Finessing a Medical Expert’s Qualifications: From Professional Communities’ Boundaries to Personal Character

This article examines the kinds of arguments that can be made in debates regarding whether or not an expert is properly qualified to critique the work or opinions of another expert. Since these debates routinely occur in both legal and political arenas, a more fine-tuned sense of their argumentative dynamics can be fruitful for reasoning through them. This article is built around the analysis of a decision which concerned the admissibility of a physician’s testimony on the medical standard of care in a malpractice case. A detailed parsing of the arguments in that decision lays the groundwork for a theoretical discussion in which broader themes relating to experts’ qualifications are drawn out. The discussion focuses on two elements present in the decision, which can serve to buttress an expert’s claim to being properly qualified: community belonging and personal character.