Crucial Concepts in Argumentation Theory.

• Author: Blair, J. Anthony
• Position: Book Reviews

Crucial Concepts in Argumentation Theory. Edited by Frans H. van Eemeren. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press (Sic Sat), 2001; pp. 240. $23.25 paper.

This book is both a state-of-the-art account of the doctrines about most of the concepts of current interest in argumentation theory and also a showpiece for the Amsterdam argumentation research group. It features eight chapters, almost all of them by members of the faculty of the Department of Speech Communication, Argumentation Theory and Rhetoric at the University of Amsterdam. The book covers the following "crucial concepts": point of view, unexpressed premises, argument schemes, argument structures, fallacies, methods of interpretation and reconstruction, and argumentation in the field of law. In a nutshell, Crucial Concepts is a set of expositions of the problem areas and reviews of the related literature.

Frans van Eemeren's overview introductory chapter begins with useful sketches of six theoretical orientations (Toulmin's model, Perelman and Olbrechts-Tyteca's new rhetoric, informal logic, radical argumentativism, modern dialectical approaches and modern rhetorical approaches) and then it outlines the seven topics covered in the book.

In Chapter 2, "Points of View," Peter Houtlosser reviews the ways in which that which is in dispute in arguments (what is argued for, or against) is identified from a variety of different theoretical perspectives. He begins with Aristotle's dialectics and modern formal dialectics from Rescher to Barth and Krabbe, discussing the different concepts of the "thesis" that is questioned and defended. He introduces Pragma-Dialectics, where the analogue of the "thesis" is the "standpoint," as a modification of formal dialectics. Then, in the sections following, Houtlosser discusses, one by one, the concepts analogous to "standpoint" that are to found in seven other theoretical perspectives, and contrasts each with the Pragma-Dialectical concept. Thus he provides both a useful sketch of these perspectives and how they treat "point of view," and also a helpful clarification of the Pragma-Dialectical standpoint by explaining how it is to be distinguished from these related but (in most cases) different concepts. He thus discusses O'Keefe's notion of an "attitude," Harman's concept of a "belief," Shiffrin's concept of an "opinion," Thomas's, Govier's and Johnson and Blair's concept of a "conclusion," Toulmin's concept of a "claim," the concept of a "proposition"...