Negotiating Political Responsibility in Times of National Tragedy

Abstract

This paper examines the way political responsibility is constructed through discourse by Romanian politicians in the Web 2.0 era. Drawing on an analytical framework proposed by Augoustinos, Hastie and Wright (2011), based on discursive psychology, and critical discourse analysis, this paper analyses the Facebook messages released by the main political actors in Romania, after the Colectiv nightclub fire. The empirical endeavour is guided by two research objectives: to analyse the discursive strategies used to create discursive identities, to assign political responsibility and to express solidarity with the victims; and to analyse a specific kind of rhetoric, the political apology, focusing on its pragmatic and linguistic features and on the emotion categories (empathy, sympathy, anger, guilt, sadness) deployed to deliver the apology. The results of the study show that when faced with a situation where the offender is hard to define, political actors prefer the use of another speech act: the expression of solidarity and compassion. While the political apology is offered only after and explicit demand, the expression of solidarity is offered promptly and willingly.

Keywords

• political apology
• discourse analysis
• CDA
• Romania