INTELLECTUAL ORIGINS OF DISCURSIVE ANALYSIS IN POLITICAL STUDIES

Abstract

The article studies the intellectual origins of a discursive approach in political science. Attention is drawn not to the process of discoursive approach formation (which was formed in the 1960s–1970s under the influence of the “linguistic turn”), but to the many themes of thought that developed and had a decisive influence on the solution of the problem of language non-neutrality in the perception and reproduction of political relations. In many respects, the reliance on different traditions predetermined the inconsistency of the notion of discourse. We are interested not so much in direct referrals (this would lead to the compilation of a very voluminous list that allow little to understand), but rather specific intellectual borrowings in the form of identifying a problem field, marking out, distinguishing and denoting the research space. What does it mean to study language as a non-neutral dimension of comprehension and re-actualization of political processes? Analytical philosophy would draw attention to the logical structures of the language, German linguistic philosophy – to the “world view”, provided by the basic structure of everyday language. Formalists would make a research in text narratives, while structuralism insists on basic structures and provides “langue/parole” model. Semiotics is a general science about symbols, which provides specific meta-language, whereas “phenomenological tradition” is based on the idea that a language plays constitutive role in the process of the intersubjective interactions and creation of social relations.