Time for a Euro currency syringe injection? Bank crisis financial credit metaphors in The Economist

Abstract

This study highlights the location of specific metaphors on the macroeconomic terrain. It starts from the assumption that in order to make ‘sense’ of the outside world, categorisation should take place. For Eubanks (2000), there is a close relationship between metaphors and frame restructuring – that is, the perspective that is taken on a social issue is determined by the way it is metaphorically represented. This study investigates how The Economist metaphorically frames certain specific target domains (bail-outs, deficit spending), as typified by its multiple responses to the financial crisis of 2008-2010. This study, therefore, pursues a qualitative analysis of metaphor use in The Economist during the aforementioned period, with a view to measuring to what extent the choice of metaphors used by the editors reflects their arguments/ideology against the backdrop of a worldwide liquidity shortfall followed by a dramatic recovery plan. A qualitative analysis is needed to interpret the pragmatic role of metaphors – for example, as to whether they communicate a positive or a negative evaluation of a specific government policy. As Charteris-Black (2004, p. 32) pointed out, “qualitative approaches answer questions such as: what are the different meanings that are attached to particular words or phrases? Are senses literal or metaphoric? What type of evaluations do they convey?”. Since metaphors are context-dependent, the case for qualitative analysis is further enhanced. To meet this end, this study draws on Lakoff and Johnson’s Critical Metaphor Theory (1980). In order to illustrate this theory, it was necessary to systematically analyse the instances of conceptual metaphors in the ‘leaders’ (i.e., the editorials) and financial columns of all the weekly issues of The Economist over a 3-year period, i.e. from September 2008 (the draft of the US Emergency Economic Stabilization Act) until December 2010 (the European sovereign debt crisis).