Negotiating digital surveillance legislation in post-Snowden times

An argumentation analysis of Finnish political discourse

Bibliographic Data

ID6085155
AuthorsMinna Tiainen (0000-0003-1337-2172)
Year2019
Volume18
Issue2
Pages207-230
Publication date2019-04-18
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal of Language and Politics (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1569-2159 • E-ISSN: 1569-9862
PublisherJohn Benjamins Publishing Company (PUBLISHER • NL)
DOI10.1075/jlp.18004.tia
OpenAlexW2911247075
LanguageEN
References cited27

In the digital era, when security agencies world-wide have been challenging basic democratic principles with massive data gathering, Finland has had a different approach: it has conducted no large-scale surveillance of citizens’ online activities. Now, however, the country is planning such a vast expansion of state surveillance that the constitution itself must be altered. The present article examines one key point in this legislative process to see how the new surveillance measures are argued for and criticized, and how the differing points of view are negotiated to ultimately enable political action. Drawing particularly on Fairclough and Fairclough’s (2012) approach to argumentation in political discourse, the article finds that surveillance is promoted as essential for national security, and criticized especially for its economic risks, consequences for civil rights and questionable effectiveness. Despite this range of critical perspectives, only economic considerations become a topic of extended deliberation

Argumentation theory · Civil liberties · Constitution · Deliberation · Deliberative democracy · Democracy · Epistemology · Law and economics · Legislation · Legislature · Negotiation · Political science · Politics · Public relations · Sociology · State (computer science · Cybersecurity and Cyber Warfare Studies · Global Security and Public Health · Privacy, Security, and Data Protection · Law · Public Administration

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