One word, two definitions: misunderstanding as the engine of disagreement

The terms that structure debate are old, they have served in very different contexts, and they have been claimed by opposing currents. Their ambiguity is not a defect of language, it is the residue of their history: each use has left a layer of meaning.

To this is added a phenomenon proper to political life. A word with a good reputation becomes a stake: it is more effective to claim it by redefining it than to oppose it. After a few decades, the same term denotes different things depending on who uses it.

Some words have even become undefinable from being so disputed. Their function is no longer to describe but to signal a belonging, and any attempt to make them precise is received as a manoeuvre.

The most reliable sign is sterility: the discussion goes round, each repeats their argument with more insistence, and nobody advances although both speakers are in good faith. A second sign is immediate agreement on concrete cases, while the disagreement reappears as soon as one returns to the general term.

The test is simple. Ask the other to give an example that falls under the word and an example that does not. If your two lists differ, the disagreement bears on the definition, and continuing to argue about substance will lead nowhere.

The first case is simple equivocation: two definitions coexist and each uses their own without knowing it. It is resolved by a clarification, and it is the easiest case.

The second is the contested definition: both speakers know the word is disputed and seek to impose their usage, because whoever defines the word has already won part of the debate. It is not resolved, but it can be named.

The third is the most insidious: the shift during the discussion, where a word is used in a broad sense to establish agreement, then in a narrow sense to draw a conclusion. It is a classic rhetorical device, and detectable as soon as one follows the examples rather than the words.

Clarifying a definition reconciles nobody: very often, the underlying disagreement reappears, but formulated on real and therefore debatable positions. That is the only progress available, and it is considerable compared with a discussion going round in circles.

It also happens that clarification reveals an agreement. Two people who thought themselves opposed may find that they were defending the same thing under two vocabularies, which is rare but frequent enough to justify starting there.

In an exchange that is bogging down, replace the contentious word with its description. Instead of discussing liberty, discuss what is forbidden, what is possible and who decides. The sentence becomes longer and the conversation becomes useful again.

This replacement has an interesting side effect: it often reveals that one of the speakers cares about the word more than about the thing. That is information, and it explains the rest of the discussion better than any argument.