Understanding repertoires of symbolic action is vital in today’s polarised politics. These repertoires comprise symbols – images, objects, narratives, practices, and ideas – stemming from civil society, history, and institutions. They are recognised within a community and combine cognitive content (ambiguous, context-dependent, and multivocal) with affective resonance. National flags, values like liberty or equality, or notions of nationhood exemplify this. Political actors draw from these repertoires to shape perceptions, make meaning, mobilise, and legitimate authority and political action. They are important tools to unify, divide, and mobilise societies.
Political science has long privileged quantifiable factors and complex models, often sidelining the study of ideas and emotions. Recently, however, growing attention has been paid to how meaning-making, storytelling, and affective communication shape political choices, policymaking, and public perceptions. This Workshop contributes to this shift by focusing on symbolic repertoires — the stock of narratives, images, practices, and categories that political actors employ to define problems, justify decisions, mobilise support, and communicate policy choices.
The Workshop aims to shed light on the diverse ways in which symbols operate in politics and policymaking. It brings together scholars working from different perspectives — those of policymakers, target groups, stakeholders, and interest groups — who share a commitment to analysing how symbols shape perceptions and cognitions, help define and legitimise policy, and influence reception and compliance.
The Workshop welcomes papers that use qualitative and comparative methods, or multi-method approaches, to examine these dynamics across contexts. Its collaborative format will ensure active feedback and dialogue across career stages and geographical locations. The ultimate objective is to foster a rich understanding of symbolic politics and to publish selected contributions in a special issue of a leading political or policy studies journal.
Anderson, Benedict. 1991. Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism. Verso Books.
Boussaguet, Laurie, Florence Faucher, et Christian Freudlsperger. 2023. « Performing Crisis Management: National Repertoires of Symbolic Action and Their Usage during the Covid-19 Pandemic in Europe ». Political Studies 71 (4): 1090‑1109.
Boussaguet, Laurie, et Florence Faucher. 2024. Symbolic Policy. Elements in Public Policy. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
Polletta, Francesca. 2006. It was like a fever: Storytelling in protest and politics. University of Chicago Press.
Simko, Christina. 2015. The Politics of Consolation: Memory and the Meaning of September 11. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Tilly, Charles. 1995. « Contentious repertoires in Great Britain, 1758-1834 ». In Repertoires and Cycles of Collective Action, par Michael W. Traugott, 15‑42. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
Trevisan, Filippo, Michael Vaughan & Ariadne Vromen. 2025. Story Tech: Power storytelling and social change advocacy. University of Michigan Press
1: How do policymakers create, extend and use repertoires of symbolic action?
2: Does the rise of AI and digital targeting change how the symbolic is used?
3: How do politicians and policymakers use citizens’ stories to construct repertoires of symbolic action?
4: How does the public respond and engage with the use of symbols?
5: How do politicians and policymakers select what symbols are the most likely to capture attention?
1: Analyse the symbolic dimension of policymaking at different stages in the process
2: Use qualitative data collection and analysis, or multi-methods approaches, and are comparative
3: Analyse rhetoric, discursive strategies, social categories and practices as part of symbolic repertoires
4: Methods and methodological innovations used to analyse repertoires of symbolic action
