Argumentation and Advocacy
48 (Spring 2012): 198-210
"This essay examines the extended threat to the political public sphere by cultures of expertise that substitute media spectacle for genuine deliberation"
Goodnight begins examining deliberation as a shaping force for future constructions. Goodnight sees deliberative rhetoric as an art that might have atrophied in recent years.
He believes current practices masquerade as deliberative rhetoric.
Creative resolution and the resolute creation of uncertainty makes arguments recognizable. Arguments, while not always controversial, are by nature uncertain in their ends.
Spheres: "branches of activity–the grounds upon which arguments are built and the authorities to which arguers appeal" (200).
Goodnight grounds the public, private, and technical spheres in Burke's notion of identification.
private: a person shows "consubstantiality"
public: a partisan act
technical: invoking career or vocation
Though the term sphere has been used to discriminate in the past, the sphere here represents a way of dealing with uncertainty. One can accept the traditional modes of argumentation or try to reshape the grounds upon which an argument is launched. The latter "expands one sphere of argument at the expense of another" (201).
"From a critics perspective, argument may be approached as a way of coming to understand the transformations of human activity through the variety of practices employed in making argument" (201). Goodnight demonstrates the danger of reverse engineering an argument at an airport bar as a way of extrapolating the general rules of argumentation. Instead of a general rule of argumentation, what would be preserved by a scholar would represent the lens of the scholar (technical sphere) in the preservation of the argument. As such, the criticism of the argument forms two camps: those who agree with the technical sphere interpretation and those that claim the community (argument) was misrepresented. The argument then becomes public and must fit within the parameters of public argument.
The analogy of how an argument at an airport bar can be taken up and disagreed with in a public sphere exemplifies the different kinds of arguments made in different arenas. "Transcending the personal and technical spheres is the public, a domain which, while not reducible to the argument practice of any group of social customs or professional communities, nevertheless may be influenced by them. But the public realm is discrete insofar as it provides forums with customs, traditions, and requirements for arguers in the recognition that the consequences of dispute extend beyond the personal and technical spheres" (202).
Goodnight then provides historical examples of how "grounds of argument may be altered" (203).
He's also concerned about the role of the common citizen in an increasingly technological world. What can the layman do in a technocracy? He pulls back from this though, believing that it's uncertain that governing our democracy has become the purvey of a technological elite.
To support this claim, Goodnight argues that the deliberation in the public sphere has been reduced to popularity contests as a means to get into office. However, it's hard to say if the public has disengaged from meaningful debate because such debates and decisions never come to the fore. So, if a decision making forum is never made public, it's hard to ascertain the liveliness of public knowledge.
In its place, the mass media has promulgated the semblance of a deliberative rhetoric.
Goodnight focuses on news reports and acknowledges that "The reports always presented the individual as a victim of social forces. Descionmaking bodies, apparently bereft of human emotion and lacking common sense, were to make decisions based upon inscrutable principles...The reports were crafted in such a way that no intelligent assessment could be made concerning the issues involved...the story simply did not invite action" (207). In short, Goodnight argues that the semblance of a public sphere operates to obscure causal factors. It produces information but fails to direct action at an origin. "What could be a way of sharing in the creation of a future is supplanted by a perpetual swirl of exciting stimuli. Thus is deliberation replaced by consumption" (207).
Goodnight calls for argumentation theorists to revitalize the lost art of deliberation by critiquing "those practices which replace deliberative rhetoric" (208).
48 (Spring 2012): 198-210
"This essay examines the extended threat to the political public sphere by cultures of expertise that substitute media spectacle for genuine deliberation"
Goodnight begins examining deliberation as a shaping force for future constructions. Goodnight sees deliberative rhetoric as an art that might have atrophied in recent years.
He believes current practices masquerade as deliberative rhetoric.
Creative resolution and the resolute creation of uncertainty makes arguments recognizable. Arguments, while not always controversial, are by nature uncertain in their ends.
Spheres: "branches of activity–the grounds upon which arguments are built and the authorities to which arguers appeal" (200).
Goodnight grounds the public, private, and technical spheres in Burke's notion of identification.
private: a person shows "consubstantiality"
public: a partisan act
technical: invoking career or vocation
Though the term sphere has been used to discriminate in the past, the sphere here represents a way of dealing with uncertainty. One can accept the traditional modes of argumentation or try to reshape the grounds upon which an argument is launched. The latter "expands one sphere of argument at the expense of another" (201).
"From a critics perspective, argument may be approached as a way of coming to understand the transformations of human activity through the variety of practices employed in making argument" (201). Goodnight demonstrates the danger of reverse engineering an argument at an airport bar as a way of extrapolating the general rules of argumentation. Instead of a general rule of argumentation, what would be preserved by a scholar would represent the lens of the scholar (technical sphere) in the preservation of the argument. As such, the criticism of the argument forms two camps: those who agree with the technical sphere interpretation and those that claim the community (argument) was misrepresented. The argument then becomes public and must fit within the parameters of public argument.
The analogy of how an argument at an airport bar can be taken up and disagreed with in a public sphere exemplifies the different kinds of arguments made in different arenas. "Transcending the personal and technical spheres is the public, a domain which, while not reducible to the argument practice of any group of social customs or professional communities, nevertheless may be influenced by them. But the public realm is discrete insofar as it provides forums with customs, traditions, and requirements for arguers in the recognition that the consequences of dispute extend beyond the personal and technical spheres" (202).
Goodnight then provides historical examples of how "grounds of argument may be altered" (203).
He's also concerned about the role of the common citizen in an increasingly technological world. What can the layman do in a technocracy? He pulls back from this though, believing that it's uncertain that governing our democracy has become the purvey of a technological elite.
To support this claim, Goodnight argues that the deliberation in the public sphere has been reduced to popularity contests as a means to get into office. However, it's hard to say if the public has disengaged from meaningful debate because such debates and decisions never come to the fore. So, if a decision making forum is never made public, it's hard to ascertain the liveliness of public knowledge.
In its place, the mass media has promulgated the semblance of a deliberative rhetoric.
Goodnight focuses on news reports and acknowledges that "The reports always presented the individual as a victim of social forces. Descionmaking bodies, apparently bereft of human emotion and lacking common sense, were to make decisions based upon inscrutable principles...The reports were crafted in such a way that no intelligent assessment could be made concerning the issues involved...the story simply did not invite action" (207). In short, Goodnight argues that the semblance of a public sphere operates to obscure causal factors. It produces information but fails to direct action at an origin. "What could be a way of sharing in the creation of a future is supplanted by a perpetual swirl of exciting stimuli. Thus is deliberation replaced by consumption" (207).
Goodnight calls for argumentation theorists to revitalize the lost art of deliberation by critiquing "those practices which replace deliberative rhetoric" (208).
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