Covid-19 and the politics of temporality
Constructing Credibility in Coronavirus Discourse
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 5682575 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Lee Jarvis (0000-0002-4149-7135, University of East Anglia, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2021 |
| Volume | 9 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 72-75 |
| Publication date | 2021-01-02 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Critical Studies on Security (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 2162-4887 • E-ISSN: 2162-4909 |
| Publisher | Informa UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1080/21624887.2021.1904363 |
| OpenAlex | W3132024465 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 9 |
| References cited | 6 |
The designation of, and response to, specific issues as security challenges is neither self-evident nor inevitable (e.g. Causes of harm must be constructed or performed as security issues to become thus; responses to (constructed) challenges must, in turn, be communicated or 'sold' to relevant audiences In this piece, I attempt to show that this is as true of pandemics as it is of other (better-studied) threats from terrorism to nuclear proliferation. I do so by considering the UK government's discursive response to the COVID-19 coronavirus, paying particular attention to the framing of governmental action within official problematisations thereof. The piece draws on a wider research project investigating UK political language across the first six months of this crisis. 1 My argument, in brief, is that a repeated, and multi-faceted, claim to governmental credibility was vital to British political discourse on this pandemic. Consider the 7 April description of the Cabinet by the Foreign Secretary, then deputising for the hospitalised Prime Minster: 'his team will not blink, and we will not flinch from the task at hand at this crucial moment. We will keep all of our focus and all of our resolve, with calm determination on delivering the government's plan to defeat the coronavirus' (Raab 2020a). Raab's comments demonstrate two crucial generative claims within this construction of governmental credibility upon which I focus in this piece. These claims are, first, to the diligence of the executive, and, second, to its competence. Engaging with these claims, I suggest, offers two contributions to our understanding of this still unfolding crisis. First, it provides empirical understanding of the discursive framing of governmental activity during a moment of profound national and international significance. Second, it enables theoretical insight into the importance of constructions of temporality -constructions of time -within the politics of security more widely (see also Jarvis 2009; Stevens 2016). Let us consider the two claims in turn
2019-20 coronavirus outbreak · Coronavirus · Credibility · Disease · Epistemology · Outbreak · Pathology · Political science · Politics · Temporality · Disaster Management and Resilience · Global Security and Public Health · Law · Medicine · Philosophy · Virology
Failing Is Not an Option, It Is the Only Option
Covid-19 and the Limits of Critical Security Theory
The clocks run at slightly different speeds. Clashing timeframes in Covid-19 health risk governance
French normalisation of exceptional powers as a response to terrorism post-Paris attacks
Constructing the coronavirus crisis
Unveiling crisis communication strategies
There is No Fixed time’
Bordering
Beyond 'fast' and 'slow
| Unique citing works | 9 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 1,8 |
| Citation span | 2021 - 2026 (6) |
| Citation velocity | current |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 9 |