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ABSTRACT
In recent years, with the establishment of a complex global media environment, foreign political leaders have been utilizing various rhetorical and media strategies for bypassing domestic national leaders to reach the hearts of the public on the other side. In this paper I discuss this practice and demonstrate three types of rhetorical bypasses that can be positioned on two ends of a continuum. At one end, the foreign actor aims at instilling fear in the heart of his or her audience by issuing threats or warnings that forecast a dark future, while at the other end, he or she aims at warming the hearts of that same public by utilizing various modes of reconciliatory talk, that is, greetings, apologies, or promises of a bright shared future. I conclude by discussing the struggles that rhetorical bypasses evoke.
Acknowledgments
I wish to thank Elihu Katz for his useful comments on this paper.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.
Notes on contributor
Zohar Kampf is Senior Lecturer at the department of Communication and Journalism, Hebrew University of Jerusalem. His research interest lies in the linkage among language, media and politics. He is the author of Transforming Media Coverage of Violent Conflicts: The New Face of War (2013, Palgrave McMillan) and of articles in communication, media and discourse analysis journals.
Notes
3. The difference between persuasion and manipulation lies in the interpretation of the legitimacy of the speech; while persuasion is based on a rational exchange of ideas (and thus is perceived as legitimate), manipulation involves nasty tactics such as power abuse, mind control, and binary discursive strategies of good vs. bad (and is thus perceived as illegitimate) (see Van Dijk Citation2006).
4. Notice that although there are similarities between conquests and bypasses, the latter lacks the courage of the heroic action of the foreign leader. Conquests have a courageous, rare aspect, that is, the ‘great steps for mankind’ that characterized the visit of Sadat in Jerusalem in 1977 and of Pope John Paul II to Poland in 1979.
8. According to the Pew Research Center poll conducted 27–30 October 2005, Bush had a 3-point edge over Kerry (48– 45%). See: http://www.people-press.org/2004/10/31/slight-bush-margin-in-final-days-of-campaign
15. http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/04/us/politics/transcript-of-netanyahus-remarks-to-congress.html?_r=0
17. This was, for example, the response of the Settlers Council to Obama's words: ‘Israelis have already experienced such illusions explode in their faces, thus would not support Obama's dangerous suggestions. The Israeli public expresses its views in democratic elections rather than encouraging young people to oppose their leadership’. http://www.haaretz.co.il/news/politics/1.1971999