Political rhetoric and its relationship to context: a new theory of the rhetorical situation,

the rhetorical and the political

Abstract: Political rhetoric is underpinned by its relationship to context. Scholars have

struggled to articulate this relationship by relying upon an ontological perspective of rhetoric

and situation. This paper utilizes a new, problematological philosophy of rhetoric in context

that overcomes these limitations. This approach employs a logic of question and answer

which articulates the contingency of rhetoric as well as the structuring effects of context,

conceived as social distance. This paper makes three conceptual innovations; philosophically

redefining the rhetorical situation via a social problematology; developing a relational

conception of situation; and originating a rhetorical theory of situatedness.

Key words: rhetoric, questioning, rhetorical situation, problematology, the political

Word count: 8,990

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Political Rhetoric and its Relationship to Context: a new theory of the rhetorical situation,

the rhetorical and the political

The relationship between political rhetoric and the context of its use lies at the heart of

contemporary debates about political rhetoric. Unlike science, which aims for universal

principles, rhetoric is situated in context and varies according to the conditions in which it is

practised. Because rhetoric varies with the context, it has long been regarded with opprobrium as

relativist reasoning. In regard to politics, rhetoric has been condemned for its use by

unscrupulous speakers, from ancient Sophists to postmodern spin doctors, who advance their

own interests by playing upon the emotions of the audience. But at the same time, rhetoric also

refers to theories of discourse as rational, deliberative argumentation oriented towards

agreement. Each possibility is equally a property of rhetoric but each accepts, to varying degrees,

that rhetoric must adapt to the context by engaging an audience about a problem, whether in a

direct, spoken address, whether written for readers, or broadcast on television or the internet.

Thus, political rhetoric cannot be limited to the search for truth and falsity. Rather, it is a matter

of practical reasoning, of success and failure in the context of its utterance. Given that political

rhetoric is used in situated social relations between a speaker and an audience, the answer to the

question of how to theorise rhetoric and context is central to specifying the nature of political

rhetoric and its possibilities.

Rhetoric is a distinctive way of analysing political language. Recently, ‘Rhetorical

Political Analysis’ has been proposed as the basis of a framework for political analysis (Atkins &

Finlayson, 2013; Finlayson, 2007; Finlayson & Martin, 2008; Martin, 2013a), which enhances

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interpretive perspectives by introducing new dimensions to the theory of political interaction,

particularly in the form of persuasion, and showing how this relates to the construction of

problems (Finlayson, 2006), ideology (Atkins, 2011; Finlayson, 2012), institutions, and political

strategy (Finlayson & Martin, 2008; Martin, 2014). Compared with other interpretive approaches

that treat ideas as largely stable and coherent epistemes which frame problems in specific ways,

rhetoric is dynamic and aimed at changing reality. Martin explains it well that rhetoric – through

its basic conception of the speaker-audience relationship and interaction with context – is

outward-looking and interactive, both between the interlocutors and between discourse and

context. It is thus ‘compatible with “dialectical” accounts of structure and agency that emphasise

the negotiation of constraints and opportunities, but with a greater focus on actors than

institutions’ (Martin, 2014, p. 2). Rhetoric not only interacts with the context, it also alters it

(Martin, 2014).

But how exactly are we to theorise this interaction? Martin (2014) takes up the debate in

drawing upon the ‘rhetorical situation’ literature from the field of rhetoric studies and applying it

to politics, articulating how actors select arguments in the mobilization of strategic concerns as a

means of managing situations. However, he applies this only to political strategy and is mainly

concerned with argumentation and persuasion. A closer philosophical examination of the

literature on rhetorical situation can prove enlightening for developing a more comprehensive

theory of the interaction of rhetoric and context, because this literature developed with particular

philosophical frameworks in mind, which are not well understood and impact upon the scope of

political rhetoric. In this article, I revisit the rhetorical situation debate with a view to uncovering

its philosophical origins and drawing from them a more thorough conception of the relationship

between rhetoric and context. In so doing, the question for political theory arises of what ‘the

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rhetorical’ concerns and how it relates to ‘the political’. I propose an alternative,

problematological philosophy of rhetorical situation, which includes a new theory of the

rhetorical and the political. This theory allows us to account for the dual dimensions of the

dynamic relations between rhetoric and its situational context, to extend the philosophy of

rhetoric to a general theory of situated communication, and also to locate the political in a

situated social relationship. The rhetorical is conceived similarly, with the relationship between

them described in terms of their treatment of distance. In sum, the analysis aims to provide a new

philosophical basis for rhetorical critique in terms of its relationship to the context of its use and

the manipulation of socio-political distance. I approach this task by drawing upon Michel

Meyer’s (2008, 2010) philosophy of rhetoric. I argue that a problematological approach

improves upon existing theories by, 1) articulating a new philosophical conception of rhetorical

situation, grounded in problematology rather than ontology. This defines the rhetorical situation

through a social problematology, explained in terms of an alternative question–answer logic.

This logic incorporates 2) a relational philosophy of the situation, which establishes 3) a

rhetorical theory of situatedness.

Rhetoric and context in the theory of rhetorical situation

The concept of rhetorical situation was first developed by Bitzer (1968) in order to formulate a

more precise definition of rhetoric by addressing the general relationship of rhetoric to the

context of its utterance. In this foundational work, questioning occupies a central place. Bitzer

proposed that rhetoric is situational because it exists as a response to a situation defined by some

problem, or ‘exigence’ (1968, p. 5). Situations control rhetoric, as questions control answers, and

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situations are only rhetorical if they require modification through rhetorical means. It is the

situation that is the ground of problems and which calls forth a rhetorical response. The

rhetorical situation has three components: the exigence, or practical problem demanding

modification; the audience; and the constraints upon the actors, within which Bitzer incorporates

the vast dimensions of social interaction; ‘persons, events, objects, and relations…beliefs,

attitudes, documents, facts, traditions, images, interests, motives and the like’ (1968, p. 8). These

influences have significant weight upon communications, whatever agency we might like to

accord to speakers. Thus, a controversy results from the philosophical assumptions of the theory:

because, for Bitzer, situation is a discrete ontological reality, distinct from the rhetoric that

responds to it, only some situations are genuinely ‘rhetorical’. Bitzer thereby constrained

rhetoric, both in its application to a delimited range of social situations and in the order of

priority between rhetoric and the independent determinants of the context. His critics complained

that these limitations were too great and perpetuated the perception of rhetoric as an adjunct

technique rather than an autonomous discipline. Vatz pointed out the consequences of accepting

Bitzer’s definition: ‘If you view meaning as intrinsic to situations, rhetorical study becomes

parasitic to philosophy, political science and whatever other discipline can inform us as to what

the real situation is’ (Vatz, 1973, pp. 157-8). The subsequent debates, conducted over many

decades, produced various critiques and modifications, distinguishable according to the priority

of the situation–rhetoric relationship, redefining one or the other so as to resolve the question of

their priority. The debate eventually converged on the general idea that both rhetoric and

situation are important. I agree with this broad formulation. However, following on from Vatz’s

concerns, the interaction has never been adequately explained, I argue, because, whether one

comes down more on the side of situation, or rhetoric, or both being influential, rhetoric and

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situation have always been ontologically demarcated, as distinct entities, so the question of their

interrelationship cannot be resolved.

To better understand the origins of rhetorical situation theory, we should examine more

closely its underlying philosophical basis in questioning, which has been under-appreciated and

warrants further attention. The controversy over the theory in rhetoric circles never sufficiently

examined the important influence of American pragmatism upon Bitzer, whose entire theory

follows closely Dewey’s pragmatist philosophy, including the central and unique role he gave to

questioning (see, Crick, 2010). Dewey (1927, 1938) proposed that philosophy responds to

problems that lie in the world of experience: thought begins with problems and involves the

transformation of indeterminate situations into intelligible problems, amenable to resolution,

which in turn constitute a practical modification of a situation such that reality is transformed. In

grounding thought in the world of experience, Dewey aimed to give pragmatism a practical,

political orientation that would mark it out as different from sterile metaphysics: true thinking

could be judged by how well it modified the world. This means that it is experience which is

primary and sets problems, and reflection which responds to them (Dewey, 1958, p. 4). Bitzer’s

theory corresponds to pragmatism quite directly; an exigence is the question found in experience,

and the place of reflective thought is occupied by rhetoric. The object of rhetoric is to transform

the situation, such that the problem is eliminated. In theory, it is therefore possible to eliminate

all problems and, consequently, Bitzer (1968, 13) concludes that rhetoric could theoretically be

abolished because, were all the exigences of the world solved, it would be possible to have

communication without rhetoric. Bitzer’s theory is a rhetorical extension of pragmatism, and it is

not difficult to see the sense of this modification: in a democracy, problems must be debated

between citizens and their representatives, so it makes sense to bring rhetoric into pragmatism in

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this manner. And, consequently, we can see why, following Dewey, he determined that rhetoric

must be secondary to experience.

The critical responses to Bitzer’s work (see Jasinski, 2001) mainly hinged upon the

subjection of rhetoric to experience, i.e., the key pragmatist tenets of his theory. Firstly, some

critics reject Bitzer’s ontology for being too objectivist and determinist, and instead propose

interpretivist versions of the rhetorical situation, reflecting the symbolic interactionist

perspective which gives priority to the discursive creativity of speakers (Brinton, 1981; see also

Burke, 1945; A. B. Miller, 1972; C. R. Miller, 1984; Vatz, 1973; Wilkerson, 1970). These

criticisms rightly target the idea that experience is determining. Critics of Dewey have also

raised this objection, noting that his ontology reflects a fundamental empiricism not incompatible

with positivism (Brandom, 2004). Others – including Bitzer himself – have argued that Bitzer’s

position was more attenuated, and that he denied neither freedom nor creativity to the speaker,

even while insisting on the structuring properties of situation (L. F. Bitzer, 1980; Patton, 1979;

see Bitzer in Tompkins, Patton, & Bitzer, 1980).1

Later contributions gave even greater weight to the autonomy of rhetoric as a device for

questioning reality, with critics emphasizing the agency of speaker and audience, and the ability

of language to generate creative interpretations beyond situational constraints. The end-point of

this trajectory could be considered to be the poststructuralist critique, in which Biesecker (1989;

see also, Edbauer, 2005; Smith & Lybarger, 1997) elaborates the conceptual limitations that the

1 The contentious interpretations that resulted reflect debates within philosophy about how to

read Dewey’s work. The symbolic interactionist tradition emphasized the interpretive elements

of pragmatism in arguing for the theory-dependence of observation; see Bernstein (1966); Rorty

(1991).6

ontology of the subject places upon the identity of the subjects in a rhetorical situation.

Ultimately, the various forays into the rhetorical situation controversy resulted in a convergence

—albeit not without considerable differences remaining—upon a position in which both

contextual constraints and rhetoric play a constitutive role in structuring rhetorical discourse and

the meaning of experience, but with a more expansive rhetorical agency than in Bitzer’s original

work (L. F. Bitzer, 1980; Consigny, 1974; Grant-Davie, 1997; see also Kinneavy, 1971;

McGuire, 1982; Tompkins et al., 1980). Other variations upon this view include works that focus

on the idea of genre and situation (Jamieson, 1973; C. R. Miller, 1984), that emphasize more

strongly the influence of the intersubjective speaker–audience relationship (Biesecker, 1989;

Garret & Xiaosui, 1993; Gorrell, 1997; Kaufer, 1979), and that bring forth the connection

between the agency of speakers and strategy (Martin, 2013b; Scott, 1980). However, in the end,

the ontological view means that the dynamic between the agency of interlocutors and the

structural constraints of context has never been fully theorised. The pragmatist-based theories are

too empiricist, while the symbolic-interactionist/interpretive theories do not relate well to social

scientific accounts of social reality.

Bitzer also follows Dewey in another interesting way, drawing upon his use of question

and answer as a logical construct. Once again, this dimension is under-explored, with many

critical reflections treating this aspect of Bitzer’s theory as merely an analogy, although later

research gives the question–answer logic more credence and extends it in new ways (Garret &

Xiaosui, 1993; Yoos, 1987). These scholars are right to emphasize the importance of question–

answer logic because it has an important philosophical basis in the pragmatism which underpins

it. This questioning theme reflects the composition of Dewey’s (1938) theory of reflective

thought as a logic of question and answer. Dewey went a considerable way towards developing a

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new philosophy of questioning: he noted that a question is also an answer, in a partial sense,

because the formulation of a question already enables us to frame a problem, to give it meaning

without necessarily resolving it via a definitive resolution (1938, pp. 108, 122). The rhetorical

situation might well have been conceived along these lines, i.e., rhetoric as a partial answer to a

situation, which structures it but also simultaneously leaves it open, thereby allowing agency for

the speaker and audience. This would also support a conception of the performative element of

the rhetorical speech-act itself as a kind of answer, differentiated from the answers reached to

substantive questions about situations. The existence of a ‘problem’ situation could then be

thought of as the result of an inquiry and rhetoric as a partial answer to it, a performative act that

creates meaning but which does not entirely determine that meaning, precisely because a partial

answer is a question and thus remains open. But Bitzer did not differentiate rhetoric’s

performative from its substantive dimension, and certainly did not do so in terms of questioning.

Following pragmatist thought, questions really were grounded in experience and thus

ontologically autonomous, whatever the involvement of the interlocutors.

Nonetheless, Bitzer’s choice of the question–answer couplet indicates something

important about the philosophical relationship of rhetoric to context. In Bitzer’s definition we

can see him grappling with the dilemma of accounting for both the necessity and contingency

that are equally properties of rhetoric. To be stable and coherent, a philosophy of rhetoric must

be grounded in necessity, which he locates in the situation: whereas the conception of situation is

general, rhetorical situations are particular, but one type of situation. Their possibility follows as

a consequence of the nature of the situation. However, we know that it is not empirically

necessary that rhetoric actually take place in social situations. A speech act is one possible

response, or answer, to a perceived problem, but so is silence or disinterest. Questions make

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answers possible, but because many answers are possible, no one particular answer is necessary:

rhetoric is a discourse of contingency. Thus, Bitzer’s logic of question and answer is too

restrictive. Given that it is in the nature of questions to generate multiple answers, and given that

resorting to rhetoric is not necessary – we can ignore problems – the rhetorical act itself must be

a contingent answer, rather than a necessary one. In performative terms, rhetoric is thus a

contingent choice, an act of agency. Furthermore, this performance is not an apodictic ‘solution’

that dissolves a question. It is a partial answer, in the Deweyan sense, a way of bringing a

substantive problem to light, giving it substance in order for us to treat it and its multiple,

creative possibilities. In his responses to critics, Bitzer (1980) attempted to negotiate the problem

of articulating a philosophy of situation while preserving rhetoric’s contingent character. But the

limitation of his response lies in the ontological division of situation and rhetoric. One can

reverse the order, as many have done, however, this accords too much weight to discourse, over

context, to be acceptable.

I argue that Bitzer found it difficult to account for the relationship between rhetoric and

context for two reasons. Firstly, he did not have a philosophy of questioning at his disposal that

dealt with the necessity–contingency problem. By presupposing that answers dissolve questions,

rhetoric is determined in regard to situation. A logic that allows answers to be problematic, or

partial, i.e., to reflect questions as questions, without necessarily eliminating them, would permit

a more open, contingent philosophical basis to rhetorical situation theory. Secondly, Bitzer’s

theory of situation relies on an implicit ontological division of experience and rhetoric that leaves

the philosophical problem of how to articulate a contingent relationship between the two such

that rhetorical situations are, thus, amenable to a range of actions and interpretations. His

philosophy of rhetorical situation implies a determinist social ontology, which is too objectivist

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to adequately include the full subjectivity of rhetoric as it is practised. In practice, rhetoric cannot

be easily separated from the context: it is both of the situation, but also a reflexive way to

transcend it; it contributes to both structure and agency, is limiting but also potentially

transformative. Therefore, it is difficult to account for it through a philosophy that relies on

fixed, ontological categories when the contingency of the relationship must be reflected in the

philosophy of rhetoric in context. Rhetoric is of a social relation but it also makes a social

relation; the direction of influence can go either way. The critics have concluded that rhetoric

and situation are different but also co-constructed. The problem is how to articulate this

difference philosophically, but also to show how one affects the other in practice, in which they

are necessarily intermingled. The ontological conception of situation impels a corresponding

conception of reality as fixed when, in fact, situations are always questionable. Furthermore, the

questioners in situations are also based within the social context of the situation, so their

relationship must equally be considered elemental to the situation, and equally questionable (on

relationality in rhetorical situation theory, see Brinton, 1981; Brockriede, 1968; Ehninger, 1968;

Yoos, 1987).

This brings us to the question of situatedness itself. If interlocutors in a rhetorical

exchange are situated, then they must be incorporated within the context, but in what way? Here,

a diversion to social theory will support drawing a distinction between the abstract philosophy of

situation from the social reality of the participants embedded in it. And this is where the

symbolic interactionist or interpretive perspective, which comes down on the side of the agency

of the interlocutors to transcend their context, also has less utility. Social actors are situated in

practice, embedded in the context of their everyday relations in which they do not necessarily

resort to reflective, ‘rational’ thought about questions, but rather operate through routine social

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practices, embodied in their manner of being in the world and naturalized through culture (see,

for example, Bourdieu, 1998). Social practice is thus often intuitive rather than reflective, and at

the same time made with regard to the relative social position of other actors, such that it is the

relational practices of society that form the basis for both interpretation and action, including

symbolic communications of all kinds (Crossley, 2011). Thus, the basis of any social situation

and any communicative exchange is the embodied relationship between the interlocutors, not

some reality that is external to them. The pragmatist view that locates problems in experience

can be rejected as insufficient because it does not take social relations themselves as the basis of

social experience. Similarly, the interpretive perspective does not account well for the

embeddedness of interlocutors in situations. Whereas ontology is premised upon the idea of

fixed, independent social beings, rhetoric is built upon an inherent relationality. The relationship

between individuals in social context is always questionable. Therefore, this relationship should

form the basis of a theory of rhetorical situation that is truly situated in social context, rather than

ontologically divided from it.

Questioning, along with the problematic nature of situations and rhetorical responses,

emerges as an important concept for rhetorical situation theory, i.e., for the theory of rhetoric and

context. But this has been developed through the constraining effects of a problem-solving,

ontological philosophy of rhetorical situation. All aspects of a rhetorical situation are

problematic, are questions but also partial answers, including the situation itself, as it is

performed by the interlocutors. Thus, it is situatedness that must be rethought in terms of both its

problematic and relational properties.

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A problematological theory of rhetorical situation

Michel Meyer’s problematology is a metaphysics based on the principle of questioning as the

foundation of thought. It establishes a new conception of the question–answer difference, which

Meyer has applied to a range of philosophical problems. One of these works is a new philosophy

of rhetoric in terms of questioning, built on reconfiguring Aristotle’s (1991) key concepts that

refer to the available means of persuasion; ethos, logos and pathos (Meyer, 2008, 2010).

Effectively, this philosophy of rhetoric is also a new social theory, in which Meyer articulates

how questioning is practised in society, with rhetoric the primary mechanism through which

social differences are negotiated. Although he does not directly address the rhetorical situation

debate, from his philosophy can be teased out an entirely new theory of rhetoric and context that

also deals with the question of the scope of rhetoric and its intersection with the political. My

reformulation of the rhetorical situation contains three conceptual innovations that broaden our

understanding of rhetoric and context; a social problematology, a problematological conception

of relationality, and a rhetorical theory of situatedness.

But first, I want to briefly recount the core ideas of Meyer’s philosophy –

problematology, or the questioning of questioning – which form the basis of my analysis. At the

general, philosophical level, Meyer constructs an entire philosophy based on the concept of

questioning, which he argues is the foundation of Reason and fundamental to human nature, the

primary way in which we understand ourselves and the world (1995). Language is a response to

our desire to question – eros animates erotesis (Meyer, 2000, p. 214) – so communication of all

kinds both answers to that desire and also reflects it, as questioning . Questioning is thus the

basis of reasoning at the meta-level and that which makes up language itself, in which questions

may be explicitly stated semantically, or not. That is, while we can explicitly put our question to 12

another person in question form, we can equally put forward an answer to that question, in the

form of a proposition, to which she may respond by questioning it in turn, so that a question-

answer dialogue ensues. In other words, questions are more than a semantic form, they are

logical constructs underpinning intersubjective relations. For example, I can ask a plumber who

has come to fix my leaky tap to diagnose the fault, or I can propose a solution in advance by

suggesting that the washer is old and needs replacing. Either way, a question is being dealt with.

Without going into further depth about the metaphysical properties of Meyer’s

philosophy, two important dimensions of problematology support the reconceptualization of the

rhetorical situation on new grounds. The first is his original conception of the question–answer

relationship, the problematological difference (Meyer, 1995). Meyer rejects the idea of a

problem-solving question–answer logic as too simplistic, arguing that answering involves two

dimensions: an apocritical aspect, or strong resolution, in which an answer dissolves a question;

and a problematological aspect, or weak resolution, in which an answer reflects and maintains a

question. Both properties are present in every communication, whether explicitly in the form of

language or implicitly in the performative element of dialogical interactions. In particular, the

concept of the problematological answer characterizes a question as already a kind of answer

because it responds to a desire to communicate and to make one’s concerns intelligible. In

formulating a question or problem, one resolves the desire to communicate, so it is

(performatively) an answer (apocritical), but because it is a question it is also (substantively) a

problematological answer, a partial resolution or stage on the way to a final answer by

explicating a question to be treated (Meyer, 1995, p. 220). The problematological difference

refers to these two dimensions of answering. This conceptual foundation is the central logical

mechanism of problematology, a philosophy which rejects ontology in favour of substituting

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questions and answers as the constituents of its philosophical world and which utilizes the

problematological difference as a link between them to interpret reality, including the symbolic

interactions of social life.

The second dimension is Meyer’s problematological theory of rhetoric. He provides a

general definition: ‘Rhetoric is the negotiation of distance between individuals in regard to a

given question’ (Meyer, 2008, p. 21; author's translation); or, in more detail; ‘rhetoric is the

negotiation of the distance (or difference) between individuals (ethos and pathos) on a given

question (given through logos)’ (Meyer, 2010, p. 408). Here, the idea of distance between

individuals reflects a relational theory of society. This resonates with recent work on relational

sociology (Crossley, 2011), which has origins as far back as Simmel. Relational social theory

aims to transcend the disjunction between individualist and holist social ontologies and give

priority to relations which include the individuals party to them. Within this field, there is

already a significant body of work which uses distance as the key operator of social

differentiation (Bottero & Prandy, 2003; Bourdieu, 1984). In Meyer’s general theory of rhetoric,

distance applies to any questioning relation, and thus may be used to analyse rhetoric in diverse

fields including fiction, drama, art and architecture (Meyer, 2007, 2008).

In terms of rhetoric in society, Meyer thus redefines rhetoric away from discourse alone

to a social-relational account of the negotiation of distance between speaker and audience. The

use of Aristotle’s categories is transformed, no longer concerning only persuasion but conceived

as three problematological entities, corresponding to the basic human questions of the Self

(ethos), the World (logos) and the Other (pathos) (2010). This adds considerable depth to the

Aristotelian framework but also radically re-imagines it. Meyer perceives that the means of

persuasion are but one iteration of more fundamental questions, which are subsumed within an 14

overarching philosophy of questioning. In addition, he transmutes these concepts from properties

of discourse to the situation itself, as definitive of the relative positions of the participants in a

questioning exchange. In a speaker–audience relation, the speaker (ethos) aims to please an

audience (pathos) through rhetorical style and arguments (logos). In a dialogue, speakers take

turns, reversing their positions so that each listener interprets the ideas and character of the other

through their own emotional reactions and in turn projects an ethos that aims to please or rebuff

the other. Each of Aristotle’s elements is equally present in this equation, thus emphasizing the

whole of rhetoric. In applying this to social relations, it affirms that we relate to others through

our values and emotions, as well as our arguments. In grounding rhetoric in distanciation, Meyer

provides the basis for a critical rhetoric which is intrinsically oriented towards understanding the

operation of social power.

From this philosophical basis, one can derive the elements of a problematological theory

of rhetoric in context. Communicative situations are composed of two (or more) questioners,

linked by a substantive question, which in turn treats the question of their relationship as the

distance between them. That is, in each and every social situation, there is an underlying question

of the situated relationship between individuals in a dialogue, or between speaker and audience,

which is the distance between them. This question of distance is not usually discussed directly,

but rather negotiated through another question, the substantive, explicit subject of rhetorical

discourse. These two questions are themselves in a dialectical relationship, which is also

rhetorical insofar as the answer to one question implies an answer to the other. The philosophy of

situation is shifted from being ontologically fixed to a problematological, relational dynamic

between individuals. The nature of the situation is philosophically problematological, in that it is

defined by questioning, and socially rhetorical, because it concerns multiple questioners in

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situated relationships, who deal with their contextual distance through a symbolic exchange. This

effects a fundamental change in the philosophical basis of the rhetorical situation, in which the

rhetorical is what defines situations. In problematology, rhetoric and the rhetorical are

fundamental.

Why define rhetoric as the negotiation of distance, rather than in terms of persuasion, or

some other familiar definition? The main reason is that it does not presume persuasion is the

object of rhetorical engagement, but rather the performance of social distanciation, which is

more general and encompasses persuasion as well. In many cases, persuasion is not the aim of

discourse at all, but rather the mitigation of the possibility of conflict. For example, when my

plumber arrives at my house to fix my tap, we first shake hands, a gesture which originated in the

showing of one’s hand to reveal that it does not hold a weapon. I may also ask him ‘How are

you?’, a question which does not literally ask what it states, because the only correct reply is

‘well’ and the same question being asked in return. All rituals of politeness are figurative and

have the same function; to reduce the face-threatening element of social encounters so as to

reduce the distance between individuals (Meyer, 2010: 408). In social encounters such as one

between a middle class academic and a working class plumber, differences in terms of social

class are potential sources of tension. Our respective accents, vocabularies, and clothing are all

rhetorical because they symbolically represent the distance between us (Bourdieu, 1984; Meyer,

2008). So, in order to establish good relations still further, the plumber and I might discuss the

weather, which is particularly useful in Britain where it is common to make remarks of amused

resignation about the rain because it is a ready source of mutual agreement. All these rhetorical

exchanges bridge the distance between us and help our commercial encounter to proceed

smoothly. Such rhetoric involves no persuasion. Instead, it aims to elide social conflicts. Rituals

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and norms of all kinds serve a deproblematizing purpose by generating consistency, in contrast

with political action, which aims to problematize and put social distances explicitly into

question. The rhetoric of my encounter with the plumber is not in the realm of ‘politics’. At the

same time, it does have a ‘political’ dimension in that it deals with a social distance between

myself and the plumber which may otherwise become a source of conflict. Such rhetoric is

political because routine social interactions suppress the appearance of alternatives through

repeated performances. Other such examples of rhetoric which repress potential conflicts include

banal nationalism (Billig, 1995) in which political identity – nationalism is identity as the

abolition of distance between citizens – is reaffirmed at the everyday level so as to go

unquestioned. Cultural norms do impact upon politics, but do so insofar as rituals, as answers,

circumscribe what is, or is not, political, because they specify which distances may be altered.

Similarly, the purpose of law, and constitutions in particular, is to contain the political (see

Thornhill, 2009) by fixing mechanisms of problem creation and resolution.

Rhetoric becomes political when it explicates questions of social distance in such a way

that they may be moved. In deliberation about a political question, interlocutors may come

together in an agreement upon an answer which abolishes the distance between them, but they

may disagree even more vehemently. In political terms, what matters is how far apart they are in

regard to the question and whether this distance is stable or fluid. What counts, politically, is the

fact that there is a potential for the distance between them to move, which is the secondary

‘answer’ to any substantive question. If my plumber engages me in debate about Britain’s place

in the European Union, and I advocate remaining while he advocates leaving (‘Brexit’), we

endeavour to persuade one another and arrive at a common resolution which would eliminate the

distance between us, at least in regard to that question. But agreement is not a necessary end. We

17

may hold to our answers and stay at the same respective distance, or our conflict may heighten

by producing more emotional reactions in turn, and thus more conflict, such that we move

further apart. This distance may correspond to larger sets of opposed social values associated

with class position; nationalism versus cosmopolitanism. The notion of distance incorporates

opinions on the question (logos), emotional responses (pathos) to the judgements of the

interlocutors, and our respective values (ethos). Rhetoric is more than just modes of persuasion,

it is the performance of social relations. A critical view of rhetoric examines power through

discourse as political distanciation beyond a limited and ideal ‘rational’ version of discourse

ethics. Thus, rhetoric is discourse with the purpose of effecting distanciation. This definition

rejects the pejorative view of rhetoric as a trivial aspect of social relations because it locates

rhetoric within the basic relational dynamics of society. It draws attention to rhetoric’s crucial

role as a device for managing complex social relations at the most fundamental level and does so

by incorporating all aspects of rhetoric, the figurative and the literal, the performative and the

substantive, both ritual discourse and deliberative argumentation.

Consequently, the philosophical relationship of rhetorical discourse to context can be

reconfigured – rejecting the pragmatist question–answer logic, in which the former directs the

latter, and also the symbolic-interactionist/interpretive perspective, which accords priority to the

interlocutors – as a problematological, dialectical relationship between two questions, 1) a

substantive question and 2) the question of distance the answers to the former implicitly resolve.

Each question may serve as an ‘answer’ for the other. The two questions are inter-twined in

practice, but nevertheless we can differentiate them in logic via problematological theory; the

question of distance is problematologically implied by discourse upon a substantive question.

The formulation of the substantive, or explicit question, is apocritical insofar as it ‘resolves’ the

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problem of bringing the underlying question of the distance between the interlocutors into

‘being’ as a question, while it is also problematological insofar as it is a question that requires its

own answer. In the reverse direction, answers upon the substantive question also generate a

solution to the related question of distance. In deliberation, if the interlocutors agree or come

close to agreeing upon an answer, then the distance between them is more proximal. If they

disagree, then the relationship between them is more distal. Contributing to this resolution

distance are many other social dimensions – for example, cultural, class, or gender differences –

and psychological affects – such as empathy or resentment, attraction or repulsion. But what

matters most is that this theory makes a problematological distinction between rhetorical

discourse and its context.

From a philosophical point of view, this definition is innovative because it is not a social

ontology of subject relations, in which rhetoric is a mode of communication that is ontologically

distinguished from its context. It is a social problematology, in which situations are mutually

constituted by questioners, through questions. Rhetoric deals with questions, or problems. But

here, these questions are not grounded in an ontologically distinct world of experience, but rather

in the social relation between individuals. This brings us to the second conceptual innovation; the

relationality of situations is the source of questions. This definition incorporates the

interlocutors, or speaker–audience couplet, within the situation at the elemental level. They are

not related to the situation, as distinct ontological entities, but are of the situation, as

problematological entities. They are thus defined by their dynamic mutual relationship,

distanciated according to the questions they share and the answers they reach. The rhetorical

situation is thus not determinate, but always in question, because social encounters between

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individuals are always potentially variable, and thus every social situation poses a question anew

for the individuals party to it.

This philosophy of rhetorical situation has some interesting properties. It allows

individuals considerable agency in how they rhetorically interact because they can question their

situation and one another in relation to it, including the possibility of transcending their

differences and acting independently of social constraints. Because the situation is

problematological, it can be questioned. And because questions have multiple solutions, no

presupposition about causality from one level to another is imported, as in many ontological

conceptions. Explicit questions and implicit distance are dynamically related, so that all kinds of

solutions for negotiating distance are possible. Rhetoric enables us to treat our differences and is

thus a potentially transformative social practice. At the same time, even though the context poses

a question, in so doing it is already a partial answer and thus will frame the debate by informing

the parties about the structuring features of the distance that divides them. This aspect is the third

major conceptual innovation of the questioning approach. Rather than conceiving of them as

ontologically distinct phenomena, this theory integrates rhetoric and situation through a

rhetorical theory of situatedness. Rhetoric – or more correctly, ‘the rhetorical’ – is incorporated

within the fundamental constituents of social interaction. Situations in general are rhetorical

because the positions of the interlocutors, via the base concept of distance, are related through

rhetorical concepts; ethos, logos, and pathos. In other iterations of rhetorical situation theory,

situatedness is not, itself, rhetorical, and therefore rhetoric is rendered subsidiary to something

more philosophically or socially primary. In problematology, rhetoric is not particular to some

situations over others. It is social situations themselves that are rhetorical, because situatedness is

rhetorical. This is a major departure from existing rhetoric theory: every instance of social

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communication is rhetorical, and therefore rhetoric can never be eliminated because the question

of distance between interlocutors is pertinent to every social encounter. This is the case even for

exchanges between the most proximate, familiar individuals. Ultimately, the concept of

rhetorical situation has been misconceived because rhetoric is a general modality of the

negotiation of social distance.

Why is a problematology of rhetoric and context preferable to an ontology? In practice, a

communicative situation is often problematic, the subject of differing interpretations, so

interlocutors cannot say precisely what it ‘is’. That is, reality is contingent upon the questions we

ask of it. Nevertheless, reality is intelligible because we can speak about it via partial answers,

which give it form without necessarily presenting solutions. Thus, it may be debated and subject

to multiple interpretations. As rhetoric gives form to indeterminate problems through language in

order to treat them, it is both a response to reality (answer) as well as what constructs it as a

problem. That is, an answer can make a question what it is, as much as the other way around. So,

on the one hand a problematic event may call forth a rhetorical response. For example, Britain’s

place in the European Union was seen to be an urgent political problem because it altered social

distances between UK and European citizens across many questions, most notably migration to

Britain from the continent. Therefore a solution was sought through publicly debating causes and

remedies. At the same time, this was an issue about which political actors struggled for years to

have recognized as a political problem, attempting to move an audience to take an interest in it,

and hence articulate their positional distance in regard to it. Here, it is the rhetorical act that

refers to things and events and makes them ‘real’ for questioners; the rhetorical exchange implies

reality-as-answer. The resort to rhetoric is still an ‘answer’ to questions about reality, but it is a

partial answer, a performative manner of treating them. Rhetoric is involved in all social

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interactions, which in turn contribute to the construction of society as an aggregated series of

social distances. I note that this theory also clearly distinguishes situation from ‘reality’. There

may be problematic things about reality, but if these do not throw up a shared interest on the

question, or impact upon social differences, then they may well be ignored. The questioning that

connects interlocutors defines the world by relating their knowledge to external factors, but it is

the properties of intersubjective questioning in context that will ultimately answer what social

reality is. Thus, there is a philosophical difference between ‘problematizing’, which constructs

reality by generating it as a question, and ‘politicizing’, which refers to realizing the potential for

moving the distance between individuals. Hence, critical rhetorical analysis aims at uncovering

the political, distanciating effects of rhetoric.

What is important for the relationship between situation and rhetorical discourse is that it

can go either way and we need not restrict ourselves to a philosophy which presupposes that

experience produces questions that come ‘first’ in the sense of a material order of reality. In

ontologically-informed perspectives, scholars have tended to allocate structure to the context as

constraints, and agency to rhetoric and interlocutors. However, this demarcation does not prove

useful in practice: we are required to heed social norms but we are also somewhat free to reject

them; we can invent ideas through rhetoric but effective rhetoric pays attention to context.

Problematological theory locates agency in terms of the problematological difference, which

shows that both rhetorical discourse and context are important. In this philosophy of rhetorical

situation, there is no determining cause-effect relationship but rather a dialectical exchange

between rhetoric and context without any necessary ordinal priority. It preserves the idea of

situation and rhetoric as different, not as different ‘things’ of determinate nature but as different

problematological constructs, relative to one another. Rhetoric and situation are not in a cause-

22

effect relationship based on a foundational logic regarding their essence, but are co-constructed

dialectically. Reality exists independently of our questioning, but a situation only has meaning as

a question because speakers produce discourse about it. In other words, the answer makes the

question what it is. In terms of a philosophical logic, the question comes first in either case,

whether because the situation is already ‘known’ as a problem, or whether it is questioning that

creates a problem as its answer. We always start from questioning, a creative act that is the

essence of human agency. And that agency is experienced as embodied in the possibility of the

relational situation-as-question.

A final property of the theory makes a further advance regarding the degree to which

individuals possess agency in context. The problematological approach distinguishes between

the philosophical definition of situation and the social logic of (rhetorical) interaction. It is by

disentangling these two logics, the philosophical and the social, that we ought to deal with the

problem of agency and structure, as it regards rhetoric. Situations are defined, philosophically, in

terms of questions and questioners, linked through the logic of the problematological difference.

But questioners situated in society operate through distinctive modes of practical questioning,

which are different from the abstract, rational reflection of philosophical questioning. Human

beings are always already situated in society. But in problematological theory, what has

previously been defined as ontological constraints are reconceptualized as elements that inform

individuals about their respective distance. Indeed, these contextual factors are part of their

situatedness, often taken for granted by the participants as ‘natural’, such that they operate

through them, rather than consciously reflecting upon them and deciding which constraints to

take up and which to ignore. As I noted above, individuals are of the situation, embedded within

it. Their practical knowledge, or way of being in the world, is comprised of the unconscious

23

social practices or routines that enable individuals to act without recourse to their reflective

consciousness (see, for example, Bourdieu, 1998; Luhmann, 1995, p. 495). This is where social,

historical, and cultural factors coalesce in an individual consciousness. In problematological

terms, practical knowledge is composed of the ready-made answers of the consciousness,

articulated through the emotions and which enable us to act intuitively, on the basis of learned

experience (Meyer, 2000). Individuals have agency in that they can reflexively question and

debate with others, but they are also constrained through their own embedded identities and

intuitive responses to others, grounded in experience.

Now, of course these embodied, unconscious ‘answers’ about how to approach social

problems colour the political negotiation of distance with others. But the residue of history, of

culture, and the consciousness are not in themselves subject to politics, given that they constitute

prefigured normative conceptions of social distance. But they are political if they have an impact

upon social distance, which may otherwise be altered. But there is still a difference between the

repression of social distance and its explication and problematization. Rhetorical discourse can

transcend presupposed answers by revealing them to be answers, i.e. problematic, and lead

individuals to question their own presuppositions, thus making possible political change. But

rhetoric may also nourish them, reaffirming people’s desire to confirm their prejudices in regard

to others. To return to my encounter with the plumber, discussing the referendum puts the

question of immigration on the table for deliberation with a view to change it, making it the

subject of politics. But this does not necessitate that it will change anything. Indeed, the debate

may simply confirm our prejudices and generate conflict where there was none. In situated

communications, such preconceived answers inform perceptions of distance from the Other. But

because they are not necessarily reflected upon, rhetoric is not entirely intentional. It may be so,

24

in the sense of a conscious strategy of argumentation, selected to support one’s interests. But

rhetorical style and social positioning are also unconscious effects of social and individual

histories. This steers us towards an intersection of social and political theory, with rhetoric as a

mediating logic between the repression of questions and the explication of new ones.

Conclusion: The rhetorical and the political

To conclude, I note that the problematological philosophy of rhetoric and context entails an

alternative reading of the relationship between the rhetorical and the political, than that proposed

by Martin. The problematology of rhetoric and context explains the overlapping of these

concepts by locating both at the level of a situated questioning exchange, in which the rhetorical

concerns the negotiation of distance through language and other symbols. Rhetoric, as spoken

discourse, is one mode of negotiation. But the rhetorical is a general property that applies to the

communicative negotiation of all social distances. This overlaps the political, which concerns the

potential for moving distance, i.e., politicization is the problematization of distance. But this is

quite different from the idea that politicization refers us to ‘the political’ as a fundamental

expression of indeterminacy at the basis of society. In problematology, indeterminacy is best

articulated through a philosophy of questioning. In the approach I have developed here, the

political is the dynamism of social differences and politics is the activity of moving (or resisting

the moving) of distance. This can include political rhetoric, especially in the form of

argumentation, but it can also include figurative discourse which aims to alter social reality by

reframing social relations so as to create new enemies and alliances, to alter distance in regard to

collective questions. Meyer’s is a broad view of the rhetorical, emphasizing that rhetoric is

25

always more than what it explicitly says. Reconceptualizing the rhetorical situation in this way

gives us a new way to appreciate this property and to see the breadth of rhetoric’s significance.

Articulating the full relationship of the rhetorical and the political would require an extended

discussion, but for now I note that they are not ontologically divided but problematologically

intertwined in the negotiation of social distance. A larger research programme would aim to

uncover how rhetoric intersects with practices of distanciation in many arenas of social life.

The dual logic of rhetoric and context in problematological theory supports an account of

the various possibilities for moving or maintaining social distance. Rhetoric, in implicitly

treating social distances through substantive questions, often supports the avoidance of political

conflict by allowing people to participate in debate without altering their substantive position.

That is, they can allow themselves to engage at the surface of a question but choose to ignore its

implications for power in society. Rhetoric is variable in regard to context and thus satisfies our

demands for originality in each new communicative context, while permitting us to tacitly accept

that underlying social relations have not been altered. The rhetorical thus expresses the seductive

properties of discourse as a way of treating political differences without changing them, a means

by which people can pretend they are critical citizens but are actually bystanders, precisely

because they wish to avoid conflict. In this sense, rhetoric is political in that it can create the

appearance of social change when none has truly occurred, an appearance that may indeed be

intentionally manipulative, but may also incorporate a seduction in which the audience is active

in its complicity. The embracing of the negative properties of rhetoric to avoid sincere

persuasion thus has a positive political purpose for all participants in a (pejoratively) rhetorical

exchange.

26

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