a result of the analysis, several argumentation techniques were identified that are directed at the effects of political discourse. The president’s speech is inciting and populist and its verbal and nonverbal components give the audience a state of anxiety. A pertinent analysis of the speech reveals a series of strategies of argumentation and manipulation which reflect a diminishing power of public communication of the president while trying to legitimate the power. Even though it is meant to be anchored in the reality of nowadays Romania, president Băsescu’s speech to the people is a failed intervention in his attempt to synchronize himself with the voice of the people and cosmeticize the crisis.

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