The Power of Political Persuasion: A Content Analysis of the Former Moroccan Prime Minister´s Speeches

Abstract

Persuasion is an essential perquisite in the construction of any type of discourse. The influential impact a discourse manipulator seeks to have on discourse receiver is an inherent constituent in the process of meaning making. Hence, the implementation of discursive and persuasive constructs helps the speaker/writer maintain their ideologies, representations and world view. One of the best manifestations of the persuasive power of discourse is, indeed, reflected in political discourse. Therefore, the aim of this paper is to analyze the persuasive constructs in the political speeches of the former Moroccan Prime Minister Abd Elilah Benkirane as a step towards understanding the effect they had on the rise of his political party (PJD) during the Arab Revolutions. Interestingly, among the backbone persuasive devices the findings came up with, the deployment of comparison, proverbs, narrative persuaision and dexic pronouns were revealed as well.