“Emotions are an indispensable source of information for politics”

Zoom sessions with low attendance, boos and shouting matches at residents’ meetings, information evenings that had to be cut short: emotions ran high on more than one occasion during the public participation initiatives surrounding Good Move, the Brussels mobility plan.

Those emotions in themselves are not the problem, argues VUB researcher Sofie Marien. Rather, it is the way in which they are harnessed and managed. Together with Karen Celis and Thomas Legein (VUB) and Kai Alhanen (University of Helsinki), Sofie is developing new, emotion-sensitive practices. These are designed to give citizens and policymakers the opportunity to exchange experiences and think about solutions together. Emotions are welcome in this process, and indeed a necessity.

Sofie Marien: “If you ignore or suppress emotions, they turn inwards and harden into resentment and mistrust. But when people can share their experiences safely and receive recognition, those same emotions can transform into mutual understanding and collective engagement.”

Your research is part of the European PLEDGE project. What is that?
Karen Celis: “PLEDGE stands for Politics of Grievance and Democratic Governance, a large-scale Horizon Europe research project running until the end of January 2027. The term ‘politics of grievance’ is difficult to translate. Perhaps ‘politics of resentment’? Or the politics of grievance or discontent? In any case, the starting point is that many people feel they have been treated unfairly and marginalised. They feel they haven’t been given opportunities, experience anger and powerlessness, and feel humiliated, ashamed and envious. This is, among other things, the story of the losers of globalisation and the growing inequality in society.”

Apparently, our democracy struggles to deal with those emotions?
Karen: “Politicians and policymakers prefer a calm, ‘rational’ debate. They prefer to filter out emotions. That’s a shame, because feelings reveal a great deal about what’s on people’s minds. By ignoring them, you miss out on crucial knowledge. Political scientists call this ‘affective knowledge’ or ‘affective information’. Politicians who aren’t in touch with the pulse of the nation easily miss the mark. Their policies then fail to meet people’s needs.”

What is your role within this major PLEDGE project?
Karen: “Emotions have negative connotations. We believe they can actually strengthen democracy. The problem is that we don’t yet have proper policy processes to do that in a constructive way. We want to develop that infrastructure. That’s why we’re now working on these new emotion-sensitive practices, which accurately capture people’s feelings and facilitate constructive debates, between policymakers and citizens and amongst citizens themselves. Our Finnish colleague is handling the offline aspect, whilst we are handling the online aspect.”

You used focus groups and workshops. What emerged from those?
Sofie Marien (VUB researcher): “Above all, the importance of emotional safety in the debate. Citizens, politicians and civil servants often feel very unsafe today when they take part in online debates and therefore drop out. For example, the fact that a stranger can comment on what they write at any moment feels very unsafe to some citizens.”

Doesn’t that make a debate difficult?
Sofie: “It’s all about creating a safe and respectful space. In such an environment, emotions can actually lead to recognition, understanding and cooperation. When people express their views on a social issue in such an environment and engage with other citizens, it can lead to empowerment. They realise they’re not the only ones concerned about the issue, and that they could tackle it together with others.”

Wouldn’t that work on Facebook?
Sofie: “Facebook was indeed often perceived as unsafe. In recent years, special participation platforms have been developed for many projects, in Brussels and elsewhere. You can reuse these for new topics, with clear agreements and rules for discussion: remain polite, don’t insult anyone, don’t use toxic language, and so on. The same standards apply to live discussions. A moderator can call people to order when they break the rules and ask them to rephrase any overly ‘harsh’ comments.”

Then you also need a moderator on online platforms.
Sofie: “Nowadays, that’s also possible with artificial intelligence. AI systems can recognise rude or toxic language even as it’s being typed.”
Karen: “The good news is: this isn’t rocket science. Through a number of concrete interventions in existing processes, you can already do a lot to guarantee that emotional safety.”

“What about freedom of speech?” I can already hear someone asking.
Karen: “That’s of the utmost importance. People must be able to speak freely, especially in deliberative processes. But the way in which emotions come across alongside the message mustn’t cause other people to shrink back and withdraw from the conversation. That would certainly be a problem. For me, that was one of the surprises from those group discussions during the research: the importance of emotional representativeness.”

What do you mean?
Karen: “You have to ensure that all the different concerns and sensitivities can be addressed. Only then can you capture that affective information we were just talking about. If you give toxic emotionality too much space, some people will withdraw from the process. Then you’re left with only the loudest voices and a polarised narrative. So: expressing your opinion is allowed, but it must be facilitated and moderated, so that the quality of the conversation and the exchange of information aren’t stifled.”

A striking finding from your research: actually, people aren’t primarily looking for solutions to their problems.
Sofie: “Above all, they have an immense need for their problems to be acknowledged. They want to be seen and heard in society, recognised in their feelings of powerlessness. Those emotion-sensitive practices are certainly a good tool for that.”
Karen: “Step one is understanding what is on people’s minds, what concerns they have, what the roots of their resentment and frustration are. Only then can you devise a policy-based solution. When you communicate about this later, as a policymaker you would do well to refer back to those initial issues and how they were discussed at the time. That is when your policy really resonates.”

What lessons can politicians and policymakers learn from your research?
Karen: “That emotions are an indispensable source of information. They can be unpleasant and hit hard, but you can work with them. I advocate a more positive view of emotions. You should see them as political raw materials, for making good decisions and implementing sound policies. And that applies throughout the entire process: from the input citizens provide on policy-making itself right through to the way you communicate about it and hold yourself accountable.”

What if you don’t take those emotions into account?
Karen: “Then you leave the field open to political parties that do. Populist and extreme parties are far ahead of centrist parties in the development of affective strategies. We often dismiss those parties as ‘opponents’. They are against the elite, against the establishment, against this and against that. But actually, they are very strong at presenting a warm ‘us’ narrative. Even if it is an ‘us versus them’ narrative in which not everyone is equally welcome.”

Can centrist parties learn something from that?
Karen: “I certainly think so. They urgently need to work on their own affective strategies and tap into people’s emotions to create a ‘we’ narrative and seek connection. That’s not emotional manipulation! Affective knowledge is needed to understand what keeps citizens awake at night.”

Perhaps politicians avoid emotions for fear that things might escalate?
Sofie: “I’ve heard that several times during our research. That’s a shame. Creating spaces where citizens can share their views with one another and with policymakers is hugely valuable. There are plenty of techniques for moderating these discussions in such a way that the outcome is positive for everyone.”
Karen: “We often talk about citizens’ distrust of politics. But politics distrusts citizens just as much. Trust needs to be built from both sides. Allowing citizens to share their emotions is a form of trust.”
Sofie: “The fact that feelings can sometimes run high is no tragedy. It’s just part of the process.”