ABSTRACT
Chapter 5 is the first of two empirical chapters that substantiate and buttress the conceptualisation of phronesis. Fieldwork interviews, while undertaken before its conceptual development, were substantially deepened when analysed through the lens of practical wisdom or phronesis. Chapter 5 uses the data from the interviews to demonstrate how practitioners use phronesis in their everyday practice and provides examples of how lived experience (phronesis) is prioritised over theory (episteme) or technique (techne) as a primary epistemology of practice. This chapter also illustrates how practitioners used each of the five dimensions of phronetic knowledge for decision-making and ‘reading’ local conflict contexts. Explicitly named by practitioners and demonstrated implicitly in interview analysis, 27 of 40 (67%) interviewees made 72 references to ‘context’ and prioritised its important to practice. This chapter also demonstrates how phronetic knowledge is used as a means of ensuring ownership, maximising relevancy, and was considered necessary for creating local impact.
