Understanding Political Discourse and the Death of the Author Captain Mohamed Hassan Al-Tahir  

Date: February 21, 2026

Political discourse is:

– A system of statements and symbolic practices aimed at influencing public opinion and directing it toward specific positions or decisions.

– It is not merely language or slogans, but rather a tool for mobilization, persuasion, and managing social and political conflict.

– It relies on constructing narratives,

– Employing symbols,

– And invoking history and identity,

to become a means of shaping collective consciousness.

Requirements and Expectations

Political discourse is expected to fulfill several functions:

– Clarification and persuasion: Presenting a clear vision and a defined program.

– Mobilization and motivation: Stirring public emotion toward political action.

– Responsibility and commitment: Ensuring the discourse aligns with values of honesty and transparency.

– Balance between reason and emotion: Avoiding excess in incitement and dilution in pacification.

Between Incitement, Pacification, and Responsibility

Political discourse oscillates between three dimensions:

– Incitement: When used to stir the masses and push them toward confrontation or radical change.

– Pacification: When employed to calm public opinion and contain it within the boundaries of the existing system.

– Responsibility: The ethical dimension that obliges the politician to balance freedom of expression with duty toward society.

The Concept of the Death of the Author

This concept, associated with Roland Barthes, deconstructs the relationship between the statement, the content, and the speaker. The text becomes an entity independent of its author, read in light of the recipient rather than the author’s intentions. Thus, the content of the text must be explored through several dimensions:

– Integration and differentiation: The statement is completed by the content, yet the speaker may recede before a text that acquires its own life.

– Objectivity and subjectivity: The text is read as an autonomous subject, detached from the author’s subjectivity.

– Freedom and responsibility: The death of the author grants the reader freedom of interpretation, but also places upon them the responsibility of comprehension and transcendence.

– Effect and influence: The text leaves an impact that surpasses its author, sometimes influencing the recipient in ways unintended by the writer.

– Assimilation and transcendence: The reader, as an organic intellectual, assimilates the text and then transcends it toward new meanings, in a continuous process of meaning production. This opens the text to manifestations of meaning through fruitful interpretation that expands horizons and awakens minds toward goodness and beauty.

Conclusion

Understanding political discourse in light of the concept of the death of the author opens a new horizon for grasping the relationship between political texts and the masses.

Discourse is not the property of its speaker; it becomes part of the public sphere, constantly reproduced and reinterpreted. Here lies the importance of responsibility: the politician must realize that his words will live beyond his will, and their impact may exceed his intent. Discourse thus transforms into a social force interacting with freedom and collective consciousness, which may imitate unconsciously. This imposes upon opinion-makers the responsibility of activating the Qur’anic text: “Not a word does he utter but there is with him an observer ready (to record).”