Manufacturing Dissent

Manipulation and counter-manipulation in times of crisis

Editor

Cornelia Ilie | Strömstad Academy, Sweden

Hardbound – Available

ISBN 9789027214447 | EUR 110.00 | USD 143.00

e-Book –

ISBN 9789027248596 | EUR 110.00 | USD 143.00

Spotlighting case studies of manipulation practices at the onset of the Covid-19 crisis in different countries and socio-political circumstances, the authors expose context-specific discourse and argumentation strategies of 'infodemics’ (misleading information and fake news), public policy mismanagement, deceptive online and offline communication tactics, and conspiracy narratives, which end up disrupting community social cohesion. In addition to targeting manipulation-driven dissent across discourse genres through corpus-based investigations, a major strength of this volume consists in debunking manipulation while foregrounding compelling acts of counter-manipulation.
The volume’s breadth of topics, depth of analytical insights and range of methodological frameworks provide unique perspectives by capturing crisis-related manipulations across a worldwide political and cultural spectrum (Austria, Brazil, China, the Czech Republic, Portugal, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom, United States), with a focus on the scale and extent of multifaceted repercussions. Reaching beyond the boundaries of pragmatics and discourse analysis, this book should be a valuable resource for researchers and practitioners of rhetoric, argumentation, media studies, social and political sciences.

[Pragmatics & Beyond New Series, 339] 2024. vi, 311 pp.

Publishing status: Available

https://doi.org/10.1075/pbns.339

Table of Contents

Crisis manipulation: Discourse- and argumentation-based approaches

Cornelia Ilie | pp. 1–23

Part I. Crisis-driven and context-related manipulation practices

Chapter 1. Spanish influenza 1918/19: A diachronic and cross-cultural perspective on blame and blame-avoidance in media and politics in times of crisis

Maria Stopfner | pp. 26–61

Chapter 2. Manipulation in exceptional times: Exploiting overwhelming contextual parameters for manipulative purposes

Didier Maillat and Steve Oswald | pp. 62–84

Chapter 3. Manipulating citizens’ beliefs and emotions: Consensus-seeking and dissensus-generating tactics in crisis management

Cornelia Ilie | pp. 85–118

Chapter 4. Maintaining political authority and credibility during the Covid-19 crisis: The case of Czech government press conferences

Martina Berrocal | pp. 119–156

Chapter 5. The legitimation of conspiracy theories through manipulation: The case of climate lockdowns

Massimiliano Demata | pp. 157–183

Part II. Discursively and argumentatively framed counter-manipulation strategies

Chapter 6. How can governments be prevented from manipulating statistics about Covid-19? An example from UK politics

Cristina Marinho and Michael Billig | pp. 186–214

Chapter 7. News media’s epistemological framings of the Covid-19 ‘lab leak’ hypothesis: A contrastive metapragmatic analysis of ‘conspiracy theory’

Cedric Deschrijver | pp. 215–239

Chapter 8. Strategic communication in the Covid-19 pandemic: Uses of arguments and manipulative tactics in institutional social media communication

Fabrizio Macagno and Ana Carolina Trevisan | pp. 240–283

Chapter 9. Lessons learned? The role of conventional arguments in avoiding blame and rebuilding trust in banking after the financial crisis

Ruth Breeze | pp. 284–307

Index | pp. 309–311

“While deception and manipulation are a regular feature of human interaction, in Manufacturing Dissent, Professor Cornelia Ilie has adroitly marshalled a compelling collection of studies that demonstrate the growing role of manipulation in political and institutional life. It is a must-read for scholars of discourse analysis, communication and pragmatics, and indeed anyone interested in better understanding the current time of seemingly never-ending crises.”

Michael Haugh, The University of Queensland

“Through a range of innovative and compelling state-of-the art chapters, this volume advances and illuminates our understanding of manipulation and counter-manipulative strategies. Importantly, cross-cultural investigations construe these phenomena as situated, tied (among others) to core discourse processes such as identity construction and intergroup communication, which shape and are shaped by societal values and ideologies. Manufacturing Dissent: Manipulation and counter-manipulation in times of crisis is destined to become a major reference for scholars and advanced students of manipulation.”

Pilar G. Blitvich, University of North Carolina at Charlotte

“The volume Manufacturing Dissent captures the problematics and paradoxes of manipulative communication and its dissent-inducing effects through a diversity of discursive, meta-discursive and inter-discursive perspectives on co-constructed manipulation by diverse actors across national, cultural and institutional contexts. The potential readership extends beyond discourse studies and includes academics and practitioners in politics, national security, conflict resolution, and other areas.”

Cezar M. Ornatowski, San Diego State University

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