Bridges or walls? A metaphorical dichotomy of Pope Francis versus Donald Trump’s views of transnational migration

Abstract

Within a wider research line on policy-driven institutional discourses on migration by international/national institutions, NGO and political leaders, this contribution is aimed at illustrating the bipolarized social representations of immigrants inspiring 24 speeches by Pope Francis and US President Donald Trump. Statistical analyses using IRAMUTEQ included “specificity analysis” of discursive forms (words) and “cluster analysis.” Results show that the Pope’s discourse on migration (articulated into four clusters) is richer than the oversimplified Trump's discourse (originating just one cluster): the words “bridges” and “walls” emerge as representational nuclei of their bipolarized views of transnational migration, as metaphorical dichotomies of inclusive/exclusive policies. Emphasizing the need to build walls to protect the Americans, inspired by the sovereign ideology (AMERICA FIRST!), President Trump does not at all suspect that in the globalized interconnected world the AMERICA FIRST may become just AMERICA ALONE!

Keywords:

• Migration
• social representations
• metaphors
• political discourse
• Donald Trump
• Pope Francis

Acknowledgments

This article has been developed within interdisciplinary research activities focused on the theme of Migratory flows and inclusive practices in Europe and Italy at the Department of Social and Developmental Psychology at Sapienza University of Rome, selected in 2017 as department of excellence by the M.I.U.R. (Italian Ministry of University and Research).