The negotiation of the sayable in political discourses. An analysis of public debate in parliament, mass media, and civil society

该项目考察了从1980年到现在德国公共领域的政治话语中可说的规范边界是如何变化的。对这项研究的需求源于这样一个事实，即近年来在政治和学术辩论中形成了两种直接对立的危机诊断。一些作者谈到，特别是在右翼民粹主义政党崛起的背景下，言论的范围不断扩大，仇恨言论日益正常化，这被认为是对自由民主的威胁。持相反立场的另一些作者批评说，可说性的界限正在进一步缩小：在他们看来，曾经是主流的言论现在被边缘化为反民主的，这本身就被认为是对民主的威胁。尽管这些辩论正在非常紧迫地进行，但缺乏系统的经验性长期研究，以确定各自的诊断在多大程度上是适当的，可说性发生了什么变化，以及如何根据民主的质量来评估它们-这对德国的情况来说尤其如此。为了弥补这一研究差距，本项目基于话语历史方法（DHA）进行了这样一项长期的调查。该项目将分为三个子项目，每个子项目致力于一个公共领域：子项目一以1980年至今德国联邦议院的辩论为例，调查政府机构领域的变化。子项目二通过分析1990年至今德国电视周日晚间谈话节目，探讨大众传媒领域可说性的变化。分项目三的目标是民间社会领域，以1980年至今的Katholikentag和Kirchentag为例对其进行了审查。所有三个次级项目首先分析移徙和一体化领域种族主义的界限划分；第二，它们包括关于言论自由及其边界的明确谈判；第三，他们确定了额外的话题，在这些话题上，可说性的谈判在每个领域都是特别冲突的。通过研究与公众舆论和政治意愿形成特别相关且彼此相互关联的三个领域，该项目有望成为第一个对德国公共领域可说性规范边界的长期变化提供系统经验评估的项目。

The project examines how normative boundaries of the sayable have changed in political discourses of the German public sphere from 1980 to the present. The need for this research arises from the fact that two directly opposing diagnoses of crisis have been formulated in the political and scholarly debate of recent years. Some authors speak, especially in the context of the rise of right-wing populist parties, of a constant expansion of what can be said and of an increasing normalization of hate-speech, which is considered a threat to liberal democracy. Taking the opposite position, other authors criticize an ever further narrowing of the boundaries of the sayable: According to them, statements that had been part of the mainstream are now being marginalized as anti-democratic, which is itself said to pose a threat to democracy. Although these debates are being conducted with great urgency, there is a lack of systematic empirical long-term studies that could determine the extent to which the respective diagnoses are appropriate, what changes in sayability have occurred, and how they are to be evaluated in terms of quality of democracy – this is particularly true for the German case. To close this research gap, the proposed project undertakes such a long-term investigation based on the Discourse Historical Approach (DHA). The project will be pursued in three subprojects, each devoted to one public arena: Subproject I investigates the changes in the governmental-institutional arena using the example of debates in the German Bundestag from 1980 to the present. Subproject II explores the changes in sayability in the mass media arena by analyzing Sunday evening talk shows on German television from 1990 to the present. Subproject III aims at the sphere of civil society, which is examined using the example of the Katholikentag and the Kirchentag from 1980 to the present. All three subprojects first analyze the drawing of boundaries with regard to racism in the fields of migration and integration; second, they include explicit negotiations about freedom of speech and its boundaries; and third, they identify additional topics on which the negotiation of sayability is particularly conflictual in each arena. By examining three spheres that are particularly relevant for the formation of public opinion and political will and that are interlinked with each other, the project promises to be the first to provide a systematic empirical assessment of the long-term change in normative boundaries of sayability in the German public sphere.