FROM CANDIDATE TO PRESIDENT-ELECT: (IM)POLITENESS AND POLITICAL IDENTITY IN PRABOWO SUBIANTO’S AL JAZEERA INTERVIEWS

Abstract

Political interviews are consequential sites for examining how (im)politeness, power, and political identity are negotiated through interaction. However, existing political (im)politeness research and reciprocity studies have paid limited attention to how reciprocal and non-reciprocal practices change when the same political actor moves across substantially different positions of political authority. This study examines how Prabowo Subianto constructs and negotiates political identity through (im)politeness and how these practices relate to changing power relations in his 2013 and 2024 Al Jazeera English interviews. Using a qualitative longitudinal design, the study analyzes two audiovisual interview interactions through interactional pragmatic discourse analysis, with the Principle of (Im)politeness Reciprocity as the primary framework and relational work, rapport management, and identity analysis as complementary lenses. The findings reveal a clear shift from defensive reciprocity in 2013, where resistance, direct rebuttal, and confrontational responses function primarily to defend legitimacy and assert authority, toward institutionalized relational management in 2024, where mitigation, reassurance, alignment, and controlled directness support authority stabilization, governability, and national leadership. The study extends reciprocity-based (im)politeness research by demonstrating that reciprocal interactional practices are not fixed across a political career but are reconfigured as political power and legitimacy change, thereby advancing a language-centred account of political identity as an interactionally achieved and longitudinally transformed phenomenon