Abstract
What are the meanings of silence? Oddly, for such a quiet entity, silence speaks volumes, because there are many ways we can interpret it. Exactly that happened when Nixon and staff tried very strenuously to keep the Democrat break-in as silent as possible throughout the saga of Watergate, in which one strikingly noisy silence was the infamous 18-minute gap in the White House tape recordings.
There is fertile ground for exploring absent information, which is the focus of Melanie Schröter’s investigation – ‘a contextualised in-depth analysis of discourses about silence and concealment in political discourse’ (p. 56). Schröter proposes a model that interrelates intention, expectation and relevance. That is, she offers interpretation of the intentions behind politicians remaining silent about issues that they have the option to speak on. That interpretation is fed by analysing the context of situations in which an audience would expect the politician to make a public statement, but s/he actually remains silent. Relevance is judged by considering the quality of possible information that is withheld.
This very careful book in effect falls into two parts: first, an overview analysis of relevant theories, research and debate, setting a framework for investigation; and second, three case studies – Helmut Kohl refusing to name financial donors to his party; Germany’s opposition SPD Party, the victim of a scandal (Waterkantgate), declining to make information public; and Angela Merkel refraining from speaking on issues that others expected her to.
Schröter starts with three theorised chapters on conceptions of silence, incorporating various theoretical approaches, but especially critical discourse analysis (CDA), her main analytical perspective. CDA enables her to explore varying ideologies and power relations within political events around silence. In this basic frame, Schröter draws helpfully on relevance theory, positioning, critical discourse studies, and the discourse-historical approach. Her critical framing inquiry, referenced by a sweep of relevant literature, is highly informative, somewhat dense at times, and illuminated with deftly selected quotations.
Throughout, Schröter is at pains to point out what she is and is not doing. A case in point is that she is not trying to do detective work on the veracity of the three key political stories that she presents. Her medium is the metadiscourse around the public events, because political silences become surrounded with words – media, commentaries, commissions of inquiry, public hearings, speeches, public statements. So Schröter focuses on the discourse around the discourse of the events themselves, for example what commentators say about a politician’s guarded public statement. She is categorically not looking at metalanguage (language reflecting on language), but at the context of events, in order to explore two areas in particular: (1) the ways in which discourse about silence relates to language ideology, especially that favouring openness and speaking out (p. 51); and (2) assumptions about what needs saying in given situations.
Referring to metadiscourse, Schröter comments on the web of intrigue that evolves in setting out to deceive: ‘concealers must intend concealment, but also discourage recipients from figuring out their intention’ (p. 27). In other words, politicians must constantly factor in the context of commentary around their actions. Hence, context resonates throughout the discussion. Since silence is ambiguous, Schröter argues, context of various kinds is crucial to interpretation, in line with Van Dijk’s assertion that ‘context controls discourse’ (p. 128).
The three case studies bring both the theoretical frame and the acute political realities alive. Kohl’s determined refusal to name donors to his party, for instance, prompts alternative interpretations of his silence. An intriguing possibility offered is that Kohl was perhaps not protecting donors at all, but hiding some other, greater, secret. The point is that the book draws on a strong theoretical frame to explore some gripping political stories, some of which hint at the silence behind the silences.
Schröter concludes, reasonably enough, that it may never be possible to find the real stories in the case studies. Then, rather surprisingly, given her book’s extensive study of political discourse, she labels the metadiscourse she has just analysed as ‘a necessary democratic ritual’ rather than as revelation. Suddenly, that metadiscourse is apparently not as important as it seemed throughout the book. Presumably, she is claiming that political commentary ultimately has limited practical effect. She also offers a somewhat contradictory argument at this point. First, she seems to diminish the metadiscourse (and by implication her own critique) as myth-making and less than significant. But second, she suggests that the whole endeavour has merit after all, though rather weakly, as ‘a reminder of the ideals of transparency and accountability’ (p. 153).
Schröter’s case seems to underestimate the public value of critical inquiry into political discourse and silence. Yet her own problematising implicitly suggests that the public and its institutions should engage in continuing scrutiny of events that impinge upon the people. In this light, Schröter’s kind of analysis is a counter to the world-weary apathy that characterises much of the Western public. Going a step further, it would be an advantage to be able to explore policy-making in the same spirit, to find out whose quiet voices behind the scenes speak the loudest and why.
Silence and Concealment is a thought-provoking book. It has a potential life beyond its own topic by offering a base for analysing other domains of discourse in society. The person in the street is very accustomed to pointing to politics as a hotbed of intrigue, scandal and concealment. But Schröter’s analysis might well apply to other key sectors of society: finance, business, commerce, the military, diplomacy, telecommunications, international relations, not to mention intelligence and spying. All are institutions that can comprise highly political behaviour, such as disinformation, concealment, and ‘wordy silences’, as, for instance, was the case with the global financial crisis. Meanwhile, spying and hacking have in any case entered the public realm in spectacular ways – Wikileaks; Edward Snowden; the News of the World case – breaking open the silence behind unwelcome revelations.