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Argumentation, Political

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Argumentation, Political
RUTH WODAK
Lancaster University, UK

Argumentation is usually defined as a nonviolent linguistic as well as cognitive pattern

of problem-solving that manifests itself in a (more or less regulated) sequence of speech
acts which form a complex (and more or less coherent) network of statements. Thus,
argumentation allows challenging or justifying validity claims such as truth and nor-
mative rightness. Moreover, argumentation is not to be perceived as an autonomous
speech act (such as an assertion or a declaration). There are no argumentative or con-
clusive speech acts per se; all types of speech acts can potentially fulfill an argumentative
function (e.g., Kopperschmidt, 2000, p. 59). Moreover, Fischer and Gottweis (2012, p. 9)
claim that “there is no firm distinction between deliberation and argumentation. This
is because deliberation is itself a form of argumentation.” Following from this claim,
they argue, quite similarly to Kopperschmidt, that argumentation “focuses on the way
that people—including opponents—reach and justify mutually acceptable decisions”
(p. 9).
Rhetoric and argumentation have their roots in antique times; many tropes and
argumentation schemes, however, have remained salient and are realized in specific
languages and contexts, for specific audiences. Of course, due to historical and
sociopolitical developments and the invention of new technological means, modes of
persuasion, manipulation, and propaganda have undergone much change. In this way,
the so-called “argumentative turn” in political science and communication provides
the policy analyst with adequate tools to analyze how certain relations of dominance
are structured, reproduced, justified, and legitimized.
Billig (1987, p. 91) states that “to understand the meaning of a sentence or whole dis-
course in an argumentative context, one should not examine merely the words within
that discourse or the images in the speaker’s mind at the moment of utterance. One
should also consider the positions which are being criticized, or against which a justifi-
cation is being mounted. Without knowing these counter-positions, the argumentative
meaning will be lost.” Hence, the main challenge for argumentative analysis in the field
of politics is to find ways of integrating the analysis of the discursive production of
reality with the (material) social practices from which social constructs emerge and in
which the speakers (actors) engage.
Fischer and Gottweis (2012, p. 1) take this opinion further and maintain that “the
argumentative turn [in policy-making and political science] expanded to include work
on discourse analysis, deliberation, deliberative democracy, citizen juries, governance,
expertise, participatory inquiry, local and tacit knowledge, collaborative planning, the
uses and role of media, and interpretive methods, among others.” Thus, it is obvious
that political actions and political behavior of all kinds are inherently tied to language

The International Encyclopedia of Political Communication, First Edition. Edited by Gianpietro Mazzoleni.
© 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Published 2015 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
DOI: 10.1002/9781118541555.wbiepc080
2 A R G U M E N TAT I O N, PO L I T I C A L

and communication. “Doing politics” (Wodak, 2011, pp. 113 ff.) consists of manifold
communicative activities, such as reporting, briefing, preparing, formulating, summa-
rizing, negotiating, forming coalitions, and also convincing others to align with one.
Many activities thus require rhetorical and persuasive skills, frequently involving
argumentative moves and schemata. It is important to emphasize that much political
work is certainly of a persuasive nature and thus necessarily linked to argumentation.
However, many domains of the profession of politics consist of other activities and
demand huge flexibility of all political entrepreneurs as they fulfill the daily institu-
tional requirements of “politics as usual.” Symbolic interactionism, interpretative policy
approaches, the paradigm of discourse analysis, rhetoric, as well as sociolinguistics have
all amply illustrated that politics is enacted and performed on frontstage and back-
stage; politics is also realized in a plethora of genres, from orally delivered speeches
and press conferences to written and disseminated party programs and policy papers,
from negotiations to parliamentary debates, and from visual posters to Internet home-
pages, employing “traditional media” such as TV and radio or “new social media” such
as Facebook and Twitter.

Approaches to political argumentation

There are many different theoretical and methodological approaches to political

argumentation and argumentation analysis (e.g., Habermas, 1984; Rubinelli, 2009;
Toulmin, 2003; van Eemeren, 2010; Walton, 2007). Since the 1970s, discourse analysts
have increasingly attempted to integrate various aspects of argumentation theory and
analysis in to their respective linguistic frameworks (e.g., Boukala, 2013; Reisigl &
Wodak, 2001; Wengeler, 2003). Simultaneously, political scientists have succeeded
in adapting specific approaches to argumentation to their needs, frequently with
very little or no contact with linguists. Since the millennium, however, inter- and
transdisciplinary conferences and networks have been established and the various
previously isolated strands have started to learn from each other.
Much recent interdisciplinary work on political argumentation draws on Jürgen
Habermas’s seminal Theory of Communicative Action (1984). Habermas’s critical
approach proposes that two parties, should they want to reach agreement or consensus,
have to satisfy a set of so-called “validity claims.” These claims imply that the speakers
have to make their utterances “intelligible” (or “comprehensible”), “true and truthful,”
and “right.” Truth claims refer to the objective world being true or false (e.g., “I
hereby say that the milk is spilt”); rightness claims refer to social actions being right
or wrong (e.g., “I hereby declare that killing is wrong”); truthfulness claims refer to
the degree of sincerity in our self-representation (e.g., “I hereby promise to return
the book”). Another important concept draws inherently on Habermas’s political
philosophy: the concept of “deliberation.” For Habermas, in contrast to Fischer and
Gottweis (2012), deliberation does not necessarily equal argumentation. Deliberation
can be understood as the public use of reason as inclusively as possible. Deliberation
is rational to the extent that claims are exchanged in an egalitarian, inclusive, and
discursive context. Thus, Reisigl and Wodak (2001, p. 34) drawing on Habermas’s
 A R G U M E N TAT I O N, PO L I T I C A L 3

emancipatory model, define “deliberative democracy” as “based on a free public sphere

and a strong civil society, in which all concerned with the specific social problem in
question can participate. … This model of democracy [ … ] is also a theory of rational
argumentation [ … ] and discursive conflict solving.”
Not all elements or components of an argumentation become linguistically mani-
fest as argumentation is frequently enthymemic. Each of its basic functional elements
(argument, conclusion rule, and claim) can potentially be omitted and thus has to be
completed “en thyme” (i.e., in the mind by inferences). The linguistic realization is
highly context-dependent; thus, in more formal contexts, different rhetorical tropes,
presuppositions, politeness markers, speech acts, and implicatures are relevant than in
more informal contexts. The degree of ritualization and institutionalization of a spe-
cific communicative event also influence the respective linguistic utterance. Moreover,
shared knowledge (in epistemic communities) has a huge impact of the implicitness or
explicitness of persuasive devices. Frequently, only groups who “are in the know” will
be able to understand and deconstruct the implicit and underlying argumentation.
It is also important to distinguish between argumentation and explanation. While
argumentation is an attempt to convince the listener of the acceptability of a standpoint
with respect to a proposition, an explanation is aimed at increasing the listener’s
understanding of the proposition represented by the statement. In this way, an
explanation can be conceived of as a linguistic and cognitive action pattern that aims at
making something comprehensible and consists of clarifying or specifying something.
Of course, sometimes, argumentation and explanation can coincide in scientific
contexts if, for example, hypothetical claims about causal relationships (causal expla-
nations) are justified or challenged with respect to theoretical validity claims of truth.
Sometimes, argumentation and narration overlap in contexts where narrative
episodes are told as illustrating examples that back a thesis (illustrative induction);
this occurs frequently in political speeches as one of many rhetorical devices where
an anecdote is narrated as an example to be generalized and to be identified with.
For example, Stone (1989) suggests looking at how political actors construct “causal
stories” (or “causal theories” or “causal ideas”) that place blame on certain actors for
certain actions and, by doing this, affect the formation of public policy agendas. Thus,
she maintains that causal stories form the essence of political problem definition and
are instrumental in struggles between individuals and groups over policy issues. More
specifically, she distinguishes between causal stories which can be used to either chal-
lenge or protect an existing social order; or assign responsibility to particular political
actors so that someone will have to stop an activity, do it differently, compensate its
victims, or possibly face punishment; or legitimate and empower particular actors as
“fixers” of the problem; or create new political alliances among people who allegedly
stand in the same victim relationship to the causal agent. In all these cases, blame
attribution is justified by a narrative via specific argumentation schemes.
The most frequently used argumentation scheme has been suggested by Toulmin,
who claims (2003, p. 86) that an argument is like an organism:

It has both a gross, anatomical structure and a finer, psychological one. When set out explicitly
in all its detail, it may occupy a number of printed pages or take perhaps a quarter of an hour to
4 A R G U M E N TAT I O N, PO L I T I C A L

deliver; and within this time or space one can distinguish the main phases marking the progress
of the argument from the initial statement of an unsettled problem to the final presentation of a
conclusion. These main phases will each of them occupy some minutes or paragraphs, and represent
the chief anatomical units of the argument- its ‘organs’ so to speak. But within each paragraph, when
one gets down to the level of individual sentences, a finer structure can be recognized, and this is the
structure with which logicians have mainly concerned themselves. It is at this psychological level
that the idea of logical form has been introduced, and here that the validity of our arguments has
ultimately to be established or refuted.

Following geometrical and jurisprudential models, Toulmin illustrates that validity

and acceptability exist in arguments beyond the logical, mathematical premises that
are linked to everyday life and knowledge. According to Toulmin, argumentation is
considered to be an attempt of a speaker to justify a statement. He reformulates Aristo-
tle’s analysis of arguments in Topics, which is based on three elements (minor premise,
major premise, conclusion), and refers to data and warrant that purport to the estab-
lishment of the claim (conclusion). Indeed, in his extended model Toulmin speaks of
backings, qualifiers, and rebuttals (conditions of exception) which add an authoritative
dimension to the argument and contribute to its acceptance (2003, pp. 87–134; see
Figure 1). Many everyday arguments as well as political debates, policy papers, and
even academic articles follow the Toulmin model, frequently recursively, sequentially,
or even in embedded argumentative chains.
In this model, the concepts are defined as follows:

C = claim: the statement/thesis in question, which is argued and has to be justified

D = data/grounds: the evidence, facts used to prove the claim
CR = warrant/conclusion rule: the hypothetical argumentation scheme that serves as a
bridge between the claim and data, that leads from the data to the claim (i.e., topos)
R = rebuttal: the statement that indicates the condition or circumstances under which
it is not possible to use the bridge/warrant
B = backing: a statement that supports the warrant that helps to prove that the war-
rant/conclusion rule is true
M = modality: qualifier that indicates or limits the strength of the claim that is formu-
lated on the basis of the data and the warrant

Another important approach is put forward by Walton (2007): practical reasoning

as an example of informal logic. He distinguishes between the instrumental scheme for
practical reasoning and the scheme for value-based practical reasoning; this schema is

Modality (probably)

Data warrant (because of) claim (thus)

rebuttal (if not)

backing (on the basis of)
Figure 1 The Toulmin model.
Source: Adapted from Toulmin, 2003
 A R G U M E N TAT I O N, PO L I T I C A L 5

Harry needs scalpicin

Harry has an itchy scalp Argument from Negative Scalpicin would make
Value Harry’s scalp no longer itchy
Harry needs something that
would make his scalp less itchy

A bad condition is
An itchy scalp is a
something which should be
bad condition
removed if possibie

Figure 2 Walton’s model of value-based practical reasoning.

Source: Adapted from Walton, 2007, p. 25

frequently employed in carefully planned political speeches, in parliamentary debates,

or at election campaigns where the audience has to be convinced of both the necessity of
certain ends and the adequacy of the means to arrive there. The scheme for value-based
practical reasoning proceeds as follows (and see Figure 2):

I have a goal G.
G is supported by my set of values, V.
Bringing about A is necessary (or sufficient) for me to bring about G.
Therefore, I should (practically ought to) bring about A.

Topoi in political discourse

The discourse historical approach (Reisigl & Wodak, 2001; Wodak, 2011) which has
been applied to many dimensions of politics (speeches, right-wing populist rhetoric,
identity politics and politics of the past, organizational politics, etc.) draws on the con-
cept of topos, apart from employing and elaborating Toulmin’s model. Kienpointner
(1996) defines topos as “search formulas which tell you how and where to look for
arguments. At the same time, topoi are warrants which guarantee the transition from
argument to conclusion” (see Figure 3).

Argument Claim

warrant / conclusion rule

Figure 3 A simplified model of argumentation.
Source: Adapted from Kienpointner, 1996, p. 75
6 A R G U M E N TAT I O N, PO L I T I C A L

In this vein, Walton (2007) claims that a topos “is a device to find arguments that can
be used to prioritize their strategic strength.” Moreover, Rubinelli (2009, p. 13) argues
that topoi are strategies of argumentation for gaining the upper hand and producing
successful speeches. Topoi can be made explicit as conditional or causal paraphrases
such as “if x, then y” or “y, because x” (Reisigl & Wodak, 2001, pp. 69–80).
Focusing on these conclusion rules, Kienpointner (1996) distinguishes between var-
ious content-abstract (i.e., formal) argumentation schemes which occur frequently in
argumentations, such as the topos of definition, the topos of the species and the genus, the
topos of comparison (topos of similarity versus topos of difference), the topos of the part
and the whole, the topos of authority, the topos of example, and the topos of analogy. For
example, the topos of authority can be deconstructed as follows:

Conclusion Rule: If authority X says that A is true, A is true.

A: X says that A is true.
C: Thus, A is true.

Topoi are commonly defined as a place in which the argument is developed. As

Boukala (2013, pp. 116 ff.) argues, the aforementioned approaches usually combine
Aristotle’s topoi with Cicero’s loci. On the other hand, Wengeler (2003) emphasizes
a content- and context-specific definition of topoi as these allow deconstructing pre-
supposed and frequently fallacious prejudices embedded in everyday common-sense
conversations. The notion of common-sense (or everyday) argumentation is salient
as many studies focus on understanding more or less explicit preferences of specific
electoral groups or political parties. For Aristotle, topoi are linked to the subject of
dialectic, called endoxon (accepted opinion). He uses the concept of endoxon in order
to describe an opinion that can be accepted by the majority of people because it
represents traditional knowledge but not necessarily true knowledge (Boukala, 2013,
p. 18). Along this vein, van Eemeren (2010, p. 111) also claims that endoxa are to be
defined as commonly held beliefs or generally accepted commitments which are linked
to normal beliefs and are acceptable for the audience.
Indeed, important interdisciplinary research on political communication conducted
within the discourse historical approach has applied both the more formally defined
Aristotelian topoi and the context-dependent content-related topoi. For example, Reisigl
and Wodak (2001) base their content-related argumentation analysis of discrimination
in discourses on Wengeler’s studies on discourses about migration in Germany and Aus-
tria (Wengeler, 2003). The adopted argumentation schemes have, of course, not been
chosen randomly. They have been selected on the basis of the similarity between the
research objects that have been analyzed (i.e., discourses on migration and asylum).
In this sense, the so-called principle of hypolepsis has been applied—the principle to
grasp the unknown by systematically connecting it with the known (with the already
elaborated analytical tools in existing discourse analytical approaches). Table 1 intro-
duces some of the most frequently used topoi in right-wing populist discourses about
immigration which have been detected—among others—in Austrian, German, British,
Swedish, Spanish, and French corpora:
 A R G U M E N TAT I O N, PO L I T I C A L 7

Table 1 Selected list of content-related topoi in discriminatory discourses about migration.

Topoi Warrants
Topos of advantage or If an action under a specific relevant point of view will be
usefulness useful, then one should perform it.
Topos of uselessness or If one can anticipate that the prognosticated
disadvantage consequences of a decision will not occur, then the
decision has to be rejected.
Topos of threat or danger If there are specific dangers or threats, one should do
something against them.
Topos of humanitarianism If a political action or decision does or does not conform
to human rights or humanitarian convictions and
values, then one should or should not perform or
make it.
Topos of burdening or If a person, an institution or a country is burdened by
weighing down specific problems, one should act in order to diminish
these burdens.
Topos of finances If a specific situation or action costs too much money or
causes a loss of revenue, one should perform actions
that diminish the costs or help to avoid the loss.
Topos of reality Because reality is as it is, a specific action/decision
should be performed/made.
Topos of numbers If the numbers prove a specific topos, a specific action
should be performed/not be carried out.
Source: Adapted from Reisigl & Wodak, 2001.

New rhetoric and pragma-dialectics

Perelman and Olbrechts-Tyteca (1969) draw on and elaborate the Aristotelian rhetoric
and develop the so-called “New Rhetoric.” Perelman and Olbrechts-Tyteca describe
New Rhetoric as “the study of the discursive techniques allowing us to induce or to
increase the mind’s adherence to the theses presented for its assent” (p. 4). Hence, Perel-
man and Olbrechts-Tyteca describe argumentation schemes that can be developed as
argumentation techniques only if they are accommodated to the premises of the eval-
uating audience. The premises are divided into two categories: premises relating to the
real and those that relate to what is preferable. The first category is, they maintain,
accepted by the universal audience, while the second one is related to the preferences
of a specific audience and linked to loci. Following Aristotle, Perelman and Olbrechts-
Tyteca distinguish between loci of quantity and loci of quality: loci of quantity justify why
a particular action should be preferred because most people would benefit; loci of qual-
ity explain why an action should be implemented because it is the best (pp. 85–93); in
this way, values and a normative stance are introduced. Hence, loci are argumentation
schemes that are based on value hierarchies and are used as justification for statements
insofar as they express the preferences of a particular audience.
Pragma-dialectics was originally proposed by van Eemeren (for an overview, see van
Eemeren, 2010). Van Eemeren (2010) provides argumentation with an everyday life
dimension in his pragma-dialectical approach: He claims that both oral and written
8 A R G U M E N TAT I O N, PO L I T I C A L

argumentations are integral parts of our daily routines. Thus, argumentation is not
restricted to epistemological or scientific functions; quite the contrary, it could be a
part of authoritative or political discourse regarding the “Other” insofar as it aims to
persuade the audience of the validity of a statement and in this way carves out in-groups
and out-groups. This approach “enables the analyst of argumentative discourse to
make a normative reconstruction of the discourse that results in an analytic overview
of all elements that are pertinent to a critical evaluation” (van Eemeren & Houtlosser,
2006, p. 381). More specifically, pragma-dialectics is defined as a method for dealing
in a systematic way with critical exchanges in verbal communication and interaction;
rhetoric, however, is defined as the theoretical study of the potential effectiveness of
argumentative discourse to persuade an audience (p. 383). The authors introduce the
concept of strategic maneuvering in order to bridge the gap between dialectics and
rhetoric.
Following Aristotle’s argumentation theory in general, they present three aspects of
strategic maneuvering (the strategic maneuvering triangle): topical potential, audience
orientation, and presentational devices (2006). Van Eemeren (2010, p. 95) claims that
these three dimensions run parallel to the three areas of classic rhetoric (i.e., ethos, logos,
and pathos). The study of the system of topics is similar to topoi or loci, the study of
audience orientation is linked to endoxa, and the study of presentational means can
be used as stylistic devices in the pursuit of reasonableness and effectiveness. Another
element of Aristotelian thought that is reformulated by strategic maneuvering is the
important concept of fallacy. According to van Eemeren (2010, p. 76), “in Aristotle’s
dialectical perspective fallacies are false moves employed in the attacker’s efforts to
refute the defender’s thesis”; the role of fallacy in strategic maneuvering is perceived
as “violations of critical discussion rules that come about as derailments of strategic
maneuvering” (van Eemeren & Houtlosser, 2006, p. 387).

SEE ALSO: Citizenship; Civil Society; Communication Theory; Critical Theory; Delib-
eration; Discourse Analysis; Discourse Ethics; Language, Political; Narrative, Political;
Persuasion, Political; Political Discourse; Rhetoric, Political

References

Billig, M. (1987). Arguing and thinking: A rhetorical approach to social psychology. Cambridge,
UK: Cambridge University Press.
Boukala, S. (2013). Greek media discourse and the construction of European identity: Suprana-
tional identity, fortress Europe and Islam as radical otherness. PhD Thesis, Lancaster University,
UK.
Fischer, F., & Gottweis, H. (Eds.). (2012). The argumentative turn revisited: Public policy as com-
municative practice. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
Habermas, J. (1984). Theory of communicative action. Boston, MA: Beacon Press.
Kienpointner, M. (1996). Vernünftig argumentieren: Regeln und Techniken der Argumentation.
Hamburg, Germany: Rowohlt.
Kopperschmidt, J. (2000). Argumentationstheorie zur Einführung. Hamburg, Germany: Junius.
Perelman, C., & Olbrechts-Tyteca, L. (1969). The new rhetoric: A treatise on argumentation. Notre
Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press.
 A R G U M E N TAT I O N, PO L I T I C A L 9

Reisigl, M., & Wodak, R. (2001). Discourse and discrimination: Rhetorics of racism and anti-
semitism. London: Routledge.
Rubinelli, S. (2009). Ars topica: The classical technique of constructing arguments from Aristotle to
Cicero. Berlin, Germany: Springer.
Stone, D. (1989). Causal stories and the formation of policy agendas. Political Science Quarterly,
104(2,) 281–300.
Toulmin, S. (2003). The uses of argument. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
van Eemeren, F. (2010). Strategic maneuvering in argumentation discourse: Extending the pragma-
dialectical theory of argumentation. Amsterdam, The Netherlands: Benjamins.
van Eemeren, F., & Houtlosser, P. (2006). Strategic maneuvering: A synthetic recapitulation.
Argumentation, 20, 381–392.
Walton, D. (2007). Dialogical models of explanation. In ExaCt 2007: Papers from the 2007 AAAI
workshop, Vancouver, July 21–22 (pp. 1–9). Menlo Park, CA: AAAI Press.
Wengeler, M. (2003). Topos und Diskurs. Tübingen, Germany: Niemeyer.
Wodak, R. (2011). The discourse of politics in action: Politics as usual. London, UK: Palgrave.

Further reading

Hajer, M., & Wagenaar, H. (Eds.). (2003). Deliberative policy analysis: Understanding governance
in the network society. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
Kienpointner, M. (2011). Rhetoric. In J. Ostman & J. Verschueren (Eds.), Pragmatics in practice
(pp. 264–277). Amsterdam, The Netherlands: Benjamins.
Walton, D. (1996). Argumentation schemes for presumptive reasoning. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence
Erlbaum Associates.

Ruth Wodak is distinguished professor emerita of discourse studies at Lancaster

University, UK. She is past-president of the Societas Linguistica Europaea and is
a member of the British Academy of Social Sciences and the Academia Europaea.
Her research interests are (critical) discourse studies, identity politics, and political
communication as well as issues of racism, anti-Semitism, and discrimination. She is
an editor of the Journal of Language and Politics and coeditor of Discourse and Society
and Critical Discourse Studies.