Living a reflective life. A thought experiment on the foundations of professional practice.

Abstract

Reflection is a phenomenon that has received widespread interest within different domains, including research of professional practice and organizational life, and that is often mounted as a supplier of epistemological, methodological, or normative ideals, as it has been associated with deep and systematic thinking, ethical conduct, or the transformation of social conditions. At that, a plethora of rival conceptions of the phenomenon exist, and these conceptions are often distinguished by the drawing of arbitrary definitory lines as motivated by the respective scholar’s personal metatheoretical concerns. In this work, I develop a conceptual account of reflection and critical reflection to provide a fundamental critique of existing conceptions and to inquire into the normative potential of reflection. Drawing from phenomenology and analytical philosophy, I define reflection as ‘thematizing one’s own attitudes’ and distinguish it from deliberation, making it possible to compare and locate the specific forms of reflection scholars have in mind when they conceive of the phenomenon as a goal-oriented pursuit of coherent justified beliefs and intentions within a larger spectrum that equally includes biased, convoluted, and incoherent ways to reflect. Besides the distinction between reflection and deliberation, I suggest that the phenomenon of reflecting on one’s life – thematizing how one experiences the world at large qua the holistic context of one’s attitudes – provides the key to understanding the motivational dynamics and interrelations between different forms of reflection. By extending these conceptual developments to encompass the social dynamics of different forms of reflection, I inquire into the foundations of professional practice within contemporary organizational life. Specifically, I raise the question of what it would mean to live a reflective life, both individually and collectively, and how this social ideal relates to the reality of institutional life partitioned into the spheres of the private and the professional. As a result, I suggest that reflection is misunderstood if it is taken as a provider of justified attitudes, theoretical orientations, or life conceptions. Instead, the normative merit of critical reflection lies in making normative conversation possible, making its actualization essential for cooperation within free societies.