Analyzing argumentation patterns in political discourse for better policy design

A new policy is needed to manage Switzerland's increasing urbanization and growing population. The second stage of the revision of the Swiss Spatial Planning Law, which has been ongoing since 2014, aims to create the legal framework to reduce or prevent the negative consequences of soil sealing, such as loss of biodiversity or urban sprawl. The revision process is characterized by substantial opposition among the actors involved; an acceptable draft revision is not conceivable. Using a structuring qualitative discourse analysis, we coded the consultation responses from the three consultation processes to date. We based our code system on acceptance factors existing in the literature and analyzed the content of the consultation responses over time and by actor. The results show that while a consensus on the instruments of the policy is emerging, there is great disagreement about the exact design and the resulting effects on the actors involved. The relative advantage of the policy and its compatibility with existing regulations are not sufficiently elaborated and presented in a comprehensible way. Ultimately, we identify several patterns of argumentation that should be considered by the policy-makers involved in the further revision, especially to address the critical arguments of the cantons and municipalities. HighlightsPoints of conflict and consensus during policy design were identified using QDA.Structuring the content of the policy discourse can support consensus-building.Typical argumentation patterns for opposing or accepting a policy were identified.Growing consensus entails shifts of actor conflicts from mid- to low-level topics.Relative advantage of a policy solution is key to increasing its acceptability.