Reforming the Rhetoricians: Aristotle's Underhanded Aim in the Rhetoric

• In Event: Terminology, Rhetoric, and Influence: Aristotle and Plato

Abstract

Part of our contemporary political crisis can be attributed to the misuse of rhetoric by political elites. By pandering to, manipulating, and riling up their supporters, these political actors contribute to deep polarization and the breakdown of civil discourse. The earliest extent treatise on rhetoric, Aristotle’s Rhetoric, addresses this same problem, in the context of recent crises brought on by rhetorical misbehavior. Reading it may help us respond to the contemporary abuse of one of the most powerful tools of the democratic politician.

Aristotle’s Rhetoric appears to be a textbook on the rules and approaches to persuasive speech. He poses the work as a rival and corrective to the other handbooks on rhetoric, which offer morally ungrounded advice to the public spirited and selfishly manipulative alike. Yet, on the surface, the work appears no different: Aristotle, too, teaches one how to plead for either side of almost any issue. Yet, I argue there is an underlying project of reform hidden in the text. Recognizing that he cannot make a direct assault on the motives of self-interested rhetoricians, Aristotle instead hopes to persuade them that the tactics most likely achieve success lie in serving the good of the audience they address. I show that Aristotle subtly employs his own mechanism of habituation to re-orient amoral rhetoricians to work for the benefit of the audiences they seek to manipulate. He thus also suggests that the crisis of misused rhetoric demands that audiences themselves take a hand in reforming democratic discourse.

Author

• Michael Collins Hawley, UNC Chapel Hill