Does reason advance democratic values, or is it a manifestation of the will to power, used by elites to justify coercion? Eugene Garver seeks a middle way through this question by claiming that certain uses of reason oppress, but others do not. Practical reason can build democratic community, but only if it is carefully delineated from manipulative sophistry and an excessively theoretical reason that seeks logical rigor to the detriment of decent practices. Garver makes rhetoric a central case of practical reason to argue his point. This is understandable, given his previous work on Aristotelian rhetoric and the history of prudence.

The author begins by taking issue with the assumption that the paradigm of rationality is disinterested bargaining between strangers. Using the example of the South African Truth Commission, he argues that embedding practical reason in political forms of friendship allows it to be sensitive to context and to build an ethos for an ethical community. How do we know we are not being manipulated into agreement for the sake of “ethical community”? Garver argues for a distinction between rational and sophistic uses of rhetoric. In contrast to the sophistry that manipulates, rational rhetoric constitutes an ethical community by offering arguments. He then explores how Brown v. Board of Education is a paradigm of practical reasoning. For Garver, the Warren Court faced a kind of impasse: It could find neither historical nor constitutional justifications for overturning Plessy. So it enunciated an ethical principle instead. Brown was an instance of epideictic rhetoric, for it urged citizens to recognize equality and antidiscrimination as fundamental American values. It thus evoked a kind of political friendship. Further, its use of practical reason was “ampliative.” That is, the Court's argument generated an ethos, but the implications of that ethos exceeded its argument. This ethos led not merely to the overturning of antimiscegenation laws and other forms of discrimination. Its ethical force also led Americans to see equality in terms of ending discrimination, profoundly transforming constitutional doctrine on sexuality, the disabled, and religious freedom (85).

Garver then argues that practical reasoning can be the subject of ethical judgment; we are not being illogical when we engage in ethical reasoning. Given his account of the proper uses of rhetoric, he must also be able to show how an authority in a democracy can legitimately employ arguments to construct an ethical ethos for the community. He distinguishes authority and force by revisiting Brown. In this case, the Court's authority derives from the force of its argument, not from precedent or history. In the kind of community to which Brown aspires, trust is central. Trust can be rational because it flows from the kind of ethical ethos that practical reason constructs. Garver next argues that his conception of practical reason can illuminate pluralism. Modern democratic communities are organized around “plural ultimate values” (p. 11). In turn, there are plural legitimate modes of interpreting the Constitution, and these pluralisms are responsible ways of thinking through ethical arguments.

In the conclusion, Garver glosses a host of problems: the relationship of philosophy to practical reason, Richard Rorty's critique of philosophy, the unity of practical reason, whether modern science is a model for democracy, human nature, the death of metaphysics, and Dewey's pragmatism. His most important point is that metaphysical arguments about human nature cannot provide a model for practical reasoning because human essence is not fixed. Human nature is open-ended because it is historically conditioned. This liberates practical reason, for it can be conceived as autonomous from philosophy and human nature. This allows it to deliberate about our ends and the plural sources of values that inform those ends. Needless to say, Garver's argument is dense, complex, and wide-ranging. My sketch does not do it justice.

I have two questions. First, what are the implications of Garver's account of rhetoric and practical reason? Aristotle argues that these are distinct, though related, phenomena: Practical reason is a virtue (arête) and rhetoric is a technique (techne). By contrast, Garver holds that rhetoric and practical reasoning are abilities or powers (pp. 163, 198) that can be used to construct a community's ethos. Perhaps he abandons Aristotle's account because he wants to make rhetoric a paradigmatic instance of practical reason. Yet this may make it more difficult to fulfill a central aim of the book—to argue that there is a difference between rational and sophistic rhetoric. The relationship among ability, virtue, and technique is far too large an issue to pursue here. But we could get a sense of the stakes involved by asking what would happen if we rejected the notion that, say, honesty is a virtue. What if we thought honesty were a kind of power that could be used in a plurality of legitimate ways to construct a community's ethos or an individual's open-ended identity? Would we be more or less likely to treat assertions of honesty as expressions of interest? In the end, Garver thinks of his account as a modification of pragmatism—as aiming at agreement rather than truth, and as pointing to plural sources of value. So he might not be discomfited to speak of a plurality of honesties or practical reasonings. But his claim that rhetoric and practical reasoning are powers or abilities may mean that his account lies closer to the spirit of some of the ancient sophists than he wants to admit. After all, many of them rejected the distinction between virtue and power.

Second, in a book defending reason from the accusation that it justifies power, it is important to ask whether Garver's account avoids that charge. In the conclusion of For the Sake of Argument, he says that metaphysical conceptions of human nature and freedom must be abandoned to allow an autonomous practical reason room to deliberate about our ends. This is ethical progress, because “forcing us to abandon the language of nature and choice and adopt the language of due process and equal protection forces us into an argumentative community” (p. 171). However, Garver never argues that human nature in an untenable concept; he simply asserts it (pp. 190–91). Perhaps he assumes that his academic audience will take for granted the death of metaphysics and of human nature. Yet these are claims, not arguments. How can forcing someone to abandon a deeply held conviction without giving any reasons either construct an argumentative community or be considered ethical progress? Further, the assertion that there is no human nature will determine which arguments are considered rational and which are not. Those basing their political policies on conceptions of human dignity, on philosophical conceptions of freedom, on religious affiliations, or on traditions of various kinds may find it hard to get a hearing in Garver's ethical community. It might be understandable if those whose deepest convictions are dismissed as irrational without philosophical argument interpret the account of practical reason that leads to this exclusion as an expression of power.