Presented to you through Paradigm Publishing Services

John Benjamins Publishing Company

Visit our Partner Page See all our books
Chapter
Licensed
Unlicensed Requires Authentication

Chapter 7. Legitimizing the Iraq War through the genre of political speeches

Rhetorics of judge-penitence in the narrative reconstruction of Denmark’s cooperation with Nazism

Abstract

In Albert Camus’ novel The Fall, the main character Jean-Baptiste Clamance introduces himself as a judge-penitent, following the motto “[t]he more I accuse myself, the more I have a right to judge you”. In this chapter, I operationalize such behavior in order to understand the strategy of persuasion used by Denmark’s then Prime-Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen when he legitimized the Iraq-invasion in 2003. In contrast to self-righteous myths, Rasmussen did so by self-critically addressing the policy of Danish collaboration with Nazi-Germany during World War Two. He thereby became able to claim, like Clamance, to have learnt the lessons from history, thus occupying the moral high ground from which he discursively constructed the opponents of the invasion as being morally inferior.

Abstract

In Albert Camus’ novel The Fall, the main character Jean-Baptiste Clamance introduces himself as a judge-penitent, following the motto “[t]he more I accuse myself, the more I have a right to judge you”. In this chapter, I operationalize such behavior in order to understand the strategy of persuasion used by Denmark’s then Prime-Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen when he legitimized the Iraq-invasion in 2003. In contrast to self-righteous myths, Rasmussen did so by self-critically addressing the policy of Danish collaboration with Nazi-Germany during World War Two. He thereby became able to claim, like Clamance, to have learnt the lessons from history, thus occupying the moral high ground from which he discursively constructed the opponents of the invasion as being morally inferior.

Chapters in this book

  1. Prelim pages i
  2. Table of contents v
  3. Notes on contributors vii
  4. Analyzing genres in political communication 1
  5. Part I. Theory-driven approaches
  6. Chapter 1. Genres in political discourse 29
  7. Chapter 2. Political interviews in context 73
  8. Chapter 3. Policy, policy communication and discursive shifts 101
  9. Chapter 4. The television election night broadcast 135
  10. Chapter 5. Analyzing meetings in political and business contexts 187
  11. Chapter 6. Presenting politics 223
  12. Part II. Data-driven approaches
  13. Chapter 7. Legitimizing the Iraq War through the genre of political speeches 239
  14. Chapter 8. Macro and micro, quantitative and qualitative 267
  15. Chapter 9. Reframing the American Dream 297
  16. Chapter 10. The late-night TV talk show as a strategic genre in American political campaigning 321
  17. Chapter 11. Multimodal legitimation 345
  18. Chapter 12. Blogging as the mediatization of politics and a new form of social interaction 379
  19. Index 423
Analyzing Genres in Political Communication
This chapter is in the book Analyzing Genres in Political Communication
https://doi.org/10.1075/dapsac.50.10for

Chapters in this book

  1. Prelim pages i
  2. Table of contents v
  3. Notes on contributors vii
  4. Analyzing genres in political communication 1
  5. Part I. Theory-driven approaches
  6. Chapter 1. Genres in political discourse 29
  7. Chapter 2. Political interviews in context 73
  8. Chapter 3. Policy, policy communication and discursive shifts 101
  9. Chapter 4. The television election night broadcast 135
  10. Chapter 5. Analyzing meetings in political and business contexts 187
  11. Chapter 6. Presenting politics 223
  12. Part II. Data-driven approaches
  13. Chapter 7. Legitimizing the Iraq War through the genre of political speeches 239
  14. Chapter 8. Macro and micro, quantitative and qualitative 267
  15. Chapter 9. Reframing the American Dream 297
  16. Chapter 10. The late-night TV talk show as a strategic genre in American political campaigning 321
  17. Chapter 11. Multimodal legitimation 345
  18. Chapter 12. Blogging as the mediatization of politics and a new form of social interaction 379
  19. Index 423
Downloaded on 12.4.2026 from https://www.degruyterbrill.com/document/doi/10.1075/dapsac.50.10for/html
Scroll to top button