How To Write More Clearly Than You Ever Have Before

Use the PASA framework to organize your ideas and deliver striking arguments

“It makes sense in my head, but I just can’t seem to express it clearly on paper!”

I can’t tell you how many times undergraduate students have said this to me over the years.

This problem—lack of clarity in writing—isn’t specific to students, though. It’s something with which many aspiring writers struggle.

Six years ago, I learned about a simple yet powerful framework for understanding, organizing, and writing about ideas that I now use every time I write.

During an eight-month-long graduate course, I had to write 12 six-to-ten-page analytical essays on academic books on topics like crime, education, governance, history, law, and politics.

Each paper had to explicitly identify and explain the corresponding book’s primary argument and subsidiary arguments.

The professor insisted each of the 12 texts featured one main argument that existed alongside, and was refined by, a set of secondary arguments.

As I read and wrote about each of the books, I continuously asked myself two questions:

1. What is the main argument here?
2. What supplemental arguments are being offered in support of the main argument?

Reading, thinking, and writing with these two questions at the forefront of my mind taught me how to make sense of and organize what I was learning about in the course.

Years later, I still use these two questions to not only filter other people’s work but also structure my own writing in a way that makes it intelligible for readers.

If you struggle to keep your ideas straight and to write in ways that other people can easily understand, the PASA framework is for you.

The PASA Framework

The PASA—primary argument versus secondary arguments—framework is based on the idea that the best (non-fiction) writing features

1. one strong, central argument
2. several supplemental arguments that support, refine, and extend the central argument.

The PASA framework allows you to express yourself clearly, coherently, and systematically, which is indispensable to effective writing.

Using the categories of major idea and secondary ideas to organize your thinking makes it possible to write in a focused, sensible, and ‘big picture’ way.

It does so because it forces you to continually justify what you’re writing by asking yourself why you’re writing it:

• Is this bit of text relevant to, or otherwise important for, my primary argument?
• If yes, how so?
• If no, what reason do I have to include it? [Hint: you should probably scrap it!]

This type of self-reflective thinking underlies the best kinds of writing, which is unsurprising given that writing is the externalization of thinking.

In order to write as clearly and persuasively as possible, ask yourself the following two questions every time you start clacking away on the keyboard:

1. What is the one defining idea I want to establish above all else?
2. How can I make the case for that idea in several different and compelling ways?

Your primary argument is your destination — e.g., Palm Springs.

Your secondary arguments are the stops along the way that ultimately allow you to reach your destination — e.g., gas stations (fuel), restaurants (food), and hotels (rest).

In the same way that a road trip has only a single final destination, a piece of writing has only one principal argument, i.e., one foundational set of claims that provide context to, and give justification for, all the other intellectual moves you make with your words.

As a writer, you must figure out your destination first and then, having established precisely where you want to go, work backwards in order to effectively plot out what you need to do to reach your endpoint successfully.

The most talented writers recognize how each element of a given bit of writing fits together in order to produce a coherent whole. Rather than getting endlessly lost in minute details, they can see the forest for the trees, as it were.

You, too, must develop this ability if you wish to separate yourself from merely average writers.

Let’s now take a look at the PASA framework in action.

The PASA Framework in Action: Cannabis Legalization

As a reminder, the PASA approach insists the best writing, from books and essays to newspaper articles and scholastic papers, features one central argument alongside a set of subsidiary arguments.

The subsidiary arguments support, flesh out, and guide the reader to and from the central argument, which reigns supreme, so to speak.

Let’s assume you want to write an essay or blog post on the following question:

Should the U.S. implement nationwide cannabis legalization — i.e., the licensed, regulated, ‘above ground’ production, distribution, and sale of cannabis for both medical and non-medical purposes?

The very first question you’d have to ask yourself is this:

• What will my basic answer to this question be?

If you were to argue, yes, the U.S. should introduce cannabis legalization at the federal level, you would then have to ask yourself this:

• What is the fundamental argument I want to establish? That is, what is the defining idea I want to make sure my audience understands after reading my paper?

In response to these questions, you could then outline your primary argument as follows:

• 1. Conclusion/Thesis: The U.S. should implement nationwide legalization of cannabis as soon as it’s reasonably and safely possible. Such a system should (1) permit consenting adults to legally purchase quality-controlled cannabis from licensed producers and sellers and (2) protect consenting adults against the threat of criminal punishment.
• 2. Premises: The federal government is economically (p1), legally (p2), morally (p3), and politically (p4) obligated to end the criminal prohibition against cannabis and to introduce a system of legal regulation.
• 3. Evidence: The presentation of various forms of data — statistics, case studies, governmental reports, publications by professional bodies, documented experiences in other countries — supporting the U.S.’ economic, legal, moral, and political obligations to end the criminalization of cannabis.

Collectively, these points would frame the central argument of your paper.

Every other aspect of your article would be devoted, in one way or another, to establishing the validity of, and to expanding and refining, this core argument.

With your final destination in mind, you’d then outline each of the secondary arguments you’d have to establish in order to fully explicate your thesis that nationwide cannabis legalization should be instituted.

Given the tenets of the central argument listed above, you’d need to establish at least four subsidiary arguments, each one consisting of its own conclusion/thesis, set of premises, and evidence.

For example purposes, I’ll sketch out one of these secondary arguments — i.e., that of moral obligation — in order to show you how the ancillary arguments would connect to the overall argument in favour of cannabis legalization.

• 1. Conclusion/Thesis: The U.S. federal government faces a multidimensional moral duty to end the criminal prohibition against cannabis and to create a system of controlled, safe, and legal access for consenting adults.
• 2. Premises: Officials in the state bureaucracy, as the democratically elected representatives and protectors of the electorate, are morally obligated to govern in accordance with the principle that no law, policy, or system shall be implemented or, if already implemented, be provided with continued support if it can be shown that such a law, policy, or system is likely to cause, or in fact has caused, a greater degree of social, political, and/or economic harm and suffering than benefit and protection. With respect to harm-inducing systems that are already in place, the state’s moral duty to dismantle such systems and to replace them with more humane, effective, and productive systems does not shrink or wither away merely because such systems have existed for long periods of time, would require significant financial investment to disassemble, or symbolize ethical or political values with which previous generations of citizens agreed. The criminal prohibition against cannabis, which has existed since the 1930s, is a well-substantiated example of just such a dangerous and counter-productive system.
• 3. Evidence: The presentation and review of a multitude of data — statistics, case studies, essays in moral theory and political philosophy, governmental reports, publications by professional bodies, interviews with victims of the Drug War — buttressing the assertion that the U.S. federal government has a moral obligation to eradicate systems and structures that evidently cause far more destruction than good in society.

This is the sort of outline you’d have to construct for the other three supplemental arguments identified earlier (i.e., regarding economic, legal, and political obligations).

Without the PASA framework, it would be very difficult, if not impossible, to create a systematic, organized, intelligible, and coherent ‘roadmap’ that connects the major argument—yes, the U.S. should implement national cannabis legalization—with the various supporting arguments to be discussed.

As this example shows, applying the PASA framework is neither quick nor easy. This shouldn’t come as a surprise, though, as great writing doesn’t emerge in the absence of serious effort.

What matters is that the approach I’ve outlined here works—I promise you that.

Yes, it takes a lot of attention, hard thinking, and patience on your part, but these are the very qualities that separate average writers from exceptional writers.

By forcing you to think in terms of major argument and supporting arguments, the PASA framework allows you to effectively sort out your thoughts and plan each of the moves you make with your words so that they make sense to and persuade your readers.

One last thing: Get more stories like this one here.