Laclau Research Articles

DISCOURSE ANALYSIS IN THE PERSPECTIVE OF ERNESTO LACLAU AND CHANTAL MOUFFE

This article elaborates on the discourse analysis approach developed by Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe. Laclau and Mouffe's ideas are still relatively new in the realm of communication studies in Indonesia. These two thinkers are more familiar with various contemporary political studies literature. Much of their theoretical arguments refer to the Neo-Marxist framework as well as the Post-structuralist perspective. This article provides the fundamental concepts developed by Laclau and Mouffe in assisting the broader socio-political discourse analysis. Laclau and Mouffe reject various basic assumptions from essentialism, foundationalism, discursive representationalism, and deconstructive approach. Using a critical literature review method, we examine the thoughts of Laclau and Mouffe in developing the discourse studies. Laclau and Mouffe's approach is practical for multiple communication studies such as political discourses, business communication, branding discourses, news analysis, and other social communication themes. It can be used to explore and study how, for example, a hegemonic discourse articulated in the practice of certain political discursive formation by various dominant political forces. Also, it is able to capture how a certain discursive topic negotiated and contested by various existing socio-political power. The implication can also extend to broader issues related to discursive practices because for Laclau and Mouffe, every social practice can be read from the lens of a discourse. To cite this article (7 th APA style): Narwaya, S. T. G. (2021). Discourse Analysis in the Perspective of Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe. Journal Communication Spectrum: Capturing New Perspectives in Communication, 11 (1), 1-11. http://dx.doi.org/10.36782/jcs.v1i1.2106

Deconstrucción del “malestar en/de/por la Soberanía” y su papel en una crítica de la democracia representativa

En el presente trabajo se valora la impronta de la perspectiva deconstructiva del mal en/de/por la soberanía, en la obra de Jaques Derrida, para una crítica anti-idolátrica de la democracia. Parte del estudio crítico de dos tradiciones de fundamentación contemporánea de la democracia representativa. El examen de la propuesta de democracia deliberativa de Habermas y de la concepción de radicalización de la democracia de Ernesto Laclau, las cuales permiten evidenciar la reproducción del proceso de formalización de la democracia. Ambas critican al paradigma del conflicto material de clases de origen marxista y responden con una comprensión comunicativa que parte de la centralidad del lenguaje y el discurso como práctica subjetiva consensual. A partir de la reducción del proceso subjetivo a la anterioridad preminente del discurso, la democracia deja de comprender las condiciones materiales de reproducción del sujeto corporal. Marco ante el cual valoramos el papel de la crítica al malestar de la soberanía presente en la obra de Jaques Derrida. El pensamiento derridiano en torno al Malestar de Soberanía critica la reducción de la diferencia desde una constelación categorial y metódica que implica el reconocimiento del conflicto irreductible que representa la emergencia contingencial del otro. La espectralidad como intuición comprensiva permite la afirmación de la responsabilidad ética, como base de toda posición gnoseológica, que pretenda dar condición de posibilidad a un discurso verdadero. Posición que resguarda la posibilidad transformadora del ejercicio de la soberanía a partir de develar sus procesos de represión subjetiva. Esta constelación categorial es sustantiva a una crítica de la reducción de la democracia en tanto ejercicio soberano.

Saussure and the Political Potential of Language

Although the linguistic theory of Ferdinand de Saussure is widely recognised as the forerunner of structuralism, it is often treated in the humanities and social sciences today as a stepping stone toward more sophisticated, generalised semiotics and theories of discourse. As a result, social and political implications of Saussure’s original conception of language have frequently been underestimated. Drawing from the classic lecture Course in General Linguistics and the fragmented notes collected in Writings in General Linguistics, this article offers a reconstruction of the social and political dimensions that were present, albeit in an inchoate form, within Saussure’s own theorisation. To act as a foil to the reconstructed Saussurean position, this article calls upon an essay that charts the historical development of the concept of discourse authored by Ernesto Laclau, who is perhaps the most politically oriented thinker among the many inheritors of the Saussurean legacy.

O caráter performativo das ocupações estudantis

O artigo analisa as ocupações secundaristas que ocorreram no ano de 2015 no estado de São Paulo, como reação à proposta de reorganização escolar que previa o fechamento de 94 escolas e a transferência compulsória de 311 mil alunos e 74 mil professores. Foi realizada uma pesquisa bibliográfica e uma análise teórica das ocupações destacando sua dimensão performativa. Esta chave de análise é sustentada a partir de autores como Ernesto Laclau, Chantal Mouffe e Judith Butler, que enfatizam o caráter relacional e contingente das identidades, e a importância do corpo na gramática atual dos conflitos sociais. As conclusões indicam que as ocupações dos secundaristas foram atos performativos em três dimensões: na emergência dos sujeitos (a identidade secundarista que emergiu com a ocupação); no modo de apresentar algumas demandas educacionais (a produção de novas práticas escolares que materializavam as mudanças desejadas); na inversão do assujeitamento administrativo pela criação de outro “corpo estudantil” visível, vibrante e atuante. As ocupações extravasaram os canais tradicionais e consagrados de reivindicação previstos pela democracia representativa, tornando-se um movimento disruptivo, com forte teor transgressivo dos poderes instituídos e que, por isso, desencadearam forte repressão por parte do Estado. Ao mesmo tempo, foram espaços de produção de novas formas de educação e de uma vida escolar com mais liberdade, autonomia e sentido, corporificando críticas que os jovens vêm fazendo há muitos anos a respeito das políticas públicas e dos modelos de escolarização que lhes são oferecidos.

Populism and the separation of power and knowledge

Not long ago, under the influence of Michel Foucault, one spoke of the conjunction of knowledge and power, but in this post-truth era power appears singularly uninterested in knowledge, even as the supporters of Donald Trump claim that he alone of all politicians speaks the truth. This essay proposes to examine the relations of power and knowledge under the present populist assault. This analysis begins in the work of Claude Lefort, who spoke of the separation of knowledge and power in democracy’s symbolic regime, and is then counterposed to Ernesto Laclau’s understanding of ‘populist reason’ in order to explore the present torsion of this relation to the point where power can appear not just separated from, but opposed to knowledge. It will be argued that it is less a question of post-truth than of different forms of truth with different truth claims, borne by different imperatives, and tied to different forms of representation – truth claims that can, in relation to each other, be indifferent, complementary, or conflictual. With this in mind, the essay asks: what is the relation of the people to truth? Do those who claim to represent the people seek possession of a different kind of truth? What is the relation of populism to ideology? And what is populism’s relation to ‘post-modernism’?

Recontextualization of Ideologies: A Critical Study of Tabooed Representation in Pakistani TV Dramas

Taboo is a religiously and socially prohibited practice. In a society, known for its conservative approach and attitude, several subjects have long not been discussed in a public discourse. This study explores how the media revolution of the 21st century is changing this situation by compromising and recontextualizing these taboos, as depicted through a text or talk. In recent years, the country's private TV industry has depicted some highly unpleasant topics in its dramas. The critical perspective of Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe (1985) probes deeply into the discourse of TV dramas to uncover the hidden ideologies behind the words in broader social and cultural contexts. To show this change, this study analyzes six Pakistani dramas dealing with hitherto tabooed topics to reveal the pros and cons of the growing ideological trends in Pakistani TV Dramas. First, the study outlines the significance of drama in shaping and recontextualizing ideologies. Second, it outlines certain salient taboo features applicable to almost every play. Finally, it suggests a few improvements in a bid to make things better.

Years in Cultural Studies: 1986

Since its infancy, the pluralistic tendencies of the cultural studies project denied methodological and procedural consistency and resisted any disciplining of cultural studies as an attempt at authoritarian policing. Over the course of the 1980s, cultural studies continued to spread beyond the United Kingdom to Australia and the United States, initially, and the rest of the world soon thereafter. Movements towards the bridging of the longstanding divisions between fact and interpretation—between the social sciences and the humanities—under the sign of a principled approach to cultural democracy saw the Althusserian Marxism characteristic of earlier cultural studies scholarship expanded by way of a critical re/engagement of the works of Gramsci. This period of ideological critique allowed for a bold intellectual, political commitment to the re/conceptualization of culture as a site of class struggle, hegemonic formation, and structural signification. Particularly, the year 1986 saw major strides in this direction with the publication of monumental manuscripts by Stuart Hall, Ernesto Laclau, and Chantal Mouffe.

Education populism? A corpus-driven analysis of Betsy DeVos’s education policy discourse

Scholars of political economy have raised the question of whether recent populist movements around the world signal the decline of neoliberal hegemony. What would such a decline mean for education policy, an arena that has been dominated by a neoliberal common sense for several decades? This study investigates the policy discourse of former U.S. President Donald Trump’s Secretary of Education, Betsy DeVos, in order to assess the extent to which it aligns with the neoliberal common sense or draws upon discourses of populism that have been gaining traction in the last few years. Using methods of corpus linguistics, I engage in a critical discourse analysis of 59 of DeVos’s public speeches delivered between 2017 and 2019 in comparison with a reference corpus of speeches delivered by DeVos’s predecessors in the George W. Bush and Barack Obama administrations. The findings, informed by Ernesto Laclau’s theory of populism as political logic and discourse, suggest that DeVos deploys several features of populist discourse even as she advocates policies that are characteristically neoliberal. I consider the implications of this discourse for education policy in the US.

DISCOURSE ANALYSIS IN THE PERSPECTIVE OF ERNESTO LACLAU AND CHANTAL MOUFFE

This article elaborates on the discourse analysis approach developed by Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe. Laclau and Mouffe's ideas are still relatively new in the realm of communication studies in Indonesia. These two thinkers are more familiar with various contemporary political studies literature. Much of their theoretical arguments refer to the Neo-Marxist framework as well as the Post-structuralist perspective. This article provides the fundamental concepts developed by Laclau and Mouffe in assisting the broader socio-political discourse analysis. Laclau and Mouffe reject various basic assumptions from essentialism, foundationalism, discursive representationalism, and deconstructive approach. Using a critical literature review method, we examine the thoughts of Laclau and Mouffe in developing the discourse studies. Laclau and Mouffe's approach is practical for multiple communication studies such as political discourses, business communication, branding discourses, news analysis, and other social communication themes. It can be used to explore and study how, for example, a hegemonic discourse articulated in the practice of certain political discursive formation by various dominant political forces. Also, it is able to capture how a certain discursive topic negotiated and contested by various existing socio-political power. The implication can also extend to broader issues related to discursive practices because for Laclau and Mouffe, every social practice can be read from the lens of a discourse.

Institutions and Political Strategy in Post-Marxist Discourse Theory: A Reply to Pedro Rey-Araújo

This reply to Pedro Rey-Araújo’s essay “Ernesto Laclau’s Oblivion of Political Economy” appreciates the importance of Rey-Araújo’s attempt to situate political strategy at the core of post-Marxist discourse theory (PDT) but finds several problems with the execution of this move. First, Rey-Araújo sets out to resolve PDT’s so-called “institutional deficit” but overlooks the existence of a substantial literature tackling this issue. Second, Rey-Araújo’s treatment divorces institutions from the hegemonic logics that play out within their confines. This ontological dualism negates the crucial insight that PDT brings to institutional research, notably that institutions are fundamentally discursive in nature and cannot be separated from the political processes that constitute them. Finally, this ontological dualism unduly limits the scope for strategic reflection through PDT. In postulating the inherently capitalist nature of the institutions within which hegemonic struggles play out, several potential political strategies are foreclosed.

Toward a Post-Foundational Political Economy: Economism and Private Property as Capitalism’s Contingent Foundations

ABSTRACT Post-foundational Discourse Theory (PFDT), initially developed by Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe, provides a systematic discursive perspective on political phenomena, the economy included. However, ever since Laclau and Mouffe rejected economism in their Hegemony and Social Strategy: Towards a Radical Democratic Politics (HSS), the economy as an object of study has failed to receive the attention it deserves within this strand of ideology and discourse theory. Different approaches to political economy could also benefit from an explicit engagement with PFDT. I begin by outlining Laclau and Mouffe’s post-foundational perspective to the economy. I will then return to their discussion of economism in HSS and argue against its rejection in PFDT as an object of study. Finally, I will critically examine Mark Devenney’s attempt to reinstate property as an object of importance for political theory and analysis.

Equivalence and Antagonism in Marx’s Theory of Value

The centrality of abstract labor in the Marxian theory of value seems to imply an essentialist position incompatible with Ernesto Laclau’s poststructuralist theory of hegemony. However, this essay argues that the Marxian value theory—in the interpretation offered by Moishe Postone—is in fact very much compatible with Laclau’s focus on social contingency insofar as it understands abstract labor as a framework of social relations. This raises the question: if abstract-labor equivalence does not derive from a metaphysical essence, then how does it emerge as a socially constructed universality? The theory of value already anticipated Laclau’s logics of difference, equivalence, and the empty signifier, and Laclau’s work on antagonism can strengthen the argument that abstract-labor equivalence does not involve essentialism. The central point of this essay is thus to interpret abstract labor as a contingent hegemonic formation, constituted upon the antagonistic exclusion of directly useful work.

Capitalism and Political Strategy in Post-Marxist Discourse Theory. Reply to Jacobs

In this paper, I provide a short reply to Jacobs’s critical appraisal of my previous article, “Ernesto Laclau’s Oblivion of Political Economy,” published in this journal, volume 32, number 2 (2020). There, I had argued that Laclau’s post-Marxism suffered from a marked incapacity to theorize the extent to which capitalist dynamics affect ongoing hegemonic struggles. In this regard, Jacobs argues that I implicitly resort to an ontological dualism at odds with post-Marxism’s ontological stance, from which an essentialist account of capitalist dynamics ensues. I argue that, while remaining firmly within post-Marxism's core ontological assumptions, further theoretical integration of political economy approaches is a promising path for enhancing post-Marxism’s usefulness for strategic reflection, as both of us ultimately aim to do.

Forging Unity within Diversity: A Discourse-Theoretical Approach to Nation-Building Politics in the Chinese and Taiwanese Contexts

This article presents a theoretical framework on discursive nation-building processes in the Chinese and Taiwanese contexts by drawing on key notions in the discourse-theoretical account about identity construction, hegemonic articulation and myth-building, as proposed by prominent scholars of Discourse Theory, like Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe (1985). The framework is based on existing literature as well as findings from two case studies about discourses belonging to two different epochs in Chinese history: (1) Chinese and Taiwanese media narratives about the 1997 Hong Kong handover, published between mid-June and mid-July 1997 and (2) Lectures on Nationalism, presented in 1924 by dr. Sun Yat-sen, an early proponent of Chinese nationalism.

Laclau, dependentistas and Eastern Europe

ABSTRACT This paper reconsiders an influential controversy within the Latin American development school and the possibilities of extrapolating it to Eastern Europe. It examines the relevance of Ernesto Laclau’s critique of Andre Gunder Frank’s theory of underdevelopment for the politics of development in Eastern Europe. The main controversy is about the processes through which capitalism generates underdevelopment in Latin America. The reframing of Laclau-Frank debate in a different historical and geographical context facilitates a different understanding of the political economy, economic history and development in the European periphery, but also throws a new light on the debate itself. This exercise of re-contextualisation helps reviving discussions about dependent and uneven development in Eastern Europe and provides important suggestions for enriching the research agenda on post-socialism. At the same time, it reveals the heuristic value of Laclau’s early work and of Frank’s theory of underdevelopment, but also their blind spots and un-reflected theoretical commitments.

Foundations of an Authoritarian Populism in an International Context

The rise of populism, and its subsequent challenge to liberal democratic institutions, is an ongoing feature of twenty-first century global politics. The author contends that providing college students with theoretical tools to untangle the relationship between the logic and practices of domestic populist political movements and liberal democratic institutions empowers them to analyze critically those challenges and consider the extent to which populism is indicative of prior institutional failure. The work of Antonio Gramsci and Ernesto Laclau are used to develop a model of populism appropriate for advanced undergraduate international relations students. The cases of the Tea Party, Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign, Victor Orbán’s rise in Hungary demonstrate the dynamics of the model and its relevance to the study of international relations and foreign policy.

The Mythologisation of the Migrant Issue in the Federal Republic of Germany as a Result of the 2015 European Migrant Crisis and Its Effect on Changes in German Migration Policy

This article deals with the process of mythologisation of the migrant issue in the Federal Republic of Germany during the period 2014–2018. The research started with the fundamental question of how selected German media represented the immigrants from predominantly Muslim countries who came to Germany during and immediately after the 2015 migrant crisis. The media content on migration and extremism was selected from the available online archives of the following German newspapers: Berliner Morgenpost, Deutsche Welle, Die Zeit, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, and Freie Presse. Using the discourse theory of Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe as the research model, three master signifiers were selected from the analysed articles: immigrants, German jihadists, and German far-right extremists. Further analysis suggested that myths were the most influential type of signification and a dominant way of dealing with the critical situation caused by the 2015 migrant crisis. As a result of that situation, the following myths were produced: the open-door myth, the myth of Islamisation and the new myth of the East. In the analysed material, references to historical German myths, like the border myth and the stab in the back myth, were also recorded. This research aimed to determine the relation between of the process of mythologisation during and immediately after the emergence of the 2015 migrant crisis and the changes in German migration policy. Furthermore, the role of hegemonic discourse was explored, especially in situations where it was used to alleviate cultural conflict and social polarisation in times of crisis.

Contesting Welfare Discourses in Post-New Order Indonesia

This article analyses the contestation of 'welfare' discourses in Indonesia since the fall of the New Order, employing the discourse theory offered by Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe in their Hegemony and Socialist Strategy (2001 [1985]). Its main argument is that welfare is an “empty signifier”, the meaning of which may shift or change as a consequence of the unfinished discursive contestations of various subject positions. This article identifies four central discourses, or master signifiers, between 1998 and 2015 that serve as “nodal points” in the hegemonisation of welfare: "Social Safety Net", "Creative Innovation" versus "Electoral Strategy", "Sustainable Development", and "Right of the People and Constitutional Obligation of the State". The dominant and hegemonic meaning of welfare, understood here as a “nodal point”, is only temporary; it is partially fixed, while at the same time experiencing ongoing discursive contestation. It is, is being, and will be subjected to unending dislocation.

Politics as construction of the unthinkable

Abstract This article is the English translation of a text originally published by Ernesto Laclau in French in 1981 as part of the proceedings of the colloquium Materialités Discursives held in Nanterre on 24–26 April 1980. In this text, Ernesto Laclau reflects on the subject of hegemony as a discursively constructed phenomenon. Building on research on the discursive construction of the acceptability of popular front politics in 1935 during the Seventh Congress of the Komintern, the author proposes a number of broader arguments on the notion of antagonism and on some of the problems related to the Marxist conception of totality.

An introduction to the special issue on ‘Discourse Theory: Ways forward for theory development and research practice’

Abstract This article introduces the special issue of the Journal of Language and Politics on ‘Discourse Theory: Ways forward for theory development and research practice.’ In this introduction we discuss the aims and structure of this special issue focused on the development of the poststructuralist and post-Marxist discourse theory originally developed by Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe.