The unwrapping of various understandings of statelessness in Latvian media discourse

Abstract

There is a substantial literature in the tradition of constructivism and sociological new institutionalism that suggests the existence of shared EU norms. Yet, the issue of how EU norms are adopted and/or contested in EU member states remains underexamined. In the paper, we therefore study the public discourse on citizenship in Latvia and examine how the discourse relates to EU norms on citizenship, minority rights and in the broader sense human rights. The analysis takes its empirical starting point in the period after the Russian annexation of Crimea in 2014 and focuses on how the issue of statelessness was discussed in the Latvian online media. Looking at how the contested term (‘statelessness’) achieves different meanings in the Latvian discourse, and how the domestic actors try to reformulate the EU norms in question, we aim at a better understanding of the diffusion of norms within the context of a regional organization. The conclusion indicates that apart from the EU human rights norm, there are several different articulations of statelessness (i.e. othering, security and instrumental) that are present in the discourse. This has enabled Latvian governments to stress their commitment to human rights promotion, while simultaneously facing criticism regarding the country’s stateless inhabitants.