Concept Of Phronesis Research Articles

Phronesis and Empathy: Allies or Opponents?

Empathizing with others is thought to be a useful, if not necessary, skill for a wise person to possess. Beyond this general conceptual assonance, however, there have been few systematic attempts to conceptualize this relationship. This paper aims to address this issue by investigating what role empathy is said to play in phronesis and whether there is a legitimate place for it in Aristotelian (or neo-Aristotelian) accounts of practical wisdom. First, after a brief overview of Aristotle’s account of phronesis, I will try to define three different ways in which empathy is thought to contribute to it according to the existing literature, based on a conceptual distinction between affective empathy, cognitive empathy, and sympathy. Second, I will ask whether empathy is the best conceptual candidate for Aristotle’s account of phronesis and, more generally, whether the wise person should always rely on empathy in order to deliberate and act well. My tentative answer will be that empathy does not seem to be perfectly compatible with the concept of phronesis, nor is it its best ally.

The Wise Leader: Where did the Roads pave by Nonaka and Takeuchi lead to?

Ikujiro Nonaka’s contribution to the knowledge management (KM) field over the last decades is remarkable. His research has heralded major paradigm shifts (e.g., emphasis on tacit knowledge). In this regard, we can consider his widely received article – The Wise Leader in Harvard Business Review (May 2011) – as an attempt to develop KM towards a new direction. In it, Nonaka and Takeuchi introduce phronesis, i.e., practical wisdom, as a complementary source of knowledge and emphasize its importance for responsible leadership. A decade after its presentation, we aim to understand how their work has influenced subsequent research. Using VOSviewer software, we develop a bibliometric analysis of the research that follows the paths laid out by Nonaka and Takeuchi. Therefore, we searched the studies citing The Wise Leader on the Scopus database. The outcomes comprise 119 documents. We scrutinized the metadata – papers, journals, institutions, countries, authors, and keywords – applying a comparative approach – authorship, bibliographic coupling, citation, co-citation, and co-occurrence analyses. The results reveal that the concepts of phronesis and practical wisdom link knowledge management and leadership, supporting Nonaka and Takeuchi’s stance on knowledge management as a primarily social endeavor whose success depends on personal capabilities and the enactment of (tacit) knowledge, both of which are mirrored in phronesis. We also find that the concept has hardly spread beyond the boundaries of knowledge management, leadership, and business ethics, although it has become interwoven with other concepts. Of these connections, those to non-rational forms of knowledge and values (e.g., spirituality, emotions, virtue ethics) may be of particular relevance to the further development of the knowledge management field. This is also reflected in the recently started discussion on responsible knowledge management. Moreover, we set an agenda for future research and offer contributions to theory and practice.

Aristotle’s hexis, phronesis, and Prolific Politics: Through a Musicological Lens

This paper attempts to examine and interpret the idea of phronesis, which unfolds in book Six of Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics. Emphasizing the role of politics, Aristotle’s concept of phronesis(practical wisdom) involves the idea of habit (hexis) or cultivating moral virtues. It is thought that phronesis helps agents avoid extremes in their choices and finally achieve the thoughtfully desired good. Implications of these ideas lead us to ask – where do we get/cultivate phronesis? What is the nature of politics that cultivates active dispositions in us? In order to answer these questions, I interpret Aristotle’s concepts of phronesis and politics through Indian Classical Music’s principle of ’improvisation.’ In the initial part, I discuss Aristotle’s ethical framework to understand the role of habit (hexis) and politics in the cultivation of phronesis. I will then show problems in MacIntyre’s interpretation of these ideas. Finally, I will argue that as a musician’s ’new’ imaginative creativity arises from ’given’ patterns of melodic possibilities provided by a prolific teacher, practical wisdom is also cultivated by ’hexis imparting’ politics. However, politics must be qualified with prolificity, which will develop autonomous moral agency and evade any coercive influence of socio-customary morality.

Phronesis as moral decathlon: contesting the redundancy thesis about phronesis

ABSTRACT Phronesis or practical wisdom – Aristotle’s intellectual meta-virtue of discernment, deliberation, and arbitration – is undergoing a revival. Yet phronesis enthusiasts have recently been experiencing blowback both from philosophers and psychologists who think that phronesis has been given an inflated role in recent theorizing and that the functions it is meant to perform can more readily and parsimoniously be accorded to less complex – and better researched – psycho-moral constructs. We refer to this as “the redundancy thesis” about phronesis, drawing upon two recent incarnations of it, by a philosopher (Miller) and a psychologist (Lapsley). The aim of this article is to contest this redundancy thesis about phronesis. In Section 2, we delineate the neo-Aristotelian concept of phronesis under scrutiny. Section 3 analyses the redundancy thesis, especially as formulated by Lapsley. Section 4 then offers an unusual twist, by turning the attention to the nature of a particular Olympic sport: decathlon. We elicit various analogies between the nature and development of decathlon as a composite, yet integral, athletic event and the (presumed) nature and development of phronesis as a composite, yet integral capacity. Section 5 finally teases out some possible implications of those analogies for the redundancy thesis.

Phronesis and enactive research from the movie industry: an exploration of entrepreneuring as practice

ABSTRACT The principle purpose of this paper is to highlight the importance of employing enactive research as a research method within the context of entrepreneurship studies. A case, for getting involved in the research, is built by presenting the advantage of being an entresearcher (Johannisson, 2018, p. 5) who combines the roles of a researcher and entrepreneur thereby combining scholarship and practice resulting in better understanding of the entrepreneurial process. The secondary purpose is to build on the concepts of phronesis (Flyvbjerg, 2001) within the domain of entrepreneurship by presenting that in the movie industry the long-term impact of practical wisdom propagated by phronesis is pertinent. Therefore, emphasizing that phronesis is essential for an entrepreneur to deal with adverse or favourable circumstances and this knowledge far outweighs the theoretical knowledge and theory that entrepreneur may possess. This qualitative research paper employs the methodology of enactive research. Set in the context of the movie industry, two case studies are presented and phronesis identified from both the case studies is analysed. In this enactive research, the researcher alone was responsible for the enactment of the two ventures illustrated and for both the financial outcome and the scientific outcome. Taking a cue from Gartner et al. (1992) enactment in these two cases was about acting first and thinking second. The researcher in both the cases operated in a possessive as well as an immersive mode by just taking charge and then submitting to the established structure of production as he was new and did not have experience to challenge the status quo. From these two cases is was concluded that in the movie industry phronesis of long-term credibility is essential for continuing the entrepreneurial process. The general context of creative arts industry and the specific context of movie industry has not been explored earlier and the complexity of this industry with the debate between commerce and art challenges the established conventions of research. Therefore insightful research employing an enactive method offers a new perspective. It is pointed out that entrepreneuring is a practice that takes up a phronesis approach of adjusting and adapting to the environment that is constantly changing rather than working with a rigid strategy.

Teachers’ view on the elements that enhance and hamper Basque and Occitan teaching in southern France: an exploratory approach

ABSTRACT This study focuses on Basque and Occitan teaching in southern France, where both are minority languages. More precisely, it aims to analyze teachers’ view on the elements that enhance and hamper Basque and Occitan teaching. It considers the concept of phronesis or teacher effect to refer to the diverse strategies used by teachers to constantly adapt to students’ needs and context. This study presents an exploratory collaborative participatory approach based on a sequential explanatory design used with Basque and Occitan secondary school teachers. The results indicate that teachers tend to highlight the role that their implication plays in learning the target language. Teachers also mention that contextual elements hamper target language learning. The study concludes that teacher implication to promote student motivation is much based on the emotional bond created with the teacher. It also relates the concept of phronesis to that of teacher implication to promote student motivation.

How rural nurses in Southern New Zealand navigate their ethical landscape-A qualitative study.

To explore rural nurse experiences of ethical issues and their management of these as a first step in a programme of work to address rural nurses' ethical needs. This study was qualitative, using mixed qualitative techniques to gather data, which was analysed using a general inductive approach. Primary health care in 2 regions of Aotearoa New Zealand. Eleven nurses working in the West Coast (District Health Board) region and 9 working within the Southern District Health Board region. Participants took part in either a focus groups or an interview with members of the research team. To document ethical issues that confronted these rural nurses and how they navigated these issues. Three themes were identified: 'Signals and Silences,' 'One and Other' and 'Frustrations and Freedoms.' A continuous thread through these themes was the concept of phronesis, or what is sometimes called practical virtue. This practical virtue largely developed through their own experiences, rather than through educational or health system specific support or resources. We found that rural nurses' deal with specific issues related to the rural setting, such as resourcing and isolation, while maintaining a relationship with the communities they serve and their professional autonomy. Additionally, we discovered the ways in which rural nurses deal with the ethical issues they encounter to be practically focussed. However, rural nurses need supportive leadership not only to sustain the moral agency they demonstrate but also to further develop their ethical decision-making practices. The provision of a clinical ethics tele-service delivering both training opportunities and an on-call consult support service would provide a potential solution.

The Scientific Judgment-Making Process from a Virtue Ethics Perspective

From my own standpoint as a scientist, I, in this paper attempt to explore the scientific judgement-making process from an ethical perspective. In the process of developing truthful scientific knowledge, there are a myriad of judgements to make for the scientist. However, our contemporary world, dominated by technology, rules and regulations, presents us with less unconditioned opportunities for exercising our judgmental abilities. Any deliberation about a choice of action within our practice is, in a manner, made for us, and not by us. The challenges that we meet is largely assumed solved either by rules of conduct or by formulas where the right thing to do is based on mechanical computations (deontology), or as within utilitarianism where one focuses on the consequences of an action. My thesis is, however, that virtue ethics and the concept of Phronesis, as a framework, is better suited to grasp the peculiarity of the scientific practice compared to the contemporary mind-set. Hence, I will try to display my perspective and show how virtue ethics can lead to enhanced understanding of both the epistemological and the ethical parts of the scientific practice.

Aesthetic Courage and Phronesis

This paper analyzes aesthetic courage, a virtue directed towards aesthetic objects when subjects are asked to confront content that is psychologically or socially risky. I examine aesthetic courage to explore how it plays a role in a virtue theoretic account of the good life. I contend that the virtue theoretic concept of phronesis, or practical wisdom, plays a strong role in guiding the virtuous agent to make decisions about the course of action that promotes her good life. The concept of phronesis in service of the good life acts as the foundation for my concept of aesthetic courage. I analyze several examples of aesthetic courage, including the controversy surrounding the contemplative garden at Stanford University in honor of Chanel Miller and other survivors of sexual assault.

Practical Reason

Paul Ricœur’s essay “Practical Reason” was initially published in 1979, and later became part of the book Du texte à l’action: essais d’herméneutique II (1986), marking Ricœur’s transition from the general problems of the justification of hermeneutics as a legitimate philosophical discipline to the problems of practical philosophy in a broad sense. Relying on the analytical theory of action, the interpretative sociology of M. Weber, and the Hegelian critique of Kantian ethics, Ricœur seeks to restore the Aristotelian concept of phronesis or “practical wisdom” in the context of modern philosophizing. This turns out to be unexpectedly relevant where neither Kant’s deontology nor the Hegelian Sittlichkeit can adequately express the entirety of human practical experience in a world where ideology and alienation have become inevitable components of social life.

Applied Ethics for Child Protection: What Would Aristotle Say?

ABSTRACT For many years, modern child protection systems have been criticised for their over-reliance on technical rational approaches to practice. It has been suggested that such approaches fail to appreciate the complex nature of child protection work and the importance of good professional judgment which goes beyond strict adherence to the likes of practice manuals and risk assessment tools. Furthermore, these approaches may be hindering rather than improving practice. In this article I say why Aristotle’s virtue ethics offers a good guide for informing good professional judgment in child protection. Namely, it moves practitioners away from being bound to prescribed modes of practice to an ethical frame that values the good character of the practitioner which includes an ability to exercise practical wisdom considered essential for determining good decision making. By drawing from Aristotle’s concept of phronesis (translated as practical wisdom), and focusing on the child protection ‘first home visit’ I identify key elements for good professional judgment in child protection. These elements are: exercising the moral virtues; being guided by the goal of practice; drawing from analytical reasoning, intuition, emotion and experience; finding the golden mean; and engaging in reflective practice.

Empowering the school leaders of tomorrow: what lessons can we learn from the decision-making of today’s school leaders?

ABSTRACT This paper examines how school leaders understand their decision-making, its impact on their school community and whether there is evidence of ‘wise’ decision-making derived from Aristotle’s concept of phronesis. A questionnaire was completed by 13 school leaders with between 2 and 25 years of experience. The first section examined patterns of decision-making related to three areas: the categories of decisions made; staff involvement and factors that influenced decision-making. The second section presents a thematic analysis of open questions related to individual experiences of ‘wise’ decision-making. Three personal attributes have been identified together with five emergent themes. The three personal attributes of a flexibility of mind, the capacity for reflexivity and the adoption of an ethical standpoint which is focused on the common good, underpin the themes providing a basis for decision-making. The themes comprise clarity and confidence in what constitutes a wise decision, acknowledging the impact of poor decision-making, values-driven leadership, time as a factor, and finally, the relationship between intuition versus experience. The personal attributes and themes offer a valuable insight into school leaders’ decision-making, of interest to both aspirant and experienced school leaders, enabling them to reflect on, and interrogate the decisions they make in leading their school.

Preference transformation through ‘green political judgement formation’? Rethinking informal deliberative citizen participation processes

ABSTRACT German municipalities are increasingly implementing informal citizen participation processes, a form of participation that can be understood as an umbrella term for deliberative formats known and used internationally. Green republican scholars claim that deliberative formats could provide space for the crucial transformation of individual preferences in the pursuit of the common good. However, it is unclear under which conditions deliberative formats really allow for preference transformation. Against this background, I aim to contribute to debates about sustainability-oriented participation and green republicanism by arguing that informal deliberative citizen participation processes and thus deliberative formats dealing with sustainability issues ought to foster phronesis (political judgement formation) in order to facilitate preference transformation. The Aristotelian concept specifies steps and elements of citizen participation aiming at decision-making and action oriented towards the common good. However, since it originates against a specific historical and cultural background, it needs to be adapted to contemporary polity settings, for instance with regard to the underlying understanding of citizenship. After outlining the concept of phronesis, I propose necessary adaptations to the original Aristotelian concept in order to arrive at an updated version of phronesis referred to as ‘green’ political judgement formation. Subsequently, I discuss possibilities for the practical implementation of phronesis and ‘green political judgement formation’, before summarizing my findings and delineating further research needs in this field.

Ensino-aprendizagem da Sabedoria Prática ( Phronesis ) em Administração: Uma Revisão Sistemática

Resumo O objetivo dessa revisão sistemática é investigar de que maneira o conceito da phronesis é relacionado à educação, ensino e aprendizagem na área de Administração e de estudos organizacionais. A phronesis é definida como sabedoria prática, ou prudência, presente em processos de deliberação, decisão e ação. A busca por artigos nas bases Scopus, Ebsco e Web of Science encontrou 37 artigos sobre o tema. A análise desses trabalhos revela os autores mais referenciados, as principais definições e os principais temas de pesquisas a respeito do ensino e aprendizagem em Administração. Ela é abordada segundo cinco principais definições: (a) disposição para o julgamento ou deliberação; (b) percepção do contexto e da situação real; (c) tipo de conhecimento prático; (d) phronetic social science ; e, (e) múltiplas definições. Os temas encontrados abordam: (a) ensino e currículo relacionados à Administração e à ética empresarial; (b) educação e ensino de professores; (c) ensino e elementos da phronesis ; (d) filosofia da educação e phronesis ; (e) profissões e outros cursos superiores; e, (f) educação infantil. Sua relação com as virtudes morais poderia ser mais explorada, pois predominam definições relacionadas à aprendizagem experiencial. Estudos futuros poderiam discutir as práticas, práxis, e abordagens voltadas para ação. JEL Code: Y80, A14, D83.

Thoughts on phronesis

ABSTRACT This essay explores the concept of phronesis in two contexts: phronesis as a virtue, in fact a meta-virtue because it guides the exercise of other virtues; and phronesis as an element in theories of practice. I argue that these two aspects are closely related, because ethics – especially virtue ethics – is best understood as a kind of practice. The second part of the essay explores some of the consequences of thinking about ethics in this way.

Heidegger y la prudencia aristotélica como protofenomenología

La comprensión aristotélica de la prudencia constituye un antecedente fundamental para entender el giro hermenéutico de la fenomenología heideggeriana. Se examina cómo la interpretación fenomenológica de Heidegger sobre esta virtud dianoética puede entenderse si se consideran a cuatro aspectos: la prioridad de la praxis respecto de los saberes teóricos, el reconocimiento de un horizonte de verdad más amplio que la verdad proposicional del logos apophantikos, el valor del instante kairológico en el que discurre la acción humana y el anticipo de la temporalidad y, cómo no, la importancia de la finitud, la libertad y la autenticidad del existir fáctico del hombre.

Descriptive inquiry: cultivating practical wisdom with teachers

Teaching is a complex task that requires that the teacher be skilled at responding effectively and ethically to unexpected situations. Many have linked a teacher’s facility in the classroom to Aristotle’s concept of phronesis, translated in this paper as practical wisdom. While the relationship between practical wisdom and teaching has gotten attention, more concrete ways of cultivating practical wisdom in teachers is needed. In this paper, I highlight how a particular practice, descriptive review, can help teachers develop practical wisdom.

A Disciple in Damascus

The story of Saul of Tarsus's switch from enthusiastic support of mainstream Judaism to joining and preaching the new messianic Judaism of the Jesus followers of his day invites probing into what the concept of phronesis meant both to Paul and to those who knew Scripture, especially the prophets. Close reading of the accounts in Acts and Philippians about his dramatic change of identity and his own self-doubts underscores the importance of understanding how the monotheizing process changes how one thinks brought Saul the student of Gamliel to become Paul the apostle of Christ and how that set the Jesus movement on a path that changed the world.

Practice research enabler: Enabling research in a social work practice context

Practitioners are curious people but have become increasingly estranged from investigation and the research process. A false divide has developed wherein knowledge gained from practice is considered by some as inferior to knowledge constructed by academics. The concept of phronesis, as practical wisdom, can provide a link to give a legitimacy to practice research. One difference between academic research and practice research is in the collaborative relationship between practitioner and researcher, a true engagement with equal partners. The academic can be seen as a practice research enabler who facilitates the knowledge which practitioners develop in a localized setting and situates it in a broader theoretical perspective. As a research enabler, a researcher brings academic expertise to supplement the practice expertise of the practitioner to develop new knowledge. In a series of examples, and using a critical discourse analysis approach, the author critically assesses his own practice to identify an unsuccessful, a partially successful and a successful example of being a practice research enabler.

Institutional Control of Social Studies Teaching as Phronesis: A Multi-Case Study

This paper presents findings from a multi-case study of social studies educators which focused on the impact of institutional requirements on social studies teaching as phronesis. The concept of phronesis, or practical wisdom of human values, occupies a central space in this study, acting as both the theoretical and methodological framework. As a theoretical framework, Aristotle’s articulation of phronesis, and its distinction from the intellectual states of episteme and techne, guided the development of research questions and acted as an entry point for analysis of participant data concerning the impact of school-based requirements on social studies teaching. As a methodological framework, this study is grounded in Flyvbjerg’s (2001) argument for a “phronetic social science,” which envisions social science work as contributing to dialogue about human values, rather than a vain attempt of strict prediction and explanation. I merge these considerations with the value and utility of qualitative case study, which functions as the study design. Based on this framing, I sought to gain an in-depth understanding of the role that schools play in the development or control of teacher’s practical wisdom and socially-minded educational goals. Answers to this question are discussed through the examination of four different cases of social studies teachers from Alabama. Through a thematic analysis of qualitative data, I illustrate that institutional teaching requirements largely constrained “phronetic” possibilities for social studies education. The major findings indicate that, rather than supporting professional teacher judgments and fostering socially conscious goals, school-based requirements pushed participants to implement technical pedagogies in order to meet pre-determined outcomes. I conclude with a discussion that critically evaluates the nature of contemporary educational reform and considers the place of social studies in this climate.