Abstract
Rapport management is argued to be a critical antecedent of voter support in election campaigns, as it can motivate cooperation. However, little research has been conducted exploring how rapport is managed in such practice. In the present study, the campaign leaflets of four political parties in Sheffield Central constituency for the 2017 UK general election were analysed in relation to rapport-management strategies. Three domains of discourse were identified and classified in terms of one or more of the six principles of persuasion: Reciprocity, Consistency and Commitment, Social Proof, Authority, Liking, and Scarcity. The findings showed that Reciprocity and Liking were the commonly employed principles in the rapport-management strategies. These two principles were established in the leaflets by justifying and explaining credentials. Authority played a major role in influencing the functioning of the other principles in the rapport-management strategies. Specifically, the more authority a party had, the stronger the commitment made to act as rapport-management strategies. In contrast, the less authority a party had, the greater social proof and scarcity were involved in the strategies.
Funding source: Social Sciences and Humanities Research, the Education Ministry of the People’s Republic of China
Award Identifier / Grant number: 18YJA740072
About the authors
Wuhan Zhu completed his PhD degree in English Language and Linguistics at the University of Sheffield, UK in 2012. He is currently Professor in School of Teacher Education, Nanjing University of Information Science and Technology and previously worked at School of English Studies, Zhejiang International Studies University. His research interests include pragmatics, applied linguistics and cross-cultural communication. He has published one monograph and more than 20 papers in Chinese and international academic journals like the RELC, Asian EFL, and Language and Intercultural Communication.
Yangfei Zhu is currently a PhD Candidate in Linguistics at the Chinese University of Hongkong. He obtained his BA (Hons) and MA degrees in English language and linguistics from the University of Sheffield in 2019 and 2020. His research interests lie in syntax, discourse analysis and applied linguistics.
Acknowledgments
Special thanks are given to Dr. Jane Mulderrig from the University of Sheffield, who provides the data in module ELL352 Approaches to Discourse for research.
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Research funding: This work was supported by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research, the Education Ministry of the People’s Republic of China under Grant 18YJA740072.
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Competing interests: Authors have declared that no competing interests exist.
The campaign leaflets Sheffield Central constituency for the UK 2017 general election.
Leaflets from Conservative Party
2.Leaflets from Labour Party
3.Leaflets from Green Party
4.Leaflets from Lib Dem.
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