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Argumentation (2024) 38:63–83
https://doi.org/10.1007/s10503-022-09590-6
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ORIGINAL RESEARCH
Epistemic Norms forPublic Political Arguments
ChristophLumer1
Accepted: 17 November 2022 / Published online: 23 February 2023
© The Author(s) 2023
Abstract
The aim of the article is to develop precise epistemic rules for good public political
arguments, by which political measures in the broad sense are justified. By means
of a theory of deliberative democracy, it is substantiated that the justification of a
political measure consists in showing argumentatively that this measure most pro-
motes the common good or is morally optimal. It is then discussed which argumen-
tation-theoretical approaches are suitable for providing epistemically sound rules for
arguments for such theses and for the associated premises, rules whose compliance
implies the truth or acceptability of the thesis. Finally, on the basis of the most suita-
ble approach, namely the epistemological one, such systems of rules for the required
types of arguments are presented that fulfil the conditions mentioned.
Keywords Public arguments· Political measures· Justification· Deliberative
democracy· Epistemological approach to argumentation· Common good· Moral
optimum· Utilitarianism· Prioritarianism· Empirical moral pluralism
1 Topic andStructure oftheArticle
The aim of this article is to find rules, criteria for good public political argumen-
tation, by which political measures in the broad sense can be justified. There are
several layers of such rules, from linguistic to process rules. This article deals
with epistemic rules for arguments (that describe the structure, in part the content
as well as the conditions of their usage), whose observance should guarantee that
the thesis of an argument is acceptable and can also be recognised as acceptable
Article submitted as a contribution to a special issue of "Argumentation" edited by Jan Albert van
Laer and Frank Zenker from WG2 of Cost "Public Argumentation".
* Christoph Lumer
lumer@unisi.it
http://www.lumer.info/
1 DISPOC (Dipartimento di Scienze Sociali, Politiche e Cognitive), Università di Siena, Via
Roma, 56, 53100Siena, Italy
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by an addressee. I will proceed as follows: 2. On the basis of elements of a theory
of deliberative democracy, I will try to determine how political measures need to
be justified and try to specify what kinds of theses need to be justified in doing
so. 3. Next, in addition to the central thesis (‘m is … morally optimal’), other
important but subordinate theses are determined that must be justified in public
argumentation. 4. A brief discussion of various approaches in argumentation the-
ory filters out the approach that is most likely to provide criteria for epistemically
good arguments by which such theses can be justified: it is the epistemological
approach. 5. Relying on what has been elaborated, epistemological criteria for
good arguments are then presented by which theses of the aforementioned kinds
can be justified. 6. Finally, an analysis of factual political argumentation shows
to what extent such standards are also empirically followed and how the factual
argumentation quality can be improved.
2 Determining theCentral Thesis ofPublic Argumentation viaits
Function inDeliberative Democracy: Serving theGeneral Good
Public arguments, as they are understood here, are political arguments about politi-
cally enforceable measures. The locus of these political arguments is deliberation,
especially in political institutions and in the broader political public, as it is char-
acteristic of deliberative democracies. Advancing these arguments has a specific
function in deliberative democracy. In the following, the epistemic norms for public
arguments will be determined in two broad steps: 1. What kinds of (central) theses
must be justified in a deliberative democracy in order to fulfil the function of public
argumentation for deliberative democracy? 2. How can such theses be justified?
In order to be able to conduct the discussion on the function of argumentation in
deliberative democracy on a better basis, what exactly is meant here by ‘deliberative
democracy’ should first be definded.
DDD Definition of ‘deliberative democracy’: ‘Deliberative democracy’ for mass
societies means: 1. representative, parliamentary democracy, 2. in which the offi-
cial, institutional political decisions are flanked by lively political debates with
broad participation in a critical public sphere (in Habermas’ sense) outside the
political institutions, in which upcoming and completed political decisions are
constantly critically prepared and commented on; 3. the epistemic hallmark of
deliberative democracy is that it is characterized by intensive and extensive argu-
mentation in the narrow, epistemological sense (with effective truth orientation),
which thus aims to establish the truth about the issues under discussion on the
basis of epistemologically founded criteria, and that this argumentation is also
encouraged (epistemic orientation).1
1 Lumer 2022b. In this paper deliberative democracy is defended as the morally best system of politi-
cal rule. The following considerations on the role of public argumentation in deliberative democracy are
based on this paper as well.
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Epistemic Norms forPublic Political Arguments
Most Western democracies have at least some deliberative elements in this sense.
Deliberative democracy combines two functional goals: an epistemic goal,
namely, to find, in particular with the help of the deliberative component, truths
important for the decision or even the one decisive truth, and a participatory, repub-
lican goal, namely, to give, with the help of the democratic component, all mem-
bers of the community the same power to determine the policy of this community
(cf. e.g. Goodin 2000). While these two components can be clearly separated exter-
nally—argumentative discourse versus voting—they seem to belong to completely
different and mutually exclusive logics of decision making: decision by finding the
truth versus decision by majority and thus social power. With respect to the truth-
seeking component, realistically speaking, the participation of the demos is more of
a hindrance to finding the truth; an expert discussion would be much more appropri-
ate. Furthermore, it is not clear what truth has to be sought after, what thesis has to
be argued for for promoting a certain political proposal or for providing its definite
justification. And with respect to the participatory component, the deliberation and
general discussion is superfluous for a decision by majority. Attempts by defenders
of deliberative democracy to reduce this tension and to connect both components
organically (e.g. Habermas 1983; 1994; Cohen 1986; 1989; 1996; 2009; Estlund
2008; Mansbridge etal. 2010) are in my opinion not convincing so far.
How can the tension between these two components be resolved? One attempt
to resolve it is the liberal conception of democracy. According to this conception,
the goal of citizens in a democracy is to advance as many of their own inter-
ests as possible. The complete realisation of one’s own interests is, of course, an
unrealistic goal; but a realistic goal is to achieve as many of one’s own interests
as possible, especially by forming coalitions that guarantee that the successful
coalition members will have a particularly large number of their own interests
fulfilled. Deliberation takes on a double function here. For one thing, it serves
to clarify all possible epistemic issues so that the final decision is as rational as
possible; but the other function is not epistemic at all; rather, deliberation is a
negotiation to secure a majority for a particular proposal through compromise.—
But this is not what happens in politics. Rather, the various participants in the
debate try to show that their own proposal is most conducive to the general good.
One reason why this is so is that in a complex democracy with a plethora of
completely disparate interests of the most diverse groups, no sufficiently strong
agreement can be found with the liberal model. Another reason is that the liberal
recourse to the interests of a number of those affected does not ensure a moral
result: certain minorities of all kinds are neglected; a coalition of the majority
can thus exploit, suppress or even try to eliminate a very large minority. At least
a significant proportion of citizens does not want this, but would like the state in
general and individual political measures in particular to follow moral principles
(Mansbridge 1990). This actual behaviour of most citizens has puzzled advocates
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of a liberal market model of democracy because they assume an image of citizens
as rational egoists who seek to maximise the fulfilment of their own interests. But
the tendency to make moral, common good or ideological decisions in politics
and beyond is factually very strong (ibid.).2
These empirical findings mean that in deliberative democracies, at least to a con-
siderable extent, a moral-instrumentalist conception of the state in particular and of
social institutions in general is realised: these institutions serve to promote (in politi-
cal philosophical terminology) the general good or to realise (in moral philosophi-
cal terminology) moral values—which includes preventing corresponding deterio-
rations. They are in the main tendency created by people to promote the common
good in a new way, reformed to promote it better; and the actions of public social
institutions in the narrow sense (i.e. institutions capable of action) aim at creating
a new common good. The following normative considerations build on this empiri-
cal analysis and are intended for people who embrace this objective and the moral-
instrumentalist conception of social institutions on moral grounds and out of con-
cern for the general good.3
According to this conception, the epistemic and participatory components of
deliberative democracy have, in the first place, the following functions: 1. The epis-
temic goal of deliberation is to determine those policies that most promote the pub-
lic good. 2. The participatory component is needed for the following reason: The
discourse only provides knowledge, not its implementation. It is the democratic par-
ticipation of all that gives moral insights their power in the first place—to the extent
that individuals are guided by these insights.
Both the participatory and the epistemic component, however, have a further
function: So far, neither among ethicists nor in the general public is there consen-
sus and there are very different ideas on how the public good should be defined
(Rawls 1989). Nor is it to be expected that agreement will be reached on this in the
near future. (Over time, however, the respective discussions marginalise the worst
justified ethics; fewer and fewer people adhere to them. And newly introduced ethi-
cal systems, in addition to formal and justification advantages, often have a com-
promise character, or they expand the scope of moral commitment. All this thus
leads to a certain convergence of the positions actually held among ethicists. The
2 Of course, there are also people who make political decisions only according to their own interests,
in particular trying to maximise the realisation of their own interests in elections, and who in public
debates, where they cannot simply point to their interests, merely argue strategically and with pretextual
moral or similar reasons in favour of those measures and programmes that come closest to satisfying
their interests. But this does not denigrate the conception of political argumentation developed in the fol-
lowing. For one thing, empirical studies (Mansbridge 1990) show that the group of people who decide
only in this way must be quite small, that rather the vast majority decides in more or less large areas of
politics according to moral, political, religious or ideological criteria—even against their own interests
and even more so when their own interests are not affected at all. For another, once a discussion is based
on moral etc. criteria, it also develops its own dynamics; even those with a purely strategic interest must
then, if they do not want to lose their credibility, endorse positions for reasons of coherence that may go
against their interests after all.
3 Such goal-setting, specifically with a utilitarian orientation, is also advocated by Goodin (1995).
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Epistemic Norms forPublic Political Arguments
general public and political discourses can benefit from these theoretical develop-
ments if they remain linked to these theoretical discourses through the critical public
sphere, education of citizens and representatives, and also have an impact on the
theoretical discourses. This is the particular moral function of the epistemic ele-
ments of deliberative democracy. In short, in the political public sphere of a delib-
erative democracy not only applied-ethical but also normative-ethical (and meta-
ethical) discussions are held.) 3. Public deliberation then also has the function of
advancing the discussion on the criteria of the public good in substantive terms.
4. And the democratic vote also has the function, as long as no epistemic agree-
ment has been reached, of deciding on the criteria to be applied for determining
the public good in particular decision situations according to the strongest social
support. 5. Another essential function of the participatory component in determin-
ing the content of morality regards the conflict in principle between the prudential
and the moral goals of individuals: To what extent should these goals be realised?
How many resources do individuals want to invest in one and the other? Through
their participation, citizens also determine collectively how much they are willing to
give for the realisation of moral goals and thus determine the size of the budget for
moral tasks. (Aside: Act utilitarianism completely ignores this question and assumes
that the moral share of the total individual budgets must be 100%.)—The delibera-
tive component of democracy could be limited to parliamentary debates. The exten-
sion of the deliberative component to what is now understood in a narrower sense
as “deliberative democracy”, i.e. in particular the strong participation of a critical
public sphere (see the above definition of ‘deliberative democracy’), has additional
functions: 6. More people and their specific knowledge are included in the deter-
mination of the general good. This broadens the information base for determining
the general good. 7. Even more weight is given to the interests of all. In addition, it
gives more weight to those conceptions of the general good according to which the
well-being of each individual must enter into the determination of the general good,
namely the welfare-ethical conceptions of the general good. 8. The participation of
individuals in the debate also improves their political knowledge, which is reflected
not only in their contributions to the debate, but also in their voting behaviour, with
which they demand morally better justified measures.
3 What Other Important Types ofTheses Need tobe Defended
inPublic Arguments?—The nal List of(More Precise) Theses
On the basis of the approach just developed, I would now like to determine more
precisely what kinds of theses actually need to be argued for mainly in public
discourse.
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If public discourse also takes part in the normative-ethical discussions about the
correct moral principles and even in the metaethical, then there are (at least) three
layers of public argumentation:
1. the meta-ethical and normative-ethical level of the discussion on the criteria of
the common welfare and the moral good and the right in general,
2. the applied-ethical level of discussion on the moral value (according to these
criteria) of proposed public measures—’This measure promotes the public good
to that and that extent’—or their obligatory nature—’Our obligation to do A
requires the public measure p.’ There are then various moral desirability criteria:
utilitarianism, prioritarianism etc. as well as formally valid and informally more
or less valid social norms; and
3. the level of empirical subquestions concerning moral value, above all the morally
relevant consequences of public measures, but also e.g. about the possible social
acceptance or support of some measure under discussion.
What has been said about the applied-ethical level needs further explanation: The
political community makes moral claims or desiderata socially binding by publicly
proclaiming them and providing them with threats of—formal, i.e. legal, or infor-
mal—sanctions. More specifically, this involves several categories of actions and
measures: 1. deontic measures that are or could be the consequence of an existing
formal, i.e. also legal, moral duty or of an informal, but nonetheless socially more or
less valid duty, namely, 1.1. actions or measures of fulfilling a duty and 1.2. of sup-
porting the respective norm by controlling its observance, applying sanctions etc.;
and, 2. moral-political measures for the moral improvement of the system of norms
and institutions: Bad norms and institutions are abolished or replaced by new, better
ones; new norms and institutions that extend moral commitment are introduced.
So, according to the outlined conception, which theses mainly have to be justified
in public argumentation? And what types of arguments can be used for this?
T1: Assessment of the individual utility of each person affected: Utility assessments
or evaluations of possible public measures from the point of view of individual
affected persons or groups of affected persons are prudential value judgements—
these can be justified with the help of practical arguments for prudential value judge-
ments (Lumer 2014).
T2: Moral evaluation: aggregation of individual utilities: The aggregation of
individual utilities in a moral or social evaluation is based on one of the indi-
vidual welfare ethical definitions of ’moral value’ like the utilitarian definition
(utilitarian moral value of p = the sum of the individual prudential utilities of p
for all the single sentient beings) or a prioritarian definition (prioritarian moral
value of p = the sum of the individual prioritaristically weighted prudential utili-
ties of p for all the single sentient beings (Lumer 2005b)) or egalitarian definition
(egalitarian moral value of p = the sum of the individual prudential utilities of p
for all the single sentient beings minus the measure of the inequalitiy of the dis-
tribution of these prudential utilities (Sen < 1973 > 1997)) etc.; these definitions
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Epistemic Norms forPublic Political Arguments
provide the mathematical formula for aggregation—this mathematical formula
plus the information on the various individual utilities are the main premises of
mathematical, i.e. deductive arguments for moral value judgements (see below
Sect.5.2; Lumer 2005a).
T3: Consequences and technical feasibility of specific public measures: On the
epistemically strongest level, theses on the feasibility and consequences of meas-
ures are scientific forecasts of all kinds—which can be sustained often by deduc-
tive, but mostly by probabilistic arguments (Lumer 2005a; 2011).
T4: Social passability and enforceability of particular measures: Theses on the
enforceability of measures rely, again at the epistemically strongest level, on
social science findings on widespread attitudes and are predictions about social
behaviour—which can be substantiated by statistical and probabilistic arguments
(Lumer 2011).
T5: Legality and moral permissiveness: That a discussed measure complies with
or is required by the currently valid social norms is a legal (or deontic) thesis.
In the simplest case such theses can be derived from the factual description of
the situation and the text of the norm. In more complicated cases interpretations
are necessary because of vagueness or contradictory norms. Such interpretations
are the subject of long legal debates. The most important hermeneutical propos-
als thereon are: recourse to the intention of the legislator and moral optimisation
within the scope of vagueness—So, in simple cases deductive arguments are suf-
ficient, whereas in more complex cases interpretive arguments for establishing
the legislator’s intention or practical arguments for prudential value judgments in
connection with deductive aggregation for establishing the morally best interpre-
tation have to be added (Lumer 1990; 1992;2005a;2010).
T6: Meta-ethical and normative-ethical discussion: The ultimate thesis of a meta-
ethical and normative-ethical discussion about public measures is that a certain
moral criterion is adequate, correct etc. How exactly to argue in this case is very
controversial in ethics. Here I list only a few types of arguments which must be
used in any case for this purpose—deductive arguments, practical arguments,
interpretive arguments (Lumer 1990: 180–209; 221–246; 320–358; 2005a: 221;
2014; 2010; a proposal for a specific strategy for justifying moral principles plus
the determination of the various arguments to be used is provided in: Lumer
2015).
T7: Secondary justifications: reference to experts: A number of the arguments
listed so far are scientifically and epistemically inaccessible to the general public
involved in the public debate, but often also to political experts. The best, i.e.
generally understandable and maximally valid, substitute for these primary argu-
ments is then the recourse to experts who provide some guarantee for a specific
thesis—this kind of justification is provided in arguments from expert opinion
(Lumer 2020). However, such arguments must also be able to deal with the com-
plex case of experts contradicting each other (ibid.).
T8: Best strategy for politically pushing through a measure: In discussions of
moral strategy, the question is not only whether and how a certain political meas-
ure can be socially pushed through at all, but what is the (morally) best strategy
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for pushing it through. This is a question of moral evaluation, for which the argu-
ments already discussed above (T2) can be used.
These are only the central theses and arguments of the discourse. All reasons put
forward for them or in them can, if necessary, in turn be justified argumentatively,
and so on, whereby more and more new types of theses and arguments can then be
introduced into the political discourse in ever more branching arguments.
4 The Epistemologically Appropriate Argumentation‑Theoretical
Approach
We now have to discuss which argumentation-theoretical approach provides criteria for
good arguments, which do justice to the function of argumentation as described at the
beginning, namely, for one, to guarantee the truth or at least the epistemic acceptability
of the correctly justified thesis—because only in this way can we find out the really
good options—and for another, to also make this truth or acceptability recognisable to
the addressees of the argument. I briefly discuss here Pragma-Dialectics, Walton’s argu-
ment schemes, criteria of Informal Logic and of epistemological argumentation theory.
Of course, these cannot be detailed discussions here, but only relatively superficial con-
siderations as to whether the respective theory contains criteria of the desired kind for
arguments for the theses mentioned at all and whether the approach has at least epis-
temic aspirations or, better, (in principle) is able to provide the epistemically required.
Pragma-Dialectics (Eemeren & Grootendorst 1984, 2004) focuses mainly on
the procedural rules of discourse and leaves the selection of criteria for good
arguments to the agreement between the participants in the opening phase of the
discussion. This approach is not very helpful for our purposes because, if we are
to engage with this framework, we would like to know what would be a good
agreement for our purposes. Occasionally, Pragma-Dialectics does provide hints
for good arguments on the "product level", but these are strongly oriented towards
deductivism. This is not very plausible as such, because it does not do justice
to the existence of weaker than deductive arguments. Deductivism does not fit
at all with the probabilistic (T3, T4), statistical (T3, T4), interpretive (T5, T6)
and practical arguments (T1, T6) as well as arguments from expert opinion (T7)
required for the respective theses.
Walton’s argumentation schemes approach (Walton 1996; Walton etal. 2008;
Walton & Sartor 2013) develops many, in its most extensive version (Walton etal.
2008)) 104, argumentation schemes; but it does not provide schemes for probabil-
istic (T3, T4) and statistical arguments (T4), however, for practical arguments.
Even so, these are mostly quite simple schemes for ends-means arguments, which
therefore do not address the actually complex side of practical arguments, i.e.
weighing up various advantages and disadvantages as well as a final quantifica-
tion of the resulting utilities. The schemes also do not provide any approach to
the ethical weighing of the interests of different persons (T2). Moreover, Walton’s
schemes—his (ex post) justification attempt (Walton & Sartor 2013) notwith-
standing—are descriptions of empirically found argument patterns but have not
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Epistemic Norms forPublic Political Arguments
been checked or even constructed epistemologically with respect to their capacity
to guarantee the thesis’ acceptability; in fact many of Walton’s schemes endorse
ineffective arguments, which too rarely lead to acceptable theses (Lumer 2022a).
Informal Logic (e.g. Blair 2012 (in particular 33–47); Govier < 1985 > 2010:
chs. 3; 7–11; 1992; Johnson 2000: 189–209) has legitimately insisted on rational
criteria for inferences and the acceptability of premises, but has dealt with these
issues only in relatively general terms (the criteria are: relevance and acceptabil-
ity of the premises as well as their sufficiency [?] to justify the conclusion), has
not provided a theory of how to develop such criteria, and accordingly has elabo-
rated only few precise criteria for good arguments. Among Informal Logicians,
Trudy Govier has still developed most of such criteria (< 1985 > 2010). But even
here, probabilistic (T3, T4), interpretive (T5) and practical arguments (T1, T2)
are not treated. And under the title "conductive arguments" she mixes e.g. practi-
cal arguments, which list advantages and disadvantages of an option, with argu-
ments from sign, where there is circumstantial evidence for and against a certain
empirical proposition.
Within the epistemological approach (Biro & Siegel 2006; Feld-
man < 1993 > 2013; 1994; Goldman 1999: 131–160; Lumer 1990; 2005a; Siegel &
Biro 1997), instead, there are theories of argumentation that fulfil the required con-
ditions. In the Practical Argumentation Theory, precise criteria for good arguments
of various types are developed. These criteria are each divided into two groups:
criteria for the argumentative validity of the argument and criteria for the adequate
use of the argument for epistemic purposes. The criteria for argumentative validity
are based on so-called epistemological principles, which are again taken from epis-
temology in the broad sense, i.e. also from probability theory or rational decision
theory and philosophical desirability theory. The content of these principles is that
they list sufficient conditions for the acceptability of a thesis. Good arguments must
then go through these conditions in detail and make true and verifiable claims about
the way in which the conditions are fulfilled for the thesis in question. If the condi-
tions of the epistemological principle are fulfilled for the respective thesis, then the
thesis is true or at least acceptable. That the argument is also adequate for cogni-
tive purposes implies above all that it is epistemically accessible, i.e. that the sub-
jects of cognition, the addressees, can verify the assertions made in the argument’s
premises, so that—in the case of a positive result—they can also subsequently note
that all the conditions of the epistemological principle are fulfilled, whereby they
have then recognised that the thesis in question is true or acceptable. (Lumer 1990;
2005a) This theory is also elaborated to such an extent that it contains criteria for
good arguments for all types of arguments required in the above (Sect.3) list. I have
already anticipated a proof of this assertion by adding to the entries in the list of
the most important argument types needed in public argumentation respective refer-
ences in each case. With all this, the epistemological approach thus provides what
was sought here: precise criteria for the necessary types of arguments, whereby
adherence to the criteria for argumentative validity guarantees the acceptability of
the thesis due to their epistemological foundation, and the additional adherence to
the criteria for situational adequacy enables the addressee to recognise the accept-
ability of the thesis.
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The result of this brief discussion is thus quite unambiguous: The only the-
ory of argumentation that provides the desired criteria for good arguments is the
epistemological theory of argumentation and therein in particular the Practical
Theory of Argumentation with its precise criteria for various argument types.
With the help of such criteria for good arguments, it is then possible to justify
a rational policy whose goal is really the general good, instead of, for example,
serving populist prejudices that are widespread in political discourse. And it is
possible to make the reasons for this rational policy comprehensible to fellow
citizens.
5 Rules fortheMain Types ofArguments Needed inPublic
Argumentation
I cannot discuss all the sets of criteria for the types of arguments mentioned in the
list of Sect.3 in detail here. For that, please refer to the bibliographical references.
Instead, I would like to present here the criteria for two types of arguments that are
actually central to political discourse, but which are rather neglected both in prac-
tice and in argumentation theory: prudential practical arguments for theses about
the individual utility of specific measures (T1) and moral practical arguments for the
moral value of such measures (T2).
5.1 Criteria forEpistemically Good Arguments forPrudential Value Judgements
(T1)
The basis of prudential practical arguments, the epistemological principle that
guides them, is the definition of ‘expected utility’. The expected utility of an event p
for a subject s is the sum of the products of probability and utility for s of the various
(relevant) consequences of p (plus the intrinsic utility of p for s). More formally:
Definition of ‘expected utility’:
An event/state p has for a subject s the expected utilityexpected utility u :=
1. let c1,..., cn be all possible consequences or implications of the event p that are
relevant for s and do not overlap;
2. the probabilities that p really produces these consequences are l1,..., ln ("l"
stands for " likeliness");
3. the utilities of c1,..., cn for s are u1,..., un;
4. the intrinsic utility of p is up;
then the expected utility of p for s is: u := l1u1 + … + lnun + up = up + Σi liui.
(Elementary) prudential practical arguments are then arguments for value judge-
ments that an event p has the (expected) utility u for a subject s; and their arguments
consist of judgements that follow the conditions of the expected utility definition
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and specify how these conditions are fulfilled in the concrete case. In the follow-
ing conditions for epistemically good prudential practical arguments, first the ideal
structure of these arguments is described (PA1); the thesis is the value judgement to
be justified (PA1.1); the reasons address the individual conditions of the definition
of expected utility (PA1.2). This is followed by the condition for the argumenta-
tive validity of such structures (PA2). Ideal practical arguments are cumbersome and
long; a further condition therefore allows for simplifications that do not affect the
validity of the argument (PA4). The last condition specifies when a valid practical
argument is epistemically accessible to someone and thus also adequate to guide
them in recognising the thesis (PA5).
Conditions for an epistemically good prudential practical argument:
I. Argument structure and argumentative validity:
PA1: Components and structure of prudential practical arguments:
PA1.1: Thesis: ‘The event p has utility u for the subject s.’
PA1.2: The reasons:
PA1.2.1: n judgements of the form: ‘The probability that event p has consequence /
implication ci is li.’ (li>0);
PA1.2.2: for each of the reasons from PA1.2.1, a reason of the form: ‘The utility of
consequence / implication ci for subject s is ui.’;
PA1.2.3: a judgement of the form: ‘The implications c1, ..., cn are all conse-
quences of p that are relevant to s—where ‘relevant’ means: the product of the
probability li and the utility ui is greater than the relevance threshold r.’;
PA1.2.4: a judgement of the form: ‘The intrinsic desirability of p is up.’;
PA1.2.5: finally, a judgement of the form: ‘The sum of (p’s intrinsic desirability)
up and of all products liui is u.’ (l1u1 +··· + lnun + up= u.)
PA2: Argumentative validity: Truth guarantee: All reasons from PA1.2 are true.
PA4: Liberalisation: Simplification rules: All of these reasons must be true,
but not all of them must be made explicit; this applies in particular to PA1.2.3,
PA1.2.4 if p has no intrinsic desirability, P1.2.5.
II. Situational adequacy:
PA5: Situational adequacy: A valid argument with properties PA0-PA4 is ade-
quate to convince a hearer h of the thesis if the following conditions hold:
PA5.4: Consequence knowledge: The addressee h already believes in the conse-
quence relations from PA1.2.1 or can recognise them immediately.
PA5.5: Value knowledge: The addressee h already believes in or can immediately
recognise the desirability judgements from PA1.2.2 and PA1.2.4.
(Abridged from: Lumer 2014; cf. also: Lumer 1990: 319-366.)
In many simple cases, above all when there are only one or two relevant conse-
quences, the utilities can also be indicated without numbers by vague indications of
magnitude such as: ‘very good’, ‘small disadvantage’.—The reasons PA1.2.2 with
the evaluation of consequences are prima facie rather strange, because they have
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the same form as the thesis justified with the argument and thus seem to lead to a
vicious circle. But the ideas behind them are: Firstly, the complex desirability of p
is already broken down to the desirability of the various consequences ci of p, which
can then be estimated more easily. Secondly, the desirability of the consequences
can possibly be justified again via the desirability of the consequences of the con-
sequences of p until one arrives at intrinsically desirable consequences. There is a
long philosophical debate about what is intrinsically desirable or relevant. The main
theory in this debate is rational hedonism, that is: precisely one’s own feelings are
intrinsically relevant to oneself; and their desirability is identical to their (positively
or negatively directed) intensity times their duration. This theory most likely is not
entirely correct; but it is probably the best approximation to the correct theory. If this
is so—and for the sake of simplicity here I assume it is—then one can simplify the
justification of individual utility judgments by using QALYs (= quality-adjusted life
years) as utility units and by relying on empirical studies from happiness research on
the influence of various factors on affective well-being in determining the hedonistic
quality of a life in a given time period. One QALY corresponds to the average affec-
tive well-being in a reference population over a period of one year. Someone who
experiences two years with the average affective well-being of society thus has a
utility of 2 QALYs in this time. Someone whose average affective well-being in one
year is only half that of the average of society has a utility of only 0.5 QALYs in that
year.
5.2 Criteria forEpistemically Good Arguments forMoral Value Judgements (T2)
I have treated the arguments for theses on the prudential individual utility of a measure
in such detail because it can be used to justify the most important premises in the argu-
ment for the actually central thesis of a justification of political measures. If political
measures are about realising the common good and, as will be shown in a moment, the
common good can be interpreted as the moral good, then in order to justify a measure
it would have to be shown that the following central thesis applies to it:
Moral justification theses for political measures:
‘m1 is the morally best among the morally permissible and realisable (tech-
nically feasible and politically enforceable) measures (in the field of options
under discussion).’
It is already clear from the meaning of this thesis that it follows deductively from
a series of premises, i.e. it can also be justified in deductive arguments with these
premises:
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Epistemic Norms forPublic Political Arguments
Premises for deductively justifying the justification thesis for a political meas-
ure:
M1: n premises of the kind: ‘The moral desirability of measure mi is vi.’;
M2: n premises of the kind: ‘mi is a realisable (technically feasible and politi-
cally passable and enforceable) measure in the field of options under discus-
sion (it is e.g. a solution to a certain socially thematised problem).’;
M3: one premise of the type: ‘m1 to mn are all possible relevant and realisable
measures in the discussed field of options.’;
(M4: n-1 premises of the type: ‘The moral desirability v1 of measure m1 is
higher than the moral desirability vi of measure mi.’ (’v1 > vi.’));
M5: one premise of the type: ‘m1 is morally permissible (i.e. does not violate
other socially valid moral principles).’4
The actually problematic among these premises, and the ones to be discussed fur-
ther in the following, are those of type M1, i.e. the moral evaluations. The only theo-
ries that provide general criteria for the common good or for moral evaluations that
can be applied to any political measures and that thus posit an overall societal (quan-
titative) target function for social action are welfare ethics.5 In ethics, these are the
standard approaches to the common good. Welfare-ethical moral evaluations aggre-
gate the moral desirability of a measure from the various individual prudential utili-
ties of this measure for all (sentient) beings, using certain mathematical aggregation
4 The strategy outlined with these premises for proving the optimality of m1, namely the pairwise com-
parison of m1 with all other relevant options on the basis of a complete value determination of m1, is
safe—if the necessary information is available—but very laborious and costly. There are simpler strat-
egies such as the incomplete pairwise comparison, in which only those consequences are taken into
account that are different for the two options—which, however, presupposes correspondingly favourable
circumstances (for further possibilities see Gallhofer & Saris 2021; Lumer 1990: 390–396; 2005c: 248–
250). And one can use other comparison schemes such as transitivity or a knockout system. In a favoura-
ble case and with a clever arrangement of the comparisons, one can then establish the optimal alternative
without any complete value determination.
5 A few negative justifications for this assertion: For deontological ethics, moral prescriptions are pri-
mary, which then enjoin certain actions and forbid others. The moral good is secondary for them, if
it plays a role at all. The concept of moral good remains correspondingly underdeveloped; it is only a
qualitative concept, above all in the form of concepts for moral goods of a certain kind (‘the good will’,
’autonomy’, ’dignity’, ’peace’). But it lacks a quantitative concept of the moral good. Contractualist eth-
ics proceed from individual utility functions; contracts serve to maximise these utilities through coop-
eration that is beneficial for all, but subject to mutual consent. However, they do not arrive at a concept
of the moral or general good. The capability approach uses ad hoc quantitative indices of goods (often
not even aggregated) for social evaluation, which are supposed to replace a common criterion of moral/
social good. Rawls’ theory of justice as fairness does indeed bring three basic goods (basic rights, social
positions, material goods) into a lexical order, which then form the basis of the constitution. However,
it leaves open how individual measures are to be decided later; in particular, Rawls does not provide a
social evaluation function to answer this question. Ordinal social choice theories, which thus only start
from preferences, cannot, as Arrow’s impossibility theorem shows, coherently define social preference
orders and accordingly certainly not define ‘social desirability’. Economic monetary evaluation criteria
such as gross national income cannot be applied to economically irrelevant political measures, do not
capture the non-economic aspects of other measures and evaluate many economic consequences in a way
that is questionable from the perspective of the common good—the same income increases of a poor per-
son and a rich person are equivalent from a purely monetary perspective, but not from the perspective of
the common good and from the perspective of all ethics.
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formulas. The competing theories in normative ethics use different aggregation for-
mulas here. The most important of these are the utilitarian, the prioritarian and the
moderate egalitarian.
Utilitarianism says: the (utilitarian) moral desirability of a measure mi (VUmi) is
equal to the sum of the various individual prudential utilities of mi for all single indi-
viduals (Smart 1973: Ch. 4):
Utilitarian moral desirability: VUmi := U1mi + U2mi + … + Uomi =
j=1∑oUjmi,
with Ujmi being the prudential, individual utility of measure mi for the subject
sj.
Utilitarianism does not take distributive justice into account. For utilitarianism, it
is equally good if an additional unit of utility from an action benefits a person who is
already doing very well, or if it benefits a person who is doing badly. Many find this
unjust.
An alternative theory of moral desirability that attempts to specify this idea of
distributive justice is prioritarianism, which says: "Benefiting [sic!] people mat-
ters more the worse off these people are" (Parfit 1997: 213). This means prioritar-
ianism gives more weight to improvements for the badly off than to those for the
better off, and the more weight the worse off the person is. However, the weight
for improvements even for the worst off never becomes infinitely large—small
improvements for them can be outweighed by many large improvements for the
better off—; and the weight for improvements even for the best off never reduces
to zero. Technically, this is realised as follows: In the prioritarian evaluation of
a world situation (e.g. the world situation in which the measure m1 is realised:
Wm1), first, the utilities of this world situation for the various individual subjects6
are each assigned a prioritarian desirability with the help of a (monotonously
increasing) concave prioritarian evaluation function (PR(.), see Fig.1). Because
of the concave form of this evaluation function, equal increases in (prudential)
utility produce less and less moral desirability increases, the higher the utility
level of a person already is. Second, these moral desirabilities are added up. The
6 In prioritarianism (and utility egalitarianism), it is initially not individual events but entire worlds that
are intrinsically valued from the perspective of a subject. This evaluation is no longer based on the defi-
nition of ‘expected utility’, but on the simpler definition of the ‘intrinsic desirability of a world w for a
subject s’ (Lumer 2009: 403–408). This desirability is equal to the sum of the intrinsic desirabilities for s
of all intrinsically relevant and overlap-free objects in that world. (The multiplications with probabilities
are thus not needed; and instead of all relevant consequences of p, all intrinsically relevant objects con-
tained in w are evaluated.) In rational hedonism as a theory of intrinsic desirability, the set of all intrin-
sically relevant and overlap-free objects is identical with the set of all feelings of s. Concretely, in the
moral evaluation, the average well-being of s in her various life periods is then multiplied by the duration
of these periods (i.e. determined in QALYs) and these products are added up. In particular, the effect of
the measure m on the average well-being in certain life periods and on the duration of these life periods
is taken into account.
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Epistemic Norms forPublic Political Arguments
prioritarian aggregation formula for the moral desirability of a world situation
Wm1 is thus:
Prioritarian moral desirability of a world situation:
VP(Wm1) := PR(U1Wm1) + PR(U2Wm1) + … + PR(UoWm1).
Compared to utilitarian moral desirability, there are three technical differences:
1. Instead of directly using the individual, prudential utilities in the aggregation
formula, these utilities are first evaluated with the prioritarian evaluation func-
tion PR in such a way that improvements for the worse off count morally more than
improvements for the better off. To achieve this, PR is monotonously increasing and
concave.7
The x-axis of this curve represents the individual, prudential utility u; the y-axis
represents the moral desirability of this benefit PRu. Due to the concave shape of
this curve, increases in utility for the worse off, i.e. persons located on the left of the
x-axis, generate greater increases in moral value than increases in prudential util-
ity for the better off. 2. The second change is that, according to most prioritarians,
the question of whether someone is well or badly off is not measured by how she is
doing now or in this hour, on this day, etc., but rather by what the prudential utility
of her whole life is. In moral evaluation, then, one must take into account the value
Fig. 1 Prioritarian moral value
function PR(u)(Lumer 2005b:
6)
7 The specific prioritarian value function suggested here and represented in Fig. 1 is:
VPe19(u) = (19/18)∙(1–19−u) (Lumer 2005b: Sect.3–4; 2009: 589–632; 2021).
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of the whole life with the measure being evaluated, or, as is said here, the value of
the world accompanying the measure. This world accompanying the measure m1 is
designated in the formula as "Wm1". 3. Now, the value of measure m1 is not equal
to the value of the whole world that goes along with it, but only the increase in
the value of the world produced by m1. One must therefore subtract from the moral
value of the world accompanying m1 the value of the world accompanying the zero
action or zero measure m0, i.e. doing nothing. It is the same for all the alternatives to
be compared. As aggregation formula for the prioritarian desirability of measure m1,
one thus obtains:
Prioritarian moral desirability:
If a measure only changes the utility of n (n < o) subjects, then the moral desir-
abilities of the world with and without this measure m1 are equal in each case for all
other subjects si (for all i > n: PR(UiWm1) = PR(UiWm0)). Thus, when calculating the
moral value of a measure m1, according to the formula just provided, only the utili-
ties of the n subjects really affected by m1 need to be taken into account.
Another justice-oriented alternative to the utilitarian aggregation of individual
utilities is moderate utility egalitarianism. According to this criterion, not only
should the sum of utilities be high, but the utilities of the different individuals should
also be equal. The egalitarian value of a social distribution of utilities is therefore
equated with the sum of all individual utilities, from which, however, a measure of
inequality is subtracted. Such measures of unequal distribution are, for example, the
Gini coefficient or the standard deviation, each multiplied by the sum of utilities.
How then to argue for a specific measure, for example a measure to contain some
epidemic?8 One would have to show that the respective measure is the morally best
of the currently available and enforceable measures. For each option, the moral
value would have to be determined by identifying what the major consequences are
for individual groups of the population: health consequences through changes in the
probability of becoming infected by the pathogen or developing certain symptoms;
the costs of the actual medical measures; economic consequences through possible
direct restrictions on economic activity or in the long run through increased taxes
or greater government debt service or through economic disruption; social conse-
quences through restrictions on otherwise normal activities, and so on. For all these
consequences for different population groups, the individual utilities would have
to be determined in terms of QALYs: How much and for how long do these con-
sequences change well-being? The political enforceability and the legal and moral
permissibility of the individual measures would have to be ensured. All this is very
VPm
1∶= PR
(
U1Wm1
)
+PR
(
U2Wm1
)
+⋯+PR
(
UoWm1
)
−PR(U1Wm0)−PR(U2Wm0)−⋯−PR(UoWm0
)
=
o
∑
j=
1
PR(UjWm1)−
o
∑
j=1
PR(UjWm0).
8 For an accomplished assessment of the kind described see: Lumer 2002.
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difficult to determine. But it is possible. And it would make explicit all those con-
siderations that so far are suppressed in the usual discussion of such measures. This
would require an interdisciplinary task force of perhaps 20 good specialists who
would first have to develop a general empirical model with which the necessary
data could be identified and from which consequences for the well-being of differ-
ent population groups could be calculated; then new empirical premises would have
to be entered into the model for each new alternative, i.e. set of combined meas-
ures, so that new alternatives could be compared with each other within maximally
a few days. Politicians and the general public would have to be informed not only
by means of a report with the complete calculation but also in short versions with
explanations of the essential premises and results. This would give the critical public
and politicians the opportunity to participate in the discussion about the premises
and the normative specifications.
5.3 Criteria forEpistemically Good Arguments forSome Other Important Types
ofTheses inPublic Argumentation
Arguments for other types of theses in public discussion cannot be discussed here
in the same detail as the previous two; references to literature must suffice here (see
already Sect.3). However, comments on some of them are still needed.
T3: Arguments for empirical theses on natural, social, economic, individual,
psychological consequences of political measures: According to rational hedon-
ism as the theory of the prudentially intrinsic good (see Sect. 5.1 above) in con-
junction with a welfare ethic, all morally relevant consequences must be pursued to
their impact on individual well-being. At this point, therefore, very rich empirical
information is required on how certain natural, economic, social, health, cultural,
etc. situations affect the well-being of individuals. Respective studies are collected,
classified and made accessible in the World Database of Happiness (https:// world
datab aseof happi ness. eur. nl/). Despite the approximately 16,000 collected studies
on subjective well-being, there are two major problems with regard to the informa-
tion needed for public arguments: 1. Most of these studies examine life satisfaction
(‘how happy are you with your life as a whole?’) and the like, but not affective,
emotional well-being (e.g. ‘how good do you feel / how happy were you yesterday
/ just before answering this poll?’; ’which kinds of feelings of the following list did
you experience yesterday: anxiety, anger, … joy, satisfaction …?’; or a more pre-
cise measurement: Kahneman et al. 2004a), as would, however, be necessary for
the welfare-ethical evaluation. 2. Many of the analyses themselves, but above all the
meta-analysis of the World Database of Happiness, concentrate on the correlation
strengths between certain types of situations and well-being, but do not provide any
information on the resulting (statistical) level of well-being or its change compared
to the average of the total population, as needed for the welfare-ethical assessments.
Here, therefore, is a huge research gap that needs to be publicised much more and
requires a considerable reorientation of happiness research for its prudential and
political-moral usability (see also: Kahneman etal. 2004b).
T6: Arguments for justifying the determination of the intrinsic good and for jus-
tifying moral principles: According to the above thesis (Sect.2), the philosophical
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discussions about the content of the intrinsic good and about the correct criterion of
the common good must also be conducted in the political public sphere. So far, this
has virtually not been the case, among other things because of the abstract level of
the discussion, but also because there is considerable disagreement in philosophy
itself about what justifications, what types of arguments could even show what the
correct determination of the prudentially intrinsic good and what the correct criteria
for the common good or, more generally, what the correct moral principles are. For
both issues, intuitionistic justifications are dominant at the moment, which, however,
are unsatisfactory from an argumentation-theoretical point of view because they
mostly beg the question. Within the epistemological argumentation theory, instead,
instrumentalist approaches to justifying determinations of the prudentially intrin-
sic good (Lumer 2009: 241–388) and to justifying moral principles (Lumer 2009:
30–53; 2015) have been developed (overview of other justification approaches:
Lumer 2009: 53–95).
T8: Arguments about the best strategy for politically pushing through a meas-
ure: The arguments discussed so far all concerned, directly or as sub-arguments for
required premises, the selection of political measures to be implemented. A com-
pletely different topic of public arguments are strategies for politically pushing
through already selected political measures: How can certain groups of voters be
won over? How can a political party be persuaded to agree to a particular meas-
ure? These questions are not about whether a certain measure can be socially pushed
through and enforced (see T4), but about what is the best strategy to push it through.
Theses T4 are used as premises within an argument for a moral optimality judge-
ment. This optimality judgement is about the moral improvement achieved by the
measure, possible positive side effects and moral costs (through political conces-
sions, consumption of resources of the political pressure group behind the proposal,
etc.). The criteria for these arguments have already been discussed above (Sect.5.2).
In political discussions, there are many more types of arguments about best strate-
gies. However, these concern best strategies from the point of view of a particular
group. Such discussions usually do not take place in the general public.
6 The Factual Situation ofPolitical Argumentation andaStrategy
forits Improvement
De facto, the norms for epistemically good arguments outlined here are virtually
not followed. For example, I have conducted an argumentation-theoretical analy-
sis of the programmes of the major political parties for the 2017 federal election
in Germany. All election programmes consisted for the most part of promises and
announcements of what the respective party will do if it enters government. The pro-
portion of argumentative text is low, less than 10%. The few arguments are almost
exclusively simple end-means arguments: It is justified that the advocated measure
is a sufficient or necessary means or a necessary precondition or a substantial part
of the realisation of the desired goal state. This is far from the standards developed
above. Arguments that approach these standards can perhaps be found at the level
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Epistemic Norms forPublic Political Arguments
of parliamentary committees, expert reports commissioned by ministries; but even
these arguments are only approximations. And the situation is probably no better in
other Western countries.
Hence there is still a great deal to be improved in factual political argumentation
from an epistemological point of view. In particular, the criteria for epistemically
good arguments in politics also need to be much more widely known. The best con-
tribution to this is probably that good examples, which initially come from science
and applied ethics, are developed in the first place. The long and complicated argu-
ments contained in them should be summarised in a generally understandable way.
They should be made accessible to persons and institutions in the broad sense of
the political public from whom a high level of argumentation can most likely be
expected. If such examples are more and more disseminated, they could also encour-
age emulation. As a result of the improved discussion, the policies adopted could
then also improve, as could the political and argumentation-theoretical education of
citizens.
Acknowledgements I thank the participants of the Working Group 2 Workshop “Norms of public argu-
mentation” (Siena 2022) of the COST Action “European Network for Argumentation and Public Policy
Analysis” for the very helpful discussion of a former version of this paper. I thank the University of Siena
and its Department of Social, Political and Cognitive Science for funding the open access publication of
this article.
Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License,
which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as
you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Com-
mons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article
are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the
material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is
not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission
directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http:// creat iveco mmons. org/ licen
ses/ by/4. 0/.
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