图像与对外政策——艾兰·库尔迪和英国关于欧洲难民危机辩论

Visual Images and Foreign Policy:Aylan Kurdi and the British Debate of European Refugee Crisis

一张三岁叙利亚男童趴在土耳其海滩上的遇难照片在社交媒体上被大量转发,引发全球关注,迫使欧洲多国在难民问题上松口。镜头具有远胜语言的冲击力和穿透力,艾兰·库尔迪的照片有力地揭示了视觉图像在重塑社会话语、身份以及影响、动员和建构对外政策话语上的重要作用。除了唤起全球对欧洲难民危机的关注,改变了很多难民的命运之外,三岁溺亡男童的图像还框定了西方国家对该政治议题辩论的话语前提。作者旨在探索图像缘何具有这样的作用。在回顾图像与对外政策的相关文献基础上,作者从后结构主义关于话语、身份和对外政策的理论出发,提出了包括图像制作、图像本身、图文结合和社会话语环境四部分组成的互文性框架,来讨论库尔迪照片所激发的英国关于欧洲难民话语的辩论。库尔迪图像和媒体传播为英国关于难民危机的政策辩论框定了可能性前提,重建了欧洲难民身份从"入侵者"到"受害者"的转变,拷问了英国作为传统人道主义国家的身份,动员了对外政策话语辩论。

The picture of the dead body of a 3-year-old Syrian boy Aylan Kurdi has attracted worldwide attention after its extensive circulation in social media,which prompted several European countries to relax their previous staunch stance on refusing to take European refugees.Camera has a penetrating power compared to words as represented by the Kurdi picture,which illustrates the important role of visual images in reconstituting social discourse and identity as well as in affecting,mobilizing and constructing foreign policy discourse.The author proposes an intertextual approach consisting of the production of image,the image itself,the image-text nexus,and main social discourse from a poststructualist take on discourse,identity and foreign policy to illustrate the role of Kurdi picture in mobilizing foreign policy debate in the UK about the refugee crisis.The empirical analysis finds that the Kurdi picture and its circulation have reconstructed the identity of foreign refugees from 'invaders' to 'victims',questioned the identity of the UK as a traditionally humanitarian country,provided possibility conditions for and mobilized foreign policy debate in the country.