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Methodological Approaches in Political Psychology: Discourse and Narrative

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The Palgrave Handbook of Global Political Psychology

Part of the book series: Palgrave Studies in Political Psychology Series ((PSPP))

Abstract

In his speech formally nominating US president Barack Obama for re-election at the 2012 Democratic National Convention, former President Bill Clinton used the power of language to forge a link between Obama and the would-be voter. He crafted contrasting societal narratives of ‘you’re-on-your-own’ versus ‘we’re-all-in-this-together’, evoking contrasting imagery of isolation versus community in the midst of hardship and linking these narratives to two distinct party ideologies. The speech was rhetorically constructed to motivate and inspire an electorate that had become increasingly complacent amidst continued economic decline and the bitterness of an ugly campaign. Clinton delivered a series of rational arguments about why re-electing Obama would be vital — arguments rooted at least in part, as he put it, in ‘arithmetic’. Employing a rhetoric not just of reason but also of emotion (‘And if you will renew the president’s contract, you will feel it. You will feel it.’), he argued that Obama represented not just the sound, logical choice but the only hope for a politics of ‘cooperation’ rather than ‘constant conflict’.

My fellow Americans, all of us in this grand hall and everybody watching at home, when we vote in this election, we’ll be deciding what kind of country we want to live in. If you want a winner-take-all, you’re-on-your-own society, you should support the Republican ticket. But if you want a country of shared opportunities and shared responsibility, a we’re-all-in-this-together society, you should vote for Barack Obama and Joe Biden.

(Bill Clinton, 5 September 2012)

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Authors
  1. Phillip L. Hammack
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  2. Andrew Pilecki
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Political Science, Huron University College, Canada

    Paul Nesbitt-Larking

  2. Department of Political Science, Lund University, Sweden

    Catarina Kinnvall

  3. Department of Politics, University of Surrey, UK

    Tereza Capelos

  4. Graduate School of Social and Behavioural Sciences, Leiden University, The Netherlands

    Henk Dekker

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© 2014 Phillip L. Hammack and Andrew Pilecki

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Hammack, P.L., Pilecki, A. (2014). Methodological Approaches in Political Psychology: Discourse and Narrative. In: Nesbitt-Larking, P., Kinnvall, C., Capelos, T., Dekker, H. (eds) The Palgrave Handbook of Global Political Psychology. Palgrave Studies in Political Psychology Series. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-137-29118-9_5

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