The presentational dimension of Geert Wilders’s populist argumentative style

Abstract

This study responds to van Eemeren’s (2019, 2021) call for research on the prototypical argumentative styles used in particular domains or communicative activity types by particular individuals or groups. It explores the argumentative style of Dutch politician Geert Wilders in presenting populist arguments, i.e., arguments claiming that if many people hold a certain standpoint, this standpoint should be accepted. A corpus study of 27 texts taken from the website of Wilders’s political party reveals four characteristics of this presentation that deviate significantly from the general descriptions of this type of argument given in the textbooks: (1) absence of indicators, (2) implicit standpoint, (3) wide range of verbs to indicate what “the people” think or believe, (4) use of a construction indicating that the speaker is acting as a mouthpiece (“on behalf of the people, I say”).