Emotions and policy change in the wake of political scandals: How did the Qatargate shake the European Parliament?

Abstract While there is an increasing interest in the role of emotions in policy studies, not much is known about how emotions unfold in one of the most emotional situations that can be encountered in politics: political scandals. To investigate how the discursive articulation of emotions shapes the policy responses to political misconduct from a constructivist perspective, this article delves into one of the most shocking corruption scandals hitting the European Union (EU) institutions in decades: the money‐for‐influence scandal, also popularly known as Qatargate. The article shows which emotions the Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) expressed in the wake of the scandal and how the discursive articulation of these emotions shaped their policy responses regarding transparency and accountability. This article combines the analysis of 28 EP plenary debates with interviews with six MEPs and high‐level EU officials.