Suchergebnisse

Transnational activism has increased in relation to international trade and development politics in the past decades, yet their power has been inadequately studied. This article analyses the STOP EPAs campaign (2004–2009) which aimed to influence the negotiations of Economic Partnership Agreements between the European Union and African, Caribbean and Pacific countries. It is analysed through a framework in which decisional and discursive power converge. It is argued that the campaign contributed to shaping the negotiations' discursive practices and, thus, helped to frame what was possible in terms of decisions. It did so by both reproducing and challenging underlying assumptions of trade and development policies, fostering the inclusion of more voices and issues in debates, and shaping subjects' identities. It was in the 'play of practice' that activism opened limited but important spaces for change, as observed in the discussions over what a pro-development World Trade Organization-compatible free trade agreement would entail.

This book refines the discursive theory of democratization by juxtaposing the elite and lay discourses in post-Soviet Russia (1996-2008). Through examining how Russians position themselves as political subjects, the analysis demonstrates that Russians rarely identify as true democrats.

Preliminary Material -- Note on political party names in English and Latvian -- Foreword /Maria Golubeva and Robert Gould -- Some Recent Discourses of Exclusion in the EU /Robert Gould -- Baltic Media Structures and the Influence of Media /Auksė Balčytienė -- Latvian Print Media as Opinion Leaders /Anda Rožukalne -- Latvian Political Party System and the Discourse on Political Parties /Iveta Kažoka -- The Construction of Ethnic Political Identity and the Mechanisms of Exclusion in the Latvian-language Media /Anda Rožukalne -- The Discursive Construction of "Russian-speakers": The Russian-language Media and Demarcated Political Identities in Latvia /Ammon Cheskin -- Multiculturalism as Imperialism: Condemnation of Social Diversity within a Discourse of Threat and Blame /Maria Golubeva -- Moral Superiority and the Soviet Stigma: Parliamentary Speech and Attribution of Blame in Political Discourses /Maria Golubeva and Iveta Kažoka -- Afterword /Maria Golubeva and Robert Gould.

Posting about one's children and family has become a routine practice for mothers on social media. The task of presenting oneself as a "good" mother is subject to the trouble of competing requirements around motherhood (e.g., neoliberal intensive mothering, feminine relationality) as well as family ideals which are unrealistic for many. These troubles are further complicated by sharenting discourses in which parental posting is seen as digital narcissism. This study examines mothers' identity work in their talk about posting family photos to social media. Twenty mothers aged between 24 and 50 were interviewed using their family photo posts as interview stimulus. Using a feminist poststructuralist framework, the data were discursively analysed, paying attention to how identity trouble was produced and repaired in three constructions of mothers' photo sharing which included: emotionally connected mothers; digitally relational mothers; and proud mothers. In these constructions, family photo posts were constituted as a selective process which performed relational work to rhetorically manage the networked audience by deflecting conflict. This included the digital repair of offline troubled identities to present oneself as "good" whilst avoiding class-based othering. How these findings offer a challenge to predominant problematisations of digital mothers is discussed.

The COVID-19 pandemic has brought into sharp focus the power of discourse – especially the discourse of the powerful. More than ever, we need to carefully scrutinise the words and storylines produced by political leaders and other influential social actors. Understanding leadership as a mediated activity performed in situ through discourse, this Article Collection focuses on how powerful political leaders across different geopolitical contexts including Germany, India, New Zealand, South Africa, UK and USA used discourse and media to 'do' leadership during the pandemic. The papers in this Article Collection showcase political leadership discourse enacted across a range of media including social media and mass media. Employing a variety of discourse analytical methods and frameworks, they reveal the kinds of discursive strategies that the leaders utilised to enact authority and agency, to win public support, and to present themselves as effective political actors in the context of a global crisis.