This article discusses the pragma-dialectical approach developed in the Netherlands by van Eemeren and Grootendorst between the 1970s and the late 1990s. After a sketch of the normative pragmatic research carried out in pragma-dialectics the metatheoretical starting points are discussed. Next, the model for critical discussion is introduced and explained, and a short account of the analysis of argumentative discourse in terms of a critical discussion is given. Finally, the rules for critical discussion associated with the model are introduced together with the fallacies that may occur in argumentative discourse as violations of these rules.