Explicitness vs. implicitness of argumentation: An intercultural comparison

Explicitness vs. implicitness of argumentation:An intercultural comparison1

SONJA TIRKKONEN-CONDIT

Abstract

This paper compares the styles of argumentation in American, British,and Finnish editorials with a focus on how explicitly the arguable isexpressed. Previous research suggested greater implicitness in Finnishargumentation, and the difference was attributed to the tendenciestowards concensus, context-dependence, and communicationreticence in Finnish society. In this paper two hypotheses areinvestigated, a global cross-cultural one and a topic-specific one,namely that Finnish argumentation is less explicit, and that 'safe'topics are more likely to elicit explicitness than 'touchy' topics.Indicators of explicitness include clarity of thesis Statement,.expression of anticipated disagreement, and expression of response inthe heading. The most marked difference was found in the clarity ofthesis Statement. Whereas the Anglo-American writers crystallize themain point of the argument into a thesis summary irrespective oftouchiness of topic, the Finns seem to use the absence of thesissummary äs some kind of politeness strategy to mitigate the messageof potential disagreement - which, however, inevitably goes togetherwith argumentation.

1. Background and purpose of the study

The starting point for this paper is the hypothesis that there are differences inFinnish and Anglo-American argumentation styles, especially äs regardsexplicitness, i.e., how explicitly disagreement, which is the 'raison d'etre' ofargumentation, is expressed in the text. The material of the study consists ofeditorials from newspapers and Journals with different political and ideologi -cal backgrounds. In linguistically based text typologies such äs Werlich(1976), editorials are classified äs belonging to the argumentative text type,and editorials were chosen äs representatives of public argumentation.Multilingua 15-3 (1996), 257-273 0167-8507/96/0015-0257

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258 5. Tirkkonen-Condit

In Finland argumentation is not valued in the way it is valued in Britain orin America, where argumentation is taught at school and where there aretextbooks on argumentation. Essay writing in Finnish schools has tradition-ally focused on expository writing in which the main emphasis is on richnessof facts, but which does not call for the writer to take a stand or to argue for aviewpoint in relation to the facts.

There is also research on Finnish conversation which suggests that Finnishculture may be a communication-reticent culture, in which silence is valuedor at least tolerated to a greater extent than, say, in English-speaking cultures(see Sallinen-Kuparinen 1986 and Lehtonen and Sajavaara 1985). In a com-munication-reticent culture, expression of disagreement is probably feit to beeven more face-threatening (see Brown and Levinson 1987) and even moredispreferred äs a speech act than in those cultures in which talking äs such isvalued. Consequently, in a communication-reticent culture, there will be agreater tendency to refrain frorn the face-threatening act altogether. Since the'raison d'etre' of argumentation, however, is disagreement, either expressedor anticipated, refraining frorn the expression of disagreement automaticallyresults in a reduction in the amount of argumentation.

It has also been suggested (Widen 1985) that Finnish culture manifests atendency towards context dependence, a feature which is said to prevail inJapanese discourse culture (see Hall 1979 and McCagg this volume). Contextdependence in written discourse means that the writer expects the readers toknow him/her and his/her Status so well that they do not need explicitargumentation in order to believe what s/he has to say. In a context-dependent culture, the value of a text or an opinion depends on who presentsthem rather than on the factual validity of argumentation. An opinion isweighed according to the Speaker's or writer's acknowledged Status. In sucha culture, therefore, argumentation adhominem will be necessary and suffi-cient. Context-dependence will result in implicitness or lack of argumenta-tion proper. There will be no need to highlight and to explicitly argue for thearguable.

Furthermore, Finnish society has been permeated by a wide-spread con-sensus in party politics äs well äs industrial relations for the last thirty years.The country has been ruled by coalition governments, in which the Socialistparties have joined forces with the Center Party and the Liberais to form thegovernment. The latest government was formed by the Social Democrats andthe Conservatives. Income policy has been typically governed by collectiveagreements between the major trade unions and employers' organizations,and there have been no major labour market conflicts. An exception to thepursuit of consensus in Finnish society has been the public political discus-sion about Finland's decision to join the EU in 1995. Even though the majorpolitical parties were officially in favor of EU membership, there was

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Explicitness vs. implicitness of argumentation 259

considerable disagreement especially among the members of the CenterParty and the Social Democrats. The major national newspapers, however,suppressed the critical voices. This was most conspicuous on the editorialpages of the Helsingin Sanomat (see Tirkkonen-Condit 1994). Consensusand authoritarian values tend to go together.

One method of identifying relative tendencies toward consensus andcontext dependence is to compare styles of public argumentation cross-culturally. The general atmosphere of consensus in Finland has beenreflected in the editorials; the largest national newspaper, the HelsinginSanomat, has adopted an explicit editorial policy of not disrupting theatmosphere of consensus (Keijo Kulha, editor-in-chief; personal commu-nication2). All these factors, i.e., the tendencies towards communication-reticence and context-dependence and the valuation of consensus rather thanargumentation, make it seem plausible that Finnish argumentation styles andpractices are somewhat different from Anglo-American ones.

The purpose of the present study was to find out whether there were differ-ences in the argumentation styles of Finnish and Anglo-American editorialsand if so, whether the differences might be traced back to some additional,more specific factors than merely global cultural differences. One needs toavoid explaining all Variation by crosscultural differences.

Results from my previous research (reported in Tirkkonen-Condit 1987 and1988) show that Finnish argumentation practices, äs they appear in editorials,cannot be combined together into one homogeneous whole about which gen-eralizations can be made en masse when cqmpared with British or Americanargumentation. Instead, argumentation styles in the Finnish editorials seemedto vary according to a more specifically defined 'culture': the explicitness inargumentation depended on whether the paper represented an Oppositionparty or a party in office, whether it had a Status äs a major national paper oräs a regional paper; äs a quality paper or äs a tabloid paper.

It seemed justified, however, to continue to look for the global culturaldifferences. It seemed reasonable to hypothesize that a culture in which talk-ing in general and argumentation in particular is highly valued woulddevelop a tradition of expressing disagreement in a more sophisticated andexplicit manner than a communication-reticent culture. Texts from a'communicative' culture would manifest more such expressions which showthat the writer takes explicit account of the antagonist(s) and the other partiesinvolved in public argumentation. Another aspect of further study seemednecessary, namely the relation between topic and argumentation style. Itseemed that some topics were 'safer' than others, and that this affected theargumentation style.

In this paper I shall examine the ways in which the topic of the editorialaffects explicitness in argumentation. It is hypothesized that there is more



260 S. Tirkkonen-Condit

explicitness in argumentation, when the topic is 'safe' in the sense that thewriter does not have to worry about the possibility that s/he might offend animportant section of the readership by expressing an arguable view about it.A safe topic is such that the writer can expect at least a majority of theimportant readers, i.e., subscribers and proponents of the paper's politicalPosition, to agree with what s/he has to say. This is a topic on which thewriter anticipates sharing a view with the important readers, against acommon antagonist. A touchy topic, in contrast, is a topic about which thewriter does not know whether the important readers will share his/her view,and one where the antagonist(s) are not readily identifiable. As regards atouchy topic, the writer does not know whether there may be importantreaders also among the ranks of the antagonist(s). Since explicitness ofargumentation is the object of interest here, it will have to be defined. Thepurpose of the next section is to define the notion of explicitness äs it is usedin this paper.

2. Indicators of explicitness

The identification of explicitness is based on the following indicators:1. presence or absence of thesis summary2. expression of anticipated disagreement3. expression of partial agreement4. frequency of response headingsThe material of the present study was analyzed by means of these indicatorsof explicitness.

The choice of the indicators is based on the idea that argumentation takesplace in response to anticipated or expressed disagreement (see, e.g., Jacobs1987 and Jackson 1987). In a written text an argumentative passage mani-fests a rhetorical pattern in which theses are accompanied by justification orevidence. The theses are those propositions on which the writer anticipatesdisagreement and therefore produces justification or evidence in their sup-port. If there are no such passages in the text, the text is not argumentative atall. The linguistic signalling of the rhetorical pattern of argumentation variesfrom one text to another, and the present analysis aims at its identification.The analysis aims at focusing attention to the core of argumentation, i.e., tothe ways in which the editorial writers signal their main thesis and theirresponse to potential disagreement or antagonism. The indicators of explicit-ness were chosen with this focus in mind. Each of the indicators will beintroduced in what follows.




2. l Presence or absence ofthesis summary

A thesis summary is a sentence or a longer passage of text which summarizesthe major theses or opinions argued for in the text. It expresses the mainpoint of the text at a more general level than the other theses presented in thetext (cf. Tomlin 1985). The thesis expressed in the thesis summary is entaüedby the other theses, äs in Example (1) the opinion expressed in (a) is entailedby (b) and (c):

(1) a. Exactly identical tax rates charged by all local authorities can neverbe achieved, and this is not even desirable.

b. There is a risk of dangerous biases, if government subsidies areallocated on this basis.

c. The leveling-off of local tax rates would also be in conflict with theautonomy of local government.(Thesis summary and two other theses; translated from HelsinginSanomat, 9 January 1987. The core of the thesis is italicized.)

Entailment in this instance means that the idea of the undesirability ofidentical local tax rates is also present (entailed) in the more specific State-ments according to which these might cause dangerous biases and be in con-flict with local autonomy. The fact that the writer 'bothers' to gather themajor theses into a thesis summary contributes to explicitness, and the pres-ence of thesis summary is therefore coded äs an indicator of explicitness.

2.2 Expression of anticipated disagreement

This relates to the expression of anticipated or existing disagreement in re-spcct of the main point argued for in the article. Expressions of anticipateddisagreement were searched for in those editorials only in which a thesissummary was present. The idea was to identify those expressions which wereimportant in respect of the whole text. Therefore, only those expressions ofanticipated disagreement were coded which related to the main point of thetext, i.e., to the point also present in the thesis summary. Since disagreementis the core of argumentation, expressions of anticipated disagreement werecoded äs indicators of explicitness.

Anticipation of disagreement can be expressed by explicit reference to theantagonists, by means of impersonal reference to the antagonists, or bymeans of implicature or presupposition. A frequent device is to convey thisby means of implicit denial äs defined by Tottie (1981 and 1982) and äsillustrated in Example (2). The editorial writer here Signals his anticipationthat at least some readers may disagree with his view that the survey of




public Services might turn out useful. The implicature conveyed by theimplicit denial is that there are those who think that the survey was futile.Justification for the writer's own view is presented in the /f-clause:

(2) The survey made of the images evoked by public Services teils usroughly what we expected. People think that public Services are morerigid than private Services. ... The survey is not futile, however, if itcontributes to improving public Services.(Translated from Suomen Kuvalehti 8 April 1988. The implicit denialis italicized.)

In example (3) anticipation of disagreement is expressed by impersonalreference to the antagonists. The antagonists are not identified, and instead,their views are referred to äs 'innuendoes':

(3) The limited nature of the debate suggests that Managua's stock isfalling fast in the U.S. But innuendoes aimed at Vice President Bush,the CIA, the National Security Agency and groups sympathetic to thecontras deserve comment.(Wall Street Journal 16 October 1986. The impersonal reference isitalicized.)

2.3 Expression ofpartial agreement

One of the polite strategies of carrying out the face-threatening act ofexpressing disagreement with the interlocutor is partial agreement (seeBrown and Levinson 1987: 113-117). Pomeranz (1984) has identified thesestrategies in spontaneous conversations in response to assessments andevaluations. She shows that a preferred response to an assessment isagreement. Disagreement is produced with a delay, with various kinds ofjustifications and is often prefaced with expressions of agreement. Mulkay(1985) has studied scientists' letters written in response to a proposal andidentified the same kind of partial or token agreements äs prefaces todisagreement in virtually all instances of disagreement. Agreements, incontrast, were produced straightaway, without prefaces. In the editorialsanalyzed for the present study, partial agreement with the antagonist(s) wassearched for in those editorials only in which a thesis summary was present.Only those partial agreements were coded which related to the main point ofthe text, i.e., to the point also present in the thesis summary. Since partialagreement is another device of showing awareness of the antagonists, it ishere regarded äs an indicator of explicitness.




Partial agreement can take a great variety of linguistic forms. There is onelinguistic feature, however, which is virtually always present when there ispartial agreement, namely a contrastive conjunction signalled by but,however, nevertheless, or some other contrastive connective. Examples (4),(5) and (6) will give an idea of how partial agreement may be expressed:

(4) The House bill in fact recognizes the need for many more workers.There would be an amnesty for aliens who have worked in the U.S.continuously since 1982. Under pressure from California growers,Congress would also give temporary legal Status to up to 350,000 farmworkers. But only about 15 % of the illegals work on the farms. Thereis also a huge demand for industrial workers.(Wall Street Journal 13 October 1986. Partial agreement is italicized.)

The main point of the article is to criticize the newest Immigration bill, the'House bill' referred to. This passage is taken from the middle of the article,and the criticism has been voiced at the very Start and continues throughoutthe article. The only item of partial agreement is the one shown above in ex-ample (4) before the connective but. The item on which the writer agreeswith the House of Representatives who passed the criticized bill is that itrecognizes the need for more workers and that it gives legal Status to 350,000farm workers. What follows after the connective but is further criticism ofthe bill.

(5) If there is any complaint to be made, it is that U.S. efforts on behalf ofthe contras come very late. Indeed, they continue to be delayed.(Wall Street Journal 16 October 1986)

Here the point of the argument is to support contemporary U.S. policies inNicaragua, including aid to the contras, and the above passage is a partialagreement; however, it is not a concession to the real antagonists but to thosewho think that the U.S. should be even more deeply involved in Nicaragua.In this case there is no contrastive connective present.

(6) No doubt there are intellectually coherent Thatcherite answers toHeseltine's arguments. But if so they are not being made. It is anindication of the barrenness of open intellectual debate in the upperreaches of the Conservative Party at the moment that Nicholas Ridley'sresponse to Heseltine seems largely to consist of a petulant 'well, youdidn't do any different when you were in office, did you?'(New Society 15 April 1988. Partial agreement is italicized.)

This article reports favorably on Michael Heseltine's Speech and accusesthe Conservatives for ignoring his criticism directed against their environ-mental and regional policies. The above passage is a good example of token




agreement with the Thatcherites', i.e., the Conservatives. It is an ironicalrather than a serious expression of agreement.

2.4 Frequency ofresponse headings

The headings are roughly divided into two categories, topic headings and re-sponse headings. Topic headings relate to the topic of the article only,whereas response headings relate to the position which the writer takes to thetopic. A response heading either reveals the main point of the argument orhints at it. It therefore contributes to explicitness, and is coded äs an indicatorof explicitness. A decision on whether a particular heading is to be coded äsa topic heading or äs a response heading often cannot be made without read-ing the whole article. A heading which looks like a response heading mayturn out to be a topic heading. For instance the heading from New Society inexample (7), out of context, looks like a response heading, because it con-tains evaluative elements:

(7) Errors of anti-racism (New Society 6 May 1988)

The editorial deals with a report which points out errors of anti-raciststrategies, and the writer argues for an opinion that this is a report which theanti-racist policy makers will have to take seriously. His response, then, doesnot focus on the 'errors' (these are pointed out in the report and are assumedto be well known to the readers already) but on the expected reactions of theanti-racist policy makers to the report. Similar instances are the followingheadings, also from New Society, which cannot be coded äs topic headingswithout reading the entire text:

(8) Classy soap (New Society 8 April 1988)

(9) The threat of AIDS (New Society l April 1988)

On the other hand, there are headings which can be rated äs topic headingseven without reading the text. Such headings are, for instance, those given inexamples (10) and (11):

(10) Homecomings (Wall Street Journal 13 October 1986)

(11) Europe vs. Arms Control (Wall Street Journal 24 October 1986)

Similarly, there are straightforward instances ofresponse headings such ästhose given in examples (12) and (13):

(12) Pay is not enough (New Society 29 April 1988)

(13) Congressional Negligence (Wall Street Journal 15 October 1986)




The papers and Journals used in the research of global cross-culturaldifferences were The Observer, The New York Times, New Society, WallStreet Journal, Helsingin Sanomat, Kansan Uutiset, Keskisuomalainen, andSuomen Kuvalehti. Thirty editorials of each of these were analysed, exceptfor Helsingin Sanomat and Keskisuomalainen, where there were two subsetsof thirty.

3. Results

The findings showed that the presence of thesis summary was clearly adividing feature between Anglo-American and Finnish editorials. The resultsof this comparison are shown in Table 1.

Table l. Presence of thesis summary in Finnish vs. Anglo-American editorials

The ObserverNew SocietyThe New York TimesWall Street JournalHelsingin Sanomat IHelsingin Sanomat IIKansan UutisetKeskisuomalainen ΓKeskisuomalainen IISuomen Kuvalehti

27/3028/3028/3028/3016/3021/3024/3019/3018/3018/30

90%93%93%93%53%70%80%63%60%60%

Table l shows that in the British and American editorials, there is thesissummary in more than 90% of the cases, whereas in the Finnish editorials thepercentage varies between 80 and 53, and that there is only one paper,Kansan Uutiset, which reaches 80 percent, whereas all the other papers showpercentages between 53 and 70.

For the second part of the analysis, i.e., the analysis of how the topicaffects explicitness of argumentation, the following papers were underreview: Wall Street Journal and New Society on the Anglo-American sideand Helsingin Sanomat, Keskisuomalainen, and Suomen Kuvalehti on theFinnish side.

When the editorials were analyzed according to topic, the presence ofthesis summary turned out to be an interesting indicator of differences withinthe Finnish material. Since thesis summary was present in virtually all Britishand American editorials, its presence was not a potentially differentiating




factor in their analysis. Instead, the other indicators, i.e., expression ofanticipated disagreement in relation to the point of the thesis summary,partial agreement with the antagonist(s), and frequency of response headings,were applicable to the analysis of Finnish and Anglo-American material. Inwhat follows, each of the papers and Journals included in the analysis will bediscussed with respect to the topics of the editorials.

3.1 Keskisuomalainen

Keskisuomalainen is a major regional paper which appears in Jyväskylä andwhich has a close affiliation to the Center Party. Two sets of editorials wereanalyzed to test the hypothesis that the paper's argumentation style mightchange, when the party which it represents ceases to be a government party.After being in government for most of the postwar period, the Center Partyhad to adopt the role of an Opposition party after the general election in theautumn of 1987. It was hypothesized that the editorials of Keskisuomalainenwould become more explicitly argumentative after this shift in the politicalset-up. The first set of thirty editorials, the 'pre-opposition' editorials, arefrom subsequent issues of 21 February to 13 March 1987 and the second set,the Opposition' material, from subsequent issues of 28 January to 10February and 13 to 16 June, 1988.

The topics discussed in the editorials are divided into (1) domestic politics;(2) other domestic issues; (3) local issues, and (4) world politics and otherforeign issues. Among these, safe topics seem to be other domestic issues,which are discussed in nine out of thirty in the 'pre-opposition' editorials andin one out of thirty in the Opposition' editorials. The topics ränge from theInternational Women's Day to the lessons 'learned' at the Oberstdorf WinterOlympic Games, the Operation queues at hospital doors and the Status of theprinted word. The indicators which point to the safety of this topic are thepresence of thesis summary in nine out of the combined ten instances, ex-plicit expression of anticipated disagreement in five instances, and partialagreement in four instances out of ten.

A politically sensitive topic, within which a comparison between the pre-opposition and the Opposition material is meaningful is legislation. There areeight editorials about this topic in the pre-opposition material äs against thir-teen in the Opposition material. The results of the comparison are summa-rized in Table 2.

There are two indicators which mark out the Opposition editorials äs moreexplicit, namely the presence of thesis summary in 70% vs. 50% of all in-stances and the proportion of response headings of 100% vs 37%. The Oppo-sition Status seems to bring a marked change in the paper's argumentation:




the area where most explicit argumentation is pursued shifts from a politi-cally neutral area to a politically sensitive area.Table 2. Explicitness in the pre-opposition vs. Opposition editorials of Keski-

suomalainen within the topic of legislation

Number of editorials onlegislationThesis summary presentExpression ofdisagreementPartial agreementResponse heading

Pre-opposition editorials8/30

4/8 = 50%2/8 = 25%

3/8 = 37%3/8 = 37%

Opposition editorials13/30

9/13 = 70%4/13 = 33%

5/13 = 38%13/13 = 100%

Touchy topics in Keskisuomalainen are local issues äs well äs world poli-tics and other foreign issues, both of which seem to be nonsensitive to thepre-opposition vs. Opposition Status. In local issues, there is a thesis summaryin only two instances out of seven and no expression of disagreement. Inaddition, there is a response heading in only three instances out of seven. Thefindings suggest that in local issues, a regional paper must adjust its views toa greater variety of interests than in the more remote domestic issues. Hencethe relative touchiness vs. safety of these topics.

To summarize, the main findings from the regional paperKeskisuomalainen are that its argumentation about local issues is implicit andthat its argumentation about legislation becomes more explicit when itsfavored party is in Opposition.

3.2 Helsingin Sanomat

Helsingin Sanomat is the largest Finnish newspaper with a nationwide circu-lation; it is independent of political parties and it represents liberal and rela-tively progressive views. It is considered to be an excellent quality paper, andit also has a position äs a local paper for the greater Helsinki area. The firstsubset of thirty editorials were from subsequent issues from the periodbetween 6 and 16 January 1987 and the second subset from the periodbetween 11 and 20 May 1995. Helsingin Sanomat keeps a critical eye on thegovernment irrespective of its political colour. Not surprisingly, the safesttopics for Helsingin Sanomat in both periods were domestic politics andother domestic issues.

The safety of domestic politics was reflected in the four indicators: therewere thesis summaries and expressions of anticipated disagree'ment in fourout of five instances in 1987 and in five out of six in 1995. Partial agreementappeared in three out of five in 1987 äs against zero out of six in 1995;




response headings appeared in five out of five in 1987 äs against three out ofsix in 1995. The fact, however, that there are only five editorials in 1987 andsix in 1995 dealing with domestic politics, can be seen äs a sign of consen-sus-awareness mentioned earlier.

In other domestic issues (ranging from cheap flights to London, FinnishRail and Communications, to the reliability of economic forecasts and thephilosophical foundations of modern Finnish civilization in 1987, and fromthe power of trade unions, the public control of insurance companies, thecures to economic depression and unemployment, Job satisfaction andpension Systems, to postgraduale education and the ecumenical movement in1995), thesis summaries appeared in seven instances out of eleven in 1987and in eight out of eleven in 1995. Anticipation of disagreement appears infive out of eleven in 1987 and in three out of eleven in 1995. The touchytopics were, äs in the instance of Keskisuomalainen, local issues äs well äsworld politics and foreign issues. This applies similarly to the 1987 and 1995subsets. Thus in 1995 world politics and foreign issues had response head-ings in only two out of nine instances and thesis summaries in five out ofnine instances.

The editorials in Helsingin Sanomat contain fewer thesis summaries thanthe other papers in the Finnish sample, äs Table l shows. Furthermore, it isinteresting to note that in three editorials in 1987 and in five in 1995 there isno argumentation, i.e., there are no theses argued at all. This also points tothe role which the paper has adopted in the maintenance of consensus.

3.3 Suomen Kuvalehti

Suomen Kuvalehti is an respected weekly Journal with a nationwide circula-tion. It is independent of political parties, but its views are closest to those ofthe Conservatives. Eighty percent of its topics dealt with domestic politicsand other domestic matters. The analyzed editorials were from successiveissues between 31 October 1987 and 17 June 1988, when the ConservativeParty was in office. Domestic politics, therefore, was a touchy topic, andthere was a clear difference in comparison with the treatment of other domes-tic issues, which was a safe area. The touchiness versus safety of these topicswas reflected by two indicators: the presence of thesis summary andexpression of anticipated disagreement, äs shown by Table 3.

The position of Suomen Kuvalehti with respect to domestic politics is iden-tical with Keskisuomalainen in its pre-opposition material. It seems thatwhen the favored party is in office, domestic politics becomes a touchy area.To summarize, Suomen KuvalehtVs argumentation was most implicit in its




editorials on clomestic politics; this was a touchy topic at a time when thefavored party, the Conservatives, were in office.

Table 3. Explicitness in the treatment of domestic politics versus other domesticissues in Suomen Kuvalehti

Presence of thesis sum - Expression of disagree -mary ment

Domestic politicsOther domestic issuesForeign issues andforeign policyTotal

6/13 = 46%9/11 = 81%3/6 = 50%

18/30 = 60%

0/13 = 0%6/11=55%

1/6 = 17%

7/30 = 23%

3.4 New Society

New Society was a British weekly Journal with relatively radical leftist views.The Journal was merged into The New Statesman in 1988, and the materialfor this study was taken from the last issues of New Society, between 11March and 20 May, 1988. New Society functioned äs an alert critic to what-ever government was in office. During the Thatcher government New Societyhad a lot to criticize, particularly in the area of social policy. In the presentmaterial, accordingly, the safest topic was domestic politics; within thistopic, the majority of editorials were aimed at criticizing the government.The. other major topic.was .other dornestic issues, such as.unio.ns, televisionprograms and Northern Ireland. There were only two articles dealing withforeign issues. The relative safety of domestic politics versus touchiness ofother domestic issues is shown by Table 4. The clearest indicator of thedifference is the expression of anticipated disagreement. Summarizing, sinceNew Society was a left-wing Journal, it feit free to criticize Thatcher'sgovernment; for it the safe topic was domestic politics and that was where itsargumentation was most explicit.

Table 4. Explicitness in the treatment of domestic politics versus other domesticissues in New Society

Expression of anticipated Frequency of responsedisagreement headings

Domestic politicsOther domestic issuesForeign issues

Total

11/19 = 58%2/9 = 22%0/2 = 0%

13/30 = 43%

16/19 = 84%7/9 =78%2/2 = 100%

25/30 = 83%




3.5 The Wall Street Journal

The Wall Street Journal is a conservative right-wing paper whose editorialspursue the interests of big business. The Reagan administration handled mostof domestic policy matters in a way which pleased the paper, and much oftheir editorial writing was in defence of the government. The material wascollected from issues between 13 and 31 October 1986, i.e., during the periodwhen America's foreign policy was more anti-Soviet and anti-detente than itwas during the last few months of the Reagan administration.

Three topic areas were identified: domestic politics plus other domesticissues; foreign policy, and foreign issues. The safest topic was foreign policy,which was marked out by the expression of anticipated disagreement. As isshown by Table 5, the other indicators did not discriminate between thetopics. There was one thing, however, which singled out The Wall StreetJournal from the rest of the material, and it was the overall frequency of theindicators of explicitness äs defined in the present study. This points to thesecurity which this paper feit about its argumentative position. The editorialwriters knew who their protagonists and antagonists were, and they knewtheir respective views even on ideologically delicate matters. Thus theirargumentation even on domestic politics was explicit in spite of the fact thattheir favored party was in office.

Table 5. Explicitness across the topics in Wall Street Journal

Domesticpolitics and otherdomestic issuesForeign policyForeign issuesTotal

Expression ofdisagreement7/16 =44%

6/8 = 75%4/6 = 66%

17/30 = 56%

Partial agreement

9/16 = 56%

4/8 = 50%2/6 = 33%

15/30 = 50%

Frequency ofresponse headings14/16 = 87%

5/8 = 62%3/6 = 50%

22/30= 73%

4. Conclusion

When we consider the possible global cultural differences between Finnishversus Anglo-American argumentation styles, there is one indicator, in par-ticular, which seems to support the implicitness hypothesis, and that is thepresence of thesis summary. The Finnish editorials, whether taken overall, incomparison with Anglo-American editorials, or taken by topic, seem to 'use'absence of thesis summary äs a politeness strategy. The absence of thesissummary is conspicuous in Helsingin Sanomat and Suomen Kuvalehti, whichare both highly respected and whose readership is politically varied. The




same kind of 'politeness strategy' was not found in the research of TheObserver or The New York Times, although their journalistic and politicalStatus äs quality papers representing liberal views and enjoying a nation-widecirculation is somewhat similar.

Moreover, the fact that Helsingin Sanomat also uses editorials for non-argumentative purposes gives support to the hypothesis that Finns may beprone to refraining from the face-threatening Situation which argumentationnecessarily involves. It will also be remembered that Helsingin Sanomat, thepillar of consensus, had relatively few editorials on the politically sensitivetopic of domestic politics, i.e., the area where their argumentation was ex-plicit. On the other hand, Keskisuomalainen gave more room to domesticpolitics and became more explicit in that area in their Opposition' Status, i.e.,at a time when consensus was not necessarily in their interest any longer.

The figures concerning the expression of anticipated disagreement alsopoint in the same direction, i.e., in the direction that the Finns may be morereluctant to express disagreement in explicit terms. Partial agreement alsoseems to be more frequent in the Anglo-American material.

The hypothesis according to which explicitness in argumentation is sensi-tive to topic receives support from the present study. In all other materialexcept The Wall Street Journal it was possible to identify safe versus touchytopics, where relative explicitness could be identified by means of the indica-tors used. It was also possible to explain the safety or touchiness of the topicsby means of political or other considerations relating to the position or Statusof the paper in question.

As was pointed out earlier, political and ideological consensus is officiallyvalued in Finland and consciously maintained äs an editorial policy by theleading national newspaper. Such emphases may be the ultimate reasons forthe implicitness of argumentation discussed here. It is to be noted, however,that exaggerated emphasis on consensus may weaken rather than strengthen asociety in the long term. A society which suppresses criticism and genuineintellectual conilict is defenceless in the face of the real challenges of theoutside world. As has been argued by J. S. Mill (1984: 75-118; first pub-lished 1859), even the best of political aims must be subjected to a discussionwhich reveals their real value.

Finland äs a Community is particularly vulnerable to the underminingelements of ideological and political consensus. Its geographical, racial,linguistic, religious and cultural homogeneity, combined with authoritarianand communication-reticent tendencies, creates an easy ground forintolerance and prejudice at the level of the individual, and for chauvinismand opportunism at the level of the nation. Such challenges äs massunemployment, economic Integration, supranational mass culture,




environmental hazards, and political and economic upheavals in the formereastern block, cannot be faced, in the long run, with inertia and opportunism.

Although it is not within the aims or within the power of a linguistic studyto 'improve' the Community which it observes, it nevertheless has a role inpointing out and describing, in explicit terms, the intuitions that many peopleshare about abstract and evasive phenomena. The present study has beenconcerned with implicitness of argumentation and with its implications for aCommunity. It seems that in Finland implicitness is one aspect of consensus.Consensus, in the short run, may contribute to the maintenance of Commu-nity, but, in the long run, it may undermine its bases - its endurance in theface of intellectual, cultural, political and environmental challenges.

University ofJoensuu, Faculty ofArts,Savonlinna School of Translation

Notes

1. An earlier version of this paper was read at the Colloquium on 'The Role of Argument inthe Creation and Maintenance of Community', Venice 7-11 August, 1988.

2. This policy also affected the editorials of Helsingin Sanomat during the two periods whenthe material for this study was collected, i.e., January 1987 and May 1995.

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Explicitness vs. implicitness of argumentation: An intercultural comparison

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