No Joking Matter: Discursive Struggle in the Canadian Refugee System

Abstract

Organizations often engage in discursive struggle as they attempt to shape and manage the institutional field of which they are a part. This struggle is influenced by broader discourses at the societal level that enable and constrain discursive activity within the institutional field. We investigate this relationship by combining a study of political cartoons, as indicators of the broader societal discourse around immigration, with a case study of the Canadian refugee system, a complex institutional field. Our analysis reveals the complex intertextual and interdiscursive relations that characterize and surround institutional fields, and shows how discursive struggle in the refugee determination system is shaped by, and shapes, broader societal discourses.