Exhibition opening ‚Populist argumentation: a wooden iron?‘ in the state parliament of North Rhine-Westphalia
On March 10th, 2020, Michael Angenendt from Institute for German and International Party Law and Party Research (PRuF) and Julian Pöhling from Institute for Philosophy of Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf opened the exhibition ‚Populist argumentation: a wooden iron? Philosophic and political science perspectives‘. The exhibition represents the completion of the eponymous teaching/research project in winter semester 2019/20. The project is linked to the degree program Philosophy, Politics and Economics and is financially supported by Heinrich Heine University. It is addressed at students, politicians, and interested citizens and is therefore aiming to promote the exchange between science, politics and society. Furthermore, the project represents an attempt to raise awareness of the harm of populist rhetoric for public discourse and intends to strengthen argumentative skills within society to empower one to argue with populists. The widespread use of argumentative skills within the population should create claims for the political discourse which lead to an improved debating culture as well as to an improved political climate in its entirety.
The project includes a lecture series which took place in Heinrich Heine Institute and VHS Düsseldorf, an accompanying seminar for students and interested citizens, a panel discussion on the consequences of populism for the public discourse such as a workshop together with the exhibition of the workshop‘s results.
Political scientist Michael Angenendt says: ‚The students created a catalogue of actions for good argumentation based on case examples. They then drew up a model which implements these rules of action in society. As project managers in this final phase we focused mainly on supporting the students when in doubt, giving them the opportunity to rehearse their presentations as part of the workshop and helping them present their results on posters. Therefore it is the student’s exhibition they can be very proud of‘.
Additional information about the project is available on https://streitgespraeche.wordpress.com
