ABSTRACT
This chapter explores how political actors try to establish their interpretive frames of current problems and developments in debates with political opponents on TV. It explains a methodological approach for analysing the complex discursive practices used in televised panel discussions by inspecting a range of examples from Austrian news programs. The evocation of social and political interpretations that legitimise a certain policy position is a basic strategy for generating support in a democratic system, which can become crucial for people's experience of political events. One example is from a panel discussion from 2001 on a referendum by the populist-right Austrian Freedom Party (FP), which proposed blocking the Czech Republic's entry into the European Union by stating conditions concerning the atomic reactor Temelin. However, eventually this is dependent on the ability of political actors to create a network of paralogical references in their enthymemic arguments spread over the discussion.
