Policy-making by tweets: discursive governance, populism, and Trump Presidency

Osman Şahin,Richard Johnson,Umut Korkut

doi:10.1080/13569775.2021.1935009

Osman Şahin, Richard Johnson + Show 1 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1080/13569775.2021.1935009

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Abstract

ABSTRACT Experience in various countries demonstrated that populist leaders enfeeble democracy. Once elected, populist leaders concentrate power in their hands while undermining horizontal checks on their power. By drawing upon the Trump presidency in the U.S., this article reveals one of the dynamics in which populist leaders bypass institutions of horizontal checks in policy-making. It argues that populist leaders use social media platforms to disseminate discourse to convince people that a certain course of action is necessary and thereafter bypass formal institutions in policy-making. Trump used discourse first to discipline the federal bureaucracy, second to roll back Obama-era social and environmental regulations, and third to reorient the US migration policy. His discourse became pervasive thanks to his efficient use of Twitter, which allowed him to achieve political change without going through formal institutional channels.

Highlights

The world has witnessed a global decay of liberal democracy (Appadurai, 2017; Mounk, 2018)
Drawing upon the discursive governance framework developed by Korkut et al (2015), we argue that populist leaders use direct mechanisms of governance informed by narratives, leitmotifs, and strategic metaphors embedded in political language, as tools to bypass formal institutions in policy-making
Departing from Searle’s (2010) interpretation of speech acts as the basis of all institutional realities, we present the construction of language with strategic slogans and subsequent framing with the use of these slogans as crucial tools to inculcate ideas in line with the goals of the political entrepreneurs in charge

Summary

Introduction

Political entrepreneurs benefit from informal forms of communication and increasingly turn to social media platforms (e.g. Twitter) to disseminate their discourse, and to sustain their dialogue without mediation of established institutions They use slogans, symbols, and metaphors to shape political and social representations within the public sphere in accordance with their own political goals (Korkut & Eslen-Ziya, 2016). Trump introduced discourses to bypass institutions of horizontal accountability, and fell out of formal policy-making mechanisms as a result It is quite clear how his metanarrative evolves to produce a subsequent political agenda. We examine four case studies of discursive governance in the Trump presidency to elaborate on political appointments, rolling back social and environmental regulations, and migration policy. The institutions had, once again, empowered discursive governance rather than impaired it

Conclusion

Findings

Notes on contributors