Donald Trump

The present study examines how Trump’s unilateral withdrawal from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) on May 8, 2018 was framed in political cartoons published in the American and French media. The paper offers a thematic analysis of cartoons published from May 8 to June 8, 2018, the peak period for publication of cartoons on the Iran nuclear deal, and accessed via Google images. The paper applies the five categorizations of news frames identified by Semetko and Valkenburg (2000)—the conflict frame, human interest frame, economic consequences frame, responsibility frame and morality frame—to the selected cartoons to identify whether the frames used in the political cartoons vary between the American and French news outlets. This comparative study shows both divergence and convergence in the issues and concerns covered in the media of the both countries.

Interpersonal metadiscourse is considered as a significant mean of smoothing communication between the speaker/writer and listener/reader. The present study intends to explore the concept and type of interpersonal metadiscourse markers employed by Donald Trump’s campaign speeches as a persuasive strategy. Descriptive qualitative research design is used in the present study. Dafouz’s (2008) classification of interpersonal metadiscourse markers was employed to analyze the gathered data. The results revealed that Trump made use of all categories of interpersonal metadiscourse markers namely hedges, certainty markers, attributors, attitude markers, and commentaries, in his campaign speeches. The frequency of attitude markers and commentaries was more than other types of metadiscourse markers in Trump’s campaign speech, which demonstrates that he attempted to persuade the public to vote for him through making an emotional link.

The present study was conducted to investigate how Trump’s unilateral withdrawal from Iran’s nuclear deal on May 8, 2018 has been framed in political cartoons published in French and Iranian media. In this paper, a thematic analysis of published cartoons available on Google images from May 8, 2018 to June 8, 2018 was conducted in both French and Farsi. Five categories of news frames identified by Semetko and Valkenburg (2002) were applied on selected cartoons to observe how these frames are used on political cartoons in French and Iranian news outlets. Findings of the study showed that withdrawal of Trump from Iran’s nuclear deal has been framed mostly as a threat for France and has been considered in a bilateral perspective between USA and France. For the Iranian press the withdrawal is mostly considered as a result of Trump’s mental instability and P5+1 inaction.

In many aspects, U.S. President Donald Trump’s approach to foreign policy-making was in sharp contrast with that of his predecessors, particularly post-WWII presidents. His hostility toward the long-lasting liberal international order that was crafted and maintained by former presidents, his eccentric ways of solving foreign policy issues, and his unusual rhetoric regarding U.S. allies and adversaries, are all indications of his “unorthodox” foreign policy approach. In an attempt to explain this unorthodoxy, in this article we aim to examine Trump’s cognitions and compare them to those of his post-WWII predecessors. In particular, we have measured the cognitive complexity score for each of these presidents to determine Trump’s position among them. In order to do so, we have calculated the Flesch-Kincaid readability score of the presidents’ verbal statements, assuming that the complexity of the statements indicates the complexity of their author’s thoughts. The results have clearly demonstrated that Trump was at the lowest level of cognitive complexity among the presidents under examination, and since a low level of cognitive complexity pertains to viewing the situation from limited perspectives, a low need for broader information, adhering to a limited number of policy options, ignoring advice, and decisiveness, we may reasonably infer that his cognitive simplicity played an important role in the unorthodoxy of his foreign policy approach.

The 2020 US presidential election was held indirectly through the Electoral College with the rivalry between Trump and Biden from both the Republican and Democratic parties, and as a result, many American crises emerged, indicating a shift in the position of soft power. Soft power means convincing others to achieve the desired result through persuasion, which was invented by Joseph Nye. The soft power of the United States has led to a loss of its international appeal by taking a hard line on soft issues, such as ignoring public diplomacy. The question is, to what extent has the 2020 election affected America's soft power position? The emergence of crises, such as inefficiency in internal management, Trump's rejection of the election results, has led to the decline of America's soft power position in the world. Given this approach to the 2020 elections, this study seeks to examine the challenges posed by many analysts, both in the debate and after the election, through a descriptive-interpretive discourse analysis method. And explain how it has degraded America's soft power position and been able to have a direct impact on its future and global policies, such as the possibility of a power shift paradigm in the international arena. It also suggests that Iran can turn threats into opportunities with constructive policies, despite maximum US pressure.