Four Approaches in Argumentation Analysis: A Review and Comparison of the Toulmin Model, Pragma-Dialectics, Political Discourse Analysis, and Argumentum Model of Topics

Abstract

The inferential relation drawn between a reason and a claim constitutes the basis of all argument approaches and models. This article conducts a concept-based comparative literature review that aims to compile and compare four contemporary argument models that are used in the analysis of everyday discourse: the Toulmin Model, Pragma-Dialectics, Political Discourse Analysis, and Argumentum Model of Topics. Argumentation theory and models are inspired, on the one hand, by discursive approaches in the emphasis put on the content and context, and on the other, from analytical philosophy and logic in the application of rational norms and standards. Before examining the four models, developed in the framework of argumentation theory, the article positions the argument approach between the social constructionist and empirical approach of discourse analysis and the formal and normative approach of logic. In examining the four argument models and their analytical reconstruction operations, it seeks to clarify their approach to inferential relations in everyday communication and illustrate their analytical differences. Throughout the four sections, schematic illustrations of how each model reconstructs a simple everyday argument are thus provided. In the conclusion, the models are compared discussing the type of studies each model is most suitable for and the cases for which each can be used most fruitfully.