In this working paper, we treat legitimacy and legitimation as interactive, discursive and relational concepts: Legitimacy is socially constructed in the public spheres of (democratic) political regimes, that is, in discursive exchanges of political elites and citizens about the acceptability of...

An influential discourse now promotes decentralization in the active labour market policy field. Drawing upon evidence from Nova Scotia and Saxony-Anhalt, two marginal jurisdictions within the Canadian and German federations, this article questions the decentralization argument. The...

This working paper first outlines the contours of a discourse analytical approach to the study of legitimation processes and then presents findings from a quantitative analysis of legitimacy-related communication in selected print media of the United Kingdom, Switzerland, and the United States...

Canada and Germany experienced considerable economic challenges and political shocks during the 1990s. High unemployment and regional labour market disparities raised concerns about the adequacy of labour market policies in both countries. Yet despite similar challenges, the two federations...

The study of policy discourse comprises actor-centered and content-oriented approaches. We attempt to close the gap between the two kinds of approaches by introducing a new methodology for the analysis of political discourse called Discourse Network Analysis. It is based on social network...