[Commlist] CfP: Applying Critical Discourse Analysis Approaches to Development Policies and Practice: Empirical and Theoretical Contributions

EADI-IOB CONFERENCE SHAPING SUSTAINABLE FUTURES
GLOBAL CHALLENGES, (G) LOCAL SOLUTIONS?
29 JUNE - 2 JULY 2026 | ANTWERP, BELGIUM

HP23 - Applying Critical Discourse Analysis Approaches to Development
Policies and Practice: Empirical and Theoretical Contributions
Convened by Farhad Mukhtarov, International Institute of Social Studies,
Erasmus University Rotterdam, and Nicolina Montesano Montessori, University
of Applied Sciences Utrecht

The focus of the 2026 EADI conference is on “recognizing, comprehending,
and dissecting” varied visions of sustainable production, distribution and
consumption of resources. In this panel, we explore the role of discourse
analytical approaches in shaping and distorting imaginaries of sustainable
and resilient future. We seek to bring together scholars who apply critical
discourse analytical approaches in development policy topics. We are
particularly interested to highlight the role of discourse analytical
approaches in informing the following topics:

 how development policies are constituted and contested, with a focus on
power

 how complexity informs development policy making and analysis

 how ideology shapes development policy making and analysis

 how methodological and theoretical approaches related to discourse theory
and post-structuralism inform each other

 how to understand and challenge existing hegemonic approaches to
development policy (Mukhtarov er al., 2022; Montesano Montessori and
Lautensach, 2024)

Critical Policy Discourse Analysis (CPDA) combines critical discourse
analysis with critical policy studies by establishing theoretical and
methodological synergies between these two fields. It does so by bringingthe
rigorous and systematic analysis of texts, informed by linguistic theory,
into transdisciplinary dialogue with theoretical frameworks capable of
recognising the socially structuring potential of discourse in development
policies and practices, but which alone tend to overlook the micro-textual
processes (Fairclough 2013; Wodak and Meyer, 2016). In this panel, we 
explore
how CPDA contributes to development policy research and practice with a
special focus on sustainability topics. This builds on some pioneering work
which laid the foundation of critical discourse research in development
studies (e.g. Gasper, 2021; Montesano Montessori et al, 2021).

References

Gasper, D., 2022. ‘Making Strange’: Discourse Analysis Tools for Teaching
Critical Development Studies. Progress in Development Studies, 22(3),
pp.288–304.

Fairclough, N., 2013. Critical Discourse Analysis and Critical Policy
Studies. Critical Policy Studies, 7(2), pp.177–197.

Montesano Montessori, N. and Lautensach, A., 2025. A blueprint for what? 
From
a critical policy discursive analysis of UN’s sustainable development goals
to a constructive rearticulation for their application. Critical Policy
Studies, 19(2), pp.222–241.

Montesano Montessori, N., Farrelly, M. and Mulderrig, J. (eds.), 2019.
Critical Policy Discourse Analysis. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar.

Mukhtarov, F., Gasper, D., Alta, A., Gautam, N., Duhita, M.S. and Hernández
Morales, D., 2022. From ‘merchants and ministers’ to ‘neutral
brokers’? Water diplomacy aspirations by the Netherlands – a discourse
analysis of the 2011 commissioned advisory report. International Journal of
Water Resources Development, 38(6), pp.1009–1031.

Wodak, R. and Meyer, M. (eds.), 2016. Methods of Critical Discourse Studies.
3rd ed. London: Sage.


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