Navigating coercion in political rhetoric: shifting strategies to cope with intervention by the Troika in Portugal

Abstract

ABSTRACTThis article examines how government actors of a nation-state cope with coercion exerted on them by an external source and how they evolve justifications and persuasive arguments when debating and reporting new policies in a setting that threatens to compromise national sovereignty and integrity. We approach the question by analyzing two diverse political arenas: parliamentary debates and public accounts by political leaders in the media during the intervention by the Troika in Portugal. The study evidences a variation in strategies to manage coercion: the politicians use both depoliticization and relativization. While discourses of depoliticization are frequent in media, in parliamentary debates the predominant strategy is to emphasize the aspect of agency by relativizing the power of the Troika. Both strategies serve to portray responsibility in the face of external intervention, but in different discursive environments political actors use different rhetorical tools to work on their institutional appearance and legitimacy.