Go to ACL ARR 2025 February homepageAnalysing German parliamentary debates: a special case of calls to order
Abstract: Our research investigates incivility in parliamentary discourse, focusing on calls to order (CtO; plural: CtOs) in the German parliament. A notable gap exists in the analysis of CtOs in parliamentary discourse. Consequently, we present a novel and comprehensive analysis of speeches delivered by German politicians spanning 72 years of parliamentary history, employing both automated and manual methodologies. This paper represents the first attempt to develop a classification system for the triggers of CtOs and to analyze the factors contributing to incivility in parliamentary discourse. Both statistical and empirical evidence suggests that despite strict regulations, the issuing of CtOs is often subjective, being significantly influenced by the session president and prevailing parliamentary trends. Thus, session presidents tend to call particular individuals to order preferentially. An insult towards individuals is the most frequent cause of CtO. Generally, male individuals and opposition party members receive more calls to order than their female and coalition party counterparts. Most of the CtO triggers were detected in speeches dedicated to governmental issues and presidency actions.
Paper Type: Short
Research Area: Computational Social Science and Cultural Analytics
Research Area Keywords: human behavior analysis, sociolinguistics, NLP tools for social analysis
Contribution Types: Data resources, Data analysis
Languages Studied: German
Submission Number: 1373
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