Political apologies by heads of state in diplomatic conflicts:between sincerity and political cynicisn

Abstract

In this paper, political apologies by heads of state in situations of diplomatic crisis in the Latin American context are studied. Pragmatics and critical discourse analysis are combined in order to analyze the types of apologies and reconciliation styles with attention to sincerity, credibility, and cynicism. The data consists of 250 texts from Venezuelan and international newspapers that covered the discursive struggle for apologies in three conflictive situations. It is shown that the sincerity condition did not apply in the two situations in which verbal offenses wcre the cause of the conflict (Peru/Venezuela, Spain/Venezuela). while it applied fully when the cause of the conflict was a military attack (Ecuador/Colombia). In all cases credibility was low, which leaves room for evaluations of cynicism. The effects on democratic dialogue and intemational relations are discussed.