Reflections on Phronetic Social Science: A Dialogue Between Stewart Clegg, Bent Flyvbjerg, and Mark Haugaard (original) (raw)
Related papers
Important Next Steps in Phronetic Social Science
In Bent Flyvbjerg, Todd Landman, and Sanford Schram, eds., Real Social Science: Applied Phronesis, Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, pp. 285-297, 2012
The term ‘phronetic social science’ was coined in Making Social Science Matter (Flyvbjerg 2001). However, as pointed out in that volume and by Schram (2006), phronetic social science existed well before this particular articulation of the concept, but it was just not organized, recognized or named as such. Rather, it occurred here and there as scholars had adopted phronesis-like methods for their own purposes. The present title is the first organized volume of empirical–practical work in phronetic social science. Before Making Social Science Matter, phronesis, as a critical term of Aristotelian philosophy, had been theorized and its continuing importance as a key concept in Western thought had been convincingly argued by distinguished philosophers like Hans Georg Gadamer, Hannah Arendt, Alasdair MacIntyre and Richard J. Bernstein, among others. But no one had developed the theory and philosophy of phronesis into a practical methodology that could be applied by researchers interested in actually practising a phronetic social science. Making Social Science Matter developed such a methodology. Its implications were discussed and developed further in Making Political Science Matter (Schram and Caterino 2006). After these two theoretical–methodological contributions, it was evident that an important next step in demonstrating the usefulness of phronetic social science would be to illustrate, with concrete examples, how applied phronesis works in practical, empirical social science research. The contributions on applied phronesis contained in the present volume make clear that this next step has now been taken.
Book review symposium: Real Social Science: Applied Phronesis
2013
In Making Social Science Matter (2001), Bent Flyvbjerg proposed a radical challenge to positivistic versions of social inquiry and rational choice. Social inquiry according to Flyvbjerg is not really a ‘science’. The latter, he claimed had roots in the notion of epistemé or what Aristotle viewed as certain and reliable knowledge. Flyvbjerg viewed this type of knowledge as ‘theoretical’. As realized in modern nomological views of science, particulars are subsumed and governed by general laws. In contrast to this nomological version of social inquiry, Flyvbjerg claimed that knowledge of the social world was phronetic in Aristotle’s sense. It is practical, context bound, and independent of theoretical knowledge. Phronesis required the wisdom, insight and skill of an interested participant in social life. Flyvbjerg’s work found a sympathetic ear in the spreading discontent with the rational choice theories and quantitative approaches dominant in major political science journals.Yet such...
Examining Normative Sociology and Phronetic Social Science in the Light of Practical Reason
Civic Sociology, 2024
Normative sociology and phronetic social science are research programmes that aim to overcome the dead end of positivism and the obfuscating effects of cryptonormativity, promising renewed social science disciplines that engage normatively with the public. In this article, I aim to deepen our understanding of social science's (re)turn to normativity by examining how the disciplinary aims of such programmes fare against their conception of practical reason. I consider Tariq Modood's presentation of the Bristol School of Multiculturalism as a form of normative sociology and begin from its understanding of practical reason after Michael Oakeshott, before specifying Modood's recommendations, also with reference to other prominent versions of normative sociology. I then show that Bent Flyvbjerg's phronetic social science, an Aristotle-inspired programme that has received widespread attention, is a particularly useful object of comparison: it bears high proximity to the Bristol School of Multiculturalism by being contextualist, dialogical, and prising public engagement. Most importantly, it too espouses antirationalist arguments via the emphasis it places on the Aristotelian notion of phronesis (practical wisdom). I argue that Oakeshott's and Aristotle's insights on the character and growth of practical reason both clarify and problematize the disciplinary aims of normative sociology and phronetic social science. Thus, to develop and defend normative social science, it is necessary to address a host of resulting challenges, most centrally the following: phronesis as an intellectual virtue based on one's disposition, character, and experience largely eludes disciplinary-level training of the kind that social scientists and political theorists have received, exercise, or provide to students.
The Place of Phronesis in Postmodern Hermeneutics
Philosophy Today, 1993
The conception of paralogy, which Jean-Francois Lyotard develops in The Postmodern Condition 2 , motivates a number of questions concerning justice and the moral life. In this paper I suggest that Lyotard's account fails to provide an adequate answer to these questions, and that a more satisfactory account of justice in paralogy can be developed by exploring the concept of phronesis. John Caputo's "ethics of dissemination," in some respects, leads us in this direction. Although both theorists attempt to develop their accounts in terms of the concept of phronesis, Lyotard reduces phronesis to cleverness, while Caputo elevates it to what he calls "meta-phronesis," a conception of how we are to cope under conditions of postmodern paralogy. Caputo's analysis of meta-phronesis, however, is carried out within the framework of a critique of the traditional concept of phronesis. To show how Caputo's account might lend itself to a fuller conception of phronesis, one which is appropriate to a postmodern hermeneutics, I raise some questions about (a) the radical definition of the paralogical situation offered by both Lyotard and Caputo, (b) Caputo's critique of phronesis, and (c) his characterization of meta-phronesis.
Real Social Science: Applied Phronesis
2012
Back cover text: Real Social Science presents a new, hands-on approach to social inquiry. The theoretical and methodological ideas behind the book, inspired by Aristotelian phronesis, represent an original perspective within the social sciences, and this volume gives readers for the first time a set of studies exemplifying what applied phronesis looks like in practice. The reflexive analysis of values and power gives new meaning to the impact of research on policy and practice. Real Social Science is a major step forward in a novel and thriving field of research. This book will benefit scholars, researchers, and students who want to make a difference in practice, not just in the academy. Its message will make it essential reading for students and academics across the social sciences.
Journal of Power, 2010
If the task of social philosophy is understood in terms of a critique of power, the question of a proper understanding of power becomes particularly pressing. This article recalls two well‐known, different ways of conceptualising power from the philosophical tradition, roughly domination and constitution. It is argued that the very definition of what contemporary social philosophy or a critical social theory can, and should, do is dependent on the very notion of power employed. Social critique can accordingly be conceived of as either the detection of impediments to individual agency or a more general assessment of power relations. Though the former remains more prominent in social theory today, the latter is broader in scope and remains useful for the project of a critical analysis of the social.
THE FUTURE OF PHRONETIC SOCIAL SCIENCES. HOW CAN WE REVIVE VALUE-RATIONALITY IN A TIME OF CRISIS
2020
In this article, I aim to clarify why the idea of prudence or practical rationality, as embodied in Aristotle's concept of phronesis, is an object of special interest to some prominent social scientists such as G. H. von Wright and B. Flyvbjerg. I raise the hypothesis that if the concept of phronesis is elaborated upon as a value-rationality, as von Wright suggests, one can find some methodological hints for re-enchanting the status of the social sciences. Specifically, one can take a new stance in the debate whether or not social sciences can meet the requirements of so-called normal science, as the natural sciences do. As a crucial premise for outlining both the methodological advantages and disadvantages of phronetic social sciences in Flyvbjerg's sense, I point out the role of what I call provocative humanism, which displays a developed vision of von Wright's theory of provocative pessimism.