Get 20M+ Full-Text Papers For Less Than $1.50/day. Start a 14-Day Trial for You or Your Team.

Learn More →

Reinventing doxa: public opinion polling as deliberative discourse

Reinventing doxa: public opinion polling as deliberative discourse Most analyses of public opinion polling focus on questions of bias or accuracy. In contrast, this study assumes the validity of polling and instead investigates polling data as a form of rhetorical argument. While ancient and modern traditions conceive of doxa as unstated collective opinion, modern opinion polling represents a transformation of the concept of doxa in deliberative democracies. By analyzing specific polls, polling data is shown to advance implicit claims about public policy and good governance. Thus, polling data do not embody an objective empirical artifact, but rather a form of deliberative argumentation that is at odds with democratic life. The study concludes by advocating a revitalization of the public culture of contestation and by discussing more indirect, intuitive means of assessing larger opinion trends. http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Argumentation and Advocacy Taylor & Francis

Reinventing doxa: public opinion polling as deliberative discourse

Ellwanger, Adam
Argumentation and Advocacy , Volume 53 (3): 18 – Jul 3, 2017
Download PDF

Reinventing doxa: public opinion polling as deliberative discourse

Abstract

Most analyses of public opinion polling focus on questions of bias or accuracy. In contrast, this study assumes the validity of polling and instead investigates polling data as a form of rhetorical argument. While ancient and modern traditions conceive of doxa as unstated collective opinion, modern opinion polling represents a transformation of the concept of doxa in deliberative democracies. By analyzing specific polls, polling data is shown to advance implicit claims about public policy and...
Loading next page...
 
/lp/taylor-francis/reinventing-doxa-public-opinion-polling-as-deliberative-discourse-HWJ9VyJKPK
Publisher
Taylor & Francis
Copyright
© 2017 American Forensic Association
ISSN
2576-8476
eISSN
1051-1431
DOI
10.1080/00028533.2017.1337330
Publisher site
See Article on Publisher Site

Abstract

Most analyses of public opinion polling focus on questions of bias or accuracy. In contrast, this study assumes the validity of polling and instead investigates polling data as a form of rhetorical argument. While ancient and modern traditions conceive of doxa as unstated collective opinion, modern opinion polling represents a transformation of the concept of doxa in deliberative democracies. By analyzing specific polls, polling data is shown to advance implicit claims about public policy and good governance. Thus, polling data do not embody an objective empirical artifact, but rather a form of deliberative argumentation that is at odds with democratic life. The study concludes by advocating a revitalization of the public culture of contestation and by discussing more indirect, intuitive means of assessing larger opinion trends.

Journal

Argumentation and Advocacy – Taylor & Francis

Published: Jul 3, 2017

Keywords: Rhetoric; public opinion; polling; doxa; democracy

References

  • Introduction to the Study of Doxa
  • Topica
  • Public Opinion Does Not Exist
  • Received Ideas and Literary Reception: The Functions of Doxa in the Understanding and Evaluation of Texts
  • Democracy—And the Common Man
  • Why We Are Doing so Badly in the Ideological War
  • The Absorption Rate of Ideas
  • Public Opinion Infrastructures: Meanings, Measures, Media
  • Public opinion and American Foreign Policy: The Case of Illusory Support for the Panama Canal Treaties
  • George Gallup and the Rhetoric of Scientific Democracy
  • Polling on the Issues Public Opinion and the Nuclear Freeze
  • Record–Low 26% Favor Handgun Ban
  • Doxa and a Critical Rhetoric: Accounting for the Rhetorical Agent Through Prudence.
  • The Role of Public Opinion in Policy Argument: An Examination of Public Opinion Rhetoric in the Federal Budget Process
  • Selections from Discourses Upon the First Ten Books of Titus Livy
  • The Concept of Public Opinion
  • Same-Sex Marriage Support Reaches New High at 55%
  • Text, Context, and the Fragmentation of Contemporary Culture
  • The Aesthetic Dimension: Aesthetics, Politics, Knowledge
  • Americans’ Sympathies for Israel Match All-Time High
  • Public Opinion and American Democracy
  • Gallup Gives Up the Horse Race
  • Is the Polling Industry in Stasis or in Crisis?