Abstract
Solidarity is a burning issue that is stoked even further by the many crises and challenges our societies face; a viral threat, migration, individualization, globalization, and war. These changes put pressure on solidarity, an already scarce resource; not just on the macro-level, the welfare state, but also on the micro-level, with regular citizens. Public opinion is important for the legitimacy of the welfare state, so it is important to know how citizens think about solidarity. Does a crisis influence how they talk about solidarity, and the solidarity frames and counter-frames they use? And how do the frames they use relate to the institutional (welfare) context they live in? These important questions will be examined through a comparative design based on Esping-Andersen's widely acknowledged typology of welfare states. I will examine conversations on social media and in focus groups by means of directed content analysis, using a framework that distinguishes between group-based, compassionate, exchange-based, and empathic solidarity frames. Innovative data and coding methods will be used, and combining different methods will provide methodological triangulation of the results. These results will give insight into how solidarity frames are shaped and reshaped throughout conversations; this crucial information can help politicians and CSOs to create a solidarity discourse that resonates with their target public.
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