The beginning of the Sendic case: Political-media scandal and Uruguayan social imaginary

Abstract

Objectives: This article analyzes the beginning of a political-media scandal that occurred in Uruguay and that resulted in the resignation of the then vice-president. For this purpose, the theory of Thompson (2001/2000) is used, who distinguishes between three kinds of political scandals: “sexual”, “financial” and “power”. One of the proposed objectives is to investigate the applicability of these categories to analyze this case and the possible relevance of complementary categories; the other is to contribute to the characterization of the contemporary Uruguayan social imaginary based on the analysis of media representations considered relevant at the beginning of this case. 

Materials and methods: The corpus of analysis was elaborated through a theoretical sampling, based on the conceptualization of the temporal and sequential structure of media scandals raised by Thompson (2001/2000), on the analytical device proposed by Carlón (2020) for the study of the circulation of meaning in hypermediatized societies and on the criterion of “saturation” or “redundancy” (Valles, 1997). This includes, in the first place, a series of media events considered key at the beginning of this political scandal, all from February 24, 2016. These are: 1) The news published by the newspaper El Observador, that Sendic was not a Graduate in Human Genetics as he claimed to be. 2) The response of the Vice President's press secretary through a communiqué. 3) The publication on El Observador's website of a telephone conversation between a journalist of that newspaper and the vice-president in which the latter acknowledged that it was not a degree that he studied. 4) The press conference that Sendic gave in response to the news of his false degree. Likewise, a tweet from a radio program as well as a fragment of the same program are incorporated into the corpus, as “dynamic interpretants” (Peirce, 1987) illustrative of the media events of that day. To carry out the analysis, a qualitative methodology is adopted, which is located within the interpretative paradigm, from a Peircean semiotic perspective, with a special emphasis on its adaptation for the study of media communication (Andacht, 2013, 1996, 1992) and its articulation with the conceptualization of Castoriadis (Andacht, 1998; McNabb, 2008). 

Results: The transgression of the vice-president denounced by El Observador and its first media repercussions are analyzed in the context of the Uruguayan semiotic “mentality” (CP 1.533). For this purpose, myths characteristic of modern Uruguay are taken as a reference and Castoriadis' (2013/1975) theory of the social imaginary is articulated with Peirce's (1931-1958) triadic semiotics. In this way, the following myths are taken into account: A) That of Uruguay as “a country of educated citizens” (Rial, 1986, p. 24), from which the secular, free, and compulsory nature of public education is claimed in the Uruguayan 'mentality' (CP 1.533). These ‘imaginary social meanings’ about education were taken up again as a “social counter-imaginary” (Rial, 1986) in the sixties by the Uruguayan left. B) That “of consensus, (...) of the impersonal law that imposes itself (...) myth of order, of respect for rules, myth of the maintenance of the rule of law” (Perelli and Rial, 1986, p. 23). This is a myth “characteristic of the Uruguayan political imaginary until 1970-1974 and which survives the rupture of the formal and informal political cultures of the 1970s” (Bayce, 1989, p. 14). C) The «myth of a country of proud humble people», based on Andacht's (1996) characterization of the phenomenon of “negative boasting”, which means “to boast about not doing it” (p. 34), a social practice instituted in the Uruguayan social imaginary: “If arrogance or demonstrating success and social or economic prominence are insurmountable taboos for the good mesocrat, modesty and negative boasting constitute irreplaceable virtues in this imaginary region” (p. 34). D) That of the exceptionality or differentiation of Uruguay (Real de Azúa, 2009/1964; Rial, 1986). This highlights the uniqueness of this country, based on its high social integration, its lower relative levels of violence, inequality, and illiteracy, as well as its early adoption of protective legislation for the subaltern sectors (Rial, 1986, pp. 22-23). The analysis shows how all these central myths of the Uruguayan social imaginary were transgressed by the vice-president, by boasting a non-existent university degree and claiming gold medals and academic success in a degree that does not even exist. It is also recognized that this scandal cannot be placed within the categories proposed in the typology elaborated by Thompson (2001/2000) and that it is necessary to propose a new one to account for it. It is proposed that of «mentalicidal scandal». This would be a type of scandal that implies the violation of the 'mentality' of a collectivity, understood in the Peircean sense as the Firstness of Thirdness (CP 1.533). 

Conclusions: As a result of the analysis, it is concluded that at the origin of the fall of the vice-president lies the contravention of key axiological aspects of the Uruguayan semiotic 'mentality'. The transgression of these values explains the high negative impact of the false attribution of a university degree, even if it was not relevant for the performance of the vice-presidential office. The news exposed Sendic to a scandalous situation, accentuated by his unsuccessful counter-allegations based on “second order transgressions” (Thompson, 2001/2000), with the usual consequences of loss of prestige and symbolic capital. The need also arises to resort to a new concept to account for the case: that of «mentalicidal scandal», based on the Peircean conceptualization of the Firstness of Thirdness (CP 1.533), which accounts for those qualitative aspects that make up a shareable tone in a given society and at the same time singularize it. In this case, it is possible to describe the Uruguayan semiotic 'mentality' as the sphere of the positive valuation of the 'cultured' or educated, of respect for the rules of the instituted game, of the proud vindication of humility and the highlighting of Uruguayan exceptionality. All these aspects, which make the tone of mediation in this imagined community, were transgressed by Sendic and sealed his fate.