Moral Rhetoric in Party Campaigns

• In Event: How Do Political Parties Adapt Their Communication and Representation?

Abstract

Political parties often use moral argumentation in their messages to voters. Moral rhetoric is a crucial part of how voters experience politics, yet we lack a systematic and comprehensive understanding of how moral rhetoric is used and the goals it serves in democratic politics. What role does moral rhetoric play in party politics? The book manuscript answers this overarching question in three parts. Using a combination of text analyses, experiments, surveys, and qualitative elite interviews, the book illustrates that the extent to which political discussions are morally framed matters. Focusing on the context of Western democracies, the book shows that moral rhetoric is a distinct aspect of political communication that is used across parties and contexts in often similar ways, in contrast to previous research that highlights differences in moral priorities between the left and the right. Moral rhetoric is an important aspect of political communication that can shape voters’ behaviors and attitudes, as well as being expected by voters as part of democratic politics. Overall, unlike common narratives in the scholarly and policymaking worlds that say morality in politics is divisive and polarizing, the book draws attention to the potential for moral rhetoric to bring voters together based on shared common ground.

Author

• Jae-Hee Jung, University of Houston