Book excerpt: Preface 9 Part 1 Aristotle, Social Research, and Action Research 13 1. Introduction -- The Challenge of Phrónêsis 15 1.1 Three Kinds of General Theory 25 1.2 Aristotle and Critical Action Research 33 2. Action Research Approaching Phrónêsis 39 2.1 A Philosopher Defending Action Research 40 2.2 Making Social Science Matter 43 2.3 Abandoning Techniques 45 Part 2 Reading Aristotle -- Limits and Possibilities for Phrónêsis 49 3. Virtues -- Intellectual and Ethical 53 3.1 Particulars of Ethical Virtues 59 4. Phrónêsis and the Other Intellectual Virtues 65 4.1 Theoretical Knowledge, and Knowledge about Things We Influence 68 4.1.1 Overlaps and Intermeshes 74 4.2 Phrónêsis as an Intellectual Virtue 77 4.2.1 Excursus: Knowledge Forms and Ways of Knowing in Aristotle 79 4.2.1.1 Praxis, Poiêsis, Khrêsis, Páthos And the Various Forms of the Epistêmai 81 4.2.1.2 Theoretical and Practical Truth 94 4.2 (Continued) Phrónêsis as an Intellectual Virtue 97 4.3 Phrónêsis and Rhetoric, Phrónêsis and Practical Syllogisms 105 4.3.1 The relationship to rhetoric 106 4.3.2 The relationship to practical syllogisms 111 5. Phrónêsis on Means and Ends, Phrónêsis and General Knowledge 115 5.1 Means and Ends, and Kinds of Causes 115 5.1.1 Poiêsis Makes Things, Praxis Makes Perfect 122 5.1.2 "Professional" Deliberations and Deductions 132 5.2 Knowledge, General and Particular 138 5.2.1 General Knowledge, Appropriate Knowledge, Knowledge in Action 138 5.2.2 Héxis (Habitus), and Empeiria (Experience) 149 5.2.3 Knowing Particulars 157 5.2.3.1 By What? 158 5.2.3.2 How? 160 5.2.3.3 Preconditions for a Universally Flexible Consideration 165 6. Developing and Defining Virtue 181 6.1 Developing Virtue 182 6.1.1 Epistêmê and Virtue through the Formation of Habit, Once More 186 6.1.2 What "Means" Means 194 6.1.3 Practical Development with a Hinge to It, the Question of Standards Again 196 6.2 Defining Virtue 205 6.2.1 Nóêsis as Dialogue, or, the Reason Why Aristotle Insists on Letting Phrónêsis Deliberate about Means Only 212 6.2.1.1 The Unfolded Know-How of Nous 214 6.2.1.2 The Topica and the Enfolded Habitus of Dialectics 217 6.2.1.3 The Philosopher, the Dialectician, and Experience 224 6.2.1.3.1 Dialogical Peculiarities 231 6.2.1.3.2 Dialogue and Experience 237 6.2.1.3.3 Basic Principle, Beginning, Medium, and End 251 6.2.1.4 Ways of Learning 256 6.2.1.5 Self-Evident First Principles? 263 6.2.1.6 Praxis1, and Praxis2 267 6.2.2 The Ethical Works do not Deliberate about Means, They Develop and Define Ends 271 6.2.3 Epistêmê, Virtue, and Phrónêsis Defined 281 6.3 Who Develops and Defines? The Art and Practice of Architectonics 292 7. Eudaimonia and Wisdom as "The Highest Practical Good"; Aristotelian Phron-Ethics, Theor-Ethics, and the Way of the Intellectual Commons 299 7.1 Kinds of Theory, Kinds of Practice 301 7.2 Ethics and Politics as Methodological Guidelines for Autonomous Practitioners 313 7.2.1 The Laws of Virtue 316 7.2.2 Tékhnê and Phrónêsis - At the Parting of the Ways 324 7.3 The Wisdom of the Commons - Common Wisdom 327 7.3.1 Tà Koiná - The Commons 333 7.3.2 The Common Skholê 340 7.4 Theor-Ethics and Primary Friendship 342 7.4.1 The Noetic "I" and the Psychological "Me" 349 7.4.2 Theorethical Interventions? 359 7.5 The Way of Theor-Ethics 361 7.5.1 Ethical Excellence - Settling with the Best "for Us", i.e. for the Second Best "Absolutely" 371 7.6 The Ways of Politics - Continuous Learning in Common 385 7.6.1 Community: What Are the Things Common? 387 7.6.2 Oikos, Pólis, and Constitutions 392 7.6.3 Developing Concord - The Ethico-Political Role of Dialogical Gatherings 399 7.6.4 Different Concepts of Politics 413 7.6.5 Unity and Diversity in the Pólis 422 7.6.6 The Koinópolis as Panarchy Aristocracy Suspended and Transcended 434 7.6.7 Religious Politics? 447 Part 3 Aristotelian Action Research - Wisdom and Eudaimonia Transposed, Social Research Transformed 455 8. Neo-Epistemic, Dialogical Action Research 459 9. From Oikos to Pólis, and Beyond 467 10. Aristotle, Marx, and Modern Work Life 479 11. Aristotle Suspended 493 12. Epilogue 503 References 509 Appendix 525 Index 527