Comments on ‘Legitimation and Strategic Maneuvering in the Political Field’

Abstract

In her paper, Ietcu-Fairclough aims at making a contribution to the analysis of strategic manoeuvring in the political field by proposing the incorporation of a sociological view of legitimacy. The author’s claim suggests that by manoeuvring strategically when they try to convince the public of the legitimacy of their actions, politicians are oriented both towards fulfilling democratic ideals and towards getting the acceptance of the majority of the people. This claim is supported by a case study of a speech delivered by the Romanian president shortly before a referendum in which the people were called upon to vote concerning the issue of the dismissal of the president after being accused by the Parliament of breaking the Constitution. The president’s speech is characterized by the author as an instance of adjudication. My comments pertain to three aspects dealt with in the paper: (a) the characterization of the president’s speech as an instance of adjudication, (b) the analysis of instances of strategic manoeuvring in the speech presented and (c) the role of the conventions of the activity type and of the rules of the political field in finding criteria for a better evaluation of the fallaciousness of the argumentative moves in the speech. In my first comment, I would like to question the correctness of judging the speech presented as a case of adjudication. The author starts from van Eemeren and Houtlossser’s (2005) view of adjudication as an argumentative activity type in the legal field and suggests that the speech delivered by the Romanian president is a case in point, because the people whom he is addressing act as a third party that judges the conflict between him and the parliament. However, taking into account only the fact that in the current case the public has to take a decision is not reason enough to consider the speech as one such instance. Moreover, as the author herself observes, in adjudication a neutral, impartial judge has to settle a dispute and the