Thought Manipulation: The Use and Abuse of Psychological Trickery (15 page)

43. As stated previously, on the one hand it seems that Hayek stretches to the very limits the human ability to choose, at least in his personal affairs. Hayek believes the burden of responsibility in a free society will lead individuals to act wisely and morally (Hayek,
The Constitution of Liberty
, 84): “In order to be effective, then, responsibility must be so confined as to enable the individual to rely on his own concrete knowledge in deciding on the importance of the different tasks, to apply his moral principles to circumstances he knows, and to help to mitigate evils voluntarily.” On the other hand, Hayek does not hesitate to emphasize the importance of social institutions in designing a human being’s course of conduct. As I will explain latter, Hayek points out that the free-market system operates similarly to evolutionary mechanism. The important issue is that whenever individuals fail in their decisions and moral behavior, the evolution operates to minimize evils and damages (Hayek,
The Constitution of Liberty
, 61): “The evolutionary theory…showed how certain institutional arrangements would induce man to use his intelligence to the best effect and how institutions could be framed so that bad people could do the least harm.”

44. Compare to
Business Week
(August 7, 1989): p. 60: “To cope with an avalanche of new products, each of which is expensive to handle and stock, retailers began imposing fees called slotting allowances. At first, they simply hoped to recoup some of their costs and discourage frivolous new products. But the eagerness with which many large companies ponied up taught retailers a lesson: Their shelf space is valuable real estate. So, producers say, stores increasingly are looking to make money not just by selling products to consumers but by renting shelf space to manufacturers.”

45. This report, which includes statistical data, deals with slotting allowances—the payments suppliers pay distributors for “product placement on the store shelves.” The report points out that a noticeable place on the shelf incurs high slotting allowances and uncompromising inspection after the success of the products. In other words, this major shift increased the sensibility to the quality of the products compared to the manipulative aspects of its marketing. Compare also to Banks, Paul, “Store Wars,” Marketing Magazine, 14 (8) 2003.

46. An illuminating example of such a power shift is connected to the unpredictable consequences of the barcode revolution. Toffler (
Powershift
, 97–99) describes a stable control of giant manufacturers, between the 1950s and 1980s, in America’s merchandises market. One of the main reasons for their power was their control of information: “Gillette knew when its advertising would appear on television, when new products were to be launched, what price promotions it would offer, and it was able to control the release of all this information. In short, Gillette and the other mass manufacturers stood between the retailer and the customer, feeding information under their exclusive control, to both.” In other words, “by coordinating production and distribution with the mass media, manufacturers by and large came to dominate all the other players in the production cycle—farmers and raw material suppliers as well as retailers.” The interesting point is that the power shift came from an unexpected direction.

Toffler, apparently, deviates from the subject. He describes an agenda of struggling with difficult problems that seem to be disconnected to the balance of power of the central players in the merchandises market. “Ever since the mid-sixties a little-noticed committee of retailers, wholesalers, and grocery manufacturers had been meeting with companies like IBM, National Cash Register, and Sweda to discuss two common supermarket problems: long checkout lines and errors in accounting. Couldn’t technology be used to overcome these difficulties? It could—if products could somehow be coded, and if computers could automatically ‘read’ the codes.” Consistent with the free-market economists’ emphasis on our limited ability to predict the full functionality of innovations, “the barcode did more, however, than speed the checkout line for millions of customers or reduce errors in accounting. It transferred power. The average U.S. supermarket now stocks 22,000 different items, and with thousands of new products continually replacing old ones, power has shifted to the retailer who can keep track of all these items—along with their sales, their profitability, the timing of advertising, costs, prices, discounts, location, special promotions, traffic flow, and so on. Now, says Pat Collins, president of the 127 Ralph’s stores in southern California, (the grocer) knows as much, if not more than, the manufacturer about his product.”

Ralph’s scanners scoop up vast volumes of data, which then helps its managers decide how much shelf space to devote to what products, when. This is a crucial decision for competing manufacturers who are hammering at the doors, pleading for every available inch of shelf on which to display their products. Instead of the manufacturer telling the store how much to take, the store now compels manufacturers to pay what is known as “push money” for space, and staggering sums for particularly desirable locations.

47. See, for example, Hayek, F. A., The Political Order of a Free People, Volume 3 of Law, Legislation and Liberty (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1979), 154.

48. In this context, it seems useful to mention the “Freiburg School of Law and Economics,” which Hayek had strong relations with. The Freiburgians have argued that competition per se, unrestrained competition, could be destructive for the market. In contrast, beneficial competition can emerge only in an appropriate legal and institutional framework. They employed the term “social market economy” instead of notions like “laissez faire liberalism.” For a further discussion on the Freiburg school and its relations with Hayek, see Vanberg, V., “ ‘Ordnungstheorie’ as Constitutional Economics—The German Conception of a ‘Social Market Economy,” in Ordo 1988 (39): 17–31. True, Hayek forcefully argued that a decent society has to follow general rules, especially because of our human limitations. However, constitutional economists emphasize that the indirect intervention in the free market should be more substantial than Hayek’s (minimal) general-rules approach. For a further discussion on Hayek’s approach, see, for example, Hayek,
The Constitution of Liberty
.

49. Basically and crudely, many free-market economists argue that a decent society should be conducted as a multidimensional free market. In this context, they tend to emphasize that the economic sphere is only one dimension of the whole structure that enables economists to concretize general claims about the decent social order. For a further discussion, see Hayek,
The Constitution of Liberty
.

CHAPTER 7

Spotlight on Politics: Intellectual Manipulation

INTRODUCTION

In contrast to limiting emotional manipulations, which are intended to lead the target to act impulsively and reflexively, limiting intellectual manipulations are constructed to supply the target with a compelling reason to behave in a way that the manipulator favors. The intention in limited intellectual manipulations is to lead the target to use reason and to act from rational considerations. However, the more interesting cases raise some severe doubts about whether the term “rationality” is appropriate. On the one hand, it is clear that the target is acting out of reason and critical thinking. On the other hand, his world view is partial, limited, and biased.

The manipulator is trying to create, or more precisely to keep, a substantial gap between the scope of the target’s world view and his field of vision. The manipulator strives to maneuver the target to act in a rational manner in the context and framework of the target’s “limited” world view. However, an examination of the bigger picture indicates that it is often difficult to accept the idea that the target is acting rationally, especially in cases where it is not clear whether the target is acting out of a free choice or whether “someone else” is maneuvering him by playing upon his human weaknesses.

MANIPULATION, PROPAGANDA, AND SOCIAL CRISIS

Statecraft is not an easy profession. The dynamic complexity of social life, often enough, invites infinite social problems and various unexpected crises. Therefore, it is not surprising to find political candidates who lack a well-thought strategy to cope with the difficulties, establishing their campaign upon incisive criticism of the present governmental policy. This strategy makes it hard to draw the line between “real” criticism and “pure” propaganda. On the one hand, the critique can indeed turn upon the real failures of the incumbent regime, but to criticize without suggesting any alternative, especially in politics, smacks of propaganda. I propose to label a political campaign that is based on criticism without proposing constructive advice the “manipulative criticism” tactic.

Principally, it seems all the easier to criticize than to offer alternative solutions, especially when there really is nothing to offer. Manipulative criticism is intended to give the impression of a sharp critic who has magical solutions to the urgent problems at stake while, in practice, he himself is confused and hardly knows where to start. Many times the manipulative challenger, hypocritically and surreptitiously, even supports the very same unpopular moves of the incumbent regime that he does not hesitate to attack and criticize in any possible public occasion.

As much as the political situation deteriorates, it seems easier to build an image of magical rescuer, but in practice the manipulative politician does not have any concrete alternative blueprint. Unfortunately, desperate people might vote for a politician who offers hope without examining critically if he has any concrete strategy or if he offers mere empty rhetoric. In these painful cases, the public recoils from confronting the “critical rescuer” for fear of banishing the little hope that his rhetoric proposes.

The question about the division of responsibility between the manipulator and the target is begged yet again: Which component, in difficult situations of social crisis, is playing the dominant role? Is it the weaknesses of a distressed people that the critical manipulator abuses, or do the voters choose to close their eyes and live under the illusion that the sharp critic has substantial solutions to offer?

The history of the twentieth century shows that the rise and flourish of manipulative totalitarian regimes, such as fascism and Nazism, did not occur in a vacuum. Society, at that time, faced an existential crisis. We learned that the deeper the frustration, the easier it becomes to sell false hope. This painful experience suggests that our critical manipulator, operating in situations of social collapse, is simply abusing human weakness.

Many liberals will never accept this view. They will argue that human beings are responsible for their decisions, choices, and behavior even in difficult times. According to their view, it is much more reasonable to expect that in extreme situations people would take responsibility for their decision making and not fall into the trap of cheap manipulative tricks. However, is it always possible to make the right decisions?

There is no doubt that on occasion society faces major crises. Ironically, protagonists of the two extreme views (weakness versus choice) emphasize elements that seem to contradict their opinions. For example, the common fascist leader, who uses almost any available trick to subordinate the individual, claims that members of society simply want to be misled. In contrast, many liberals, great believers in the individual’s ability to choose freely, have described in detail the external and internal social conditions that paved the way to massive submission to the fascist propaganda in the beginning of the twentieth century.

The crucial point is that the fascist’s actions and strategy indicate that he is simply lying. He does not believe his own assertion, which attributes too much weight to a human being’s freedom of choice in times of social distresses and under the pressure of massive propaganda. In opposition, liberals, especially those who emphasize the difficulties, seem more honest and consistent. They claim that internal and external distresses might be a necessary condition to the success of propaganda, but certainly not a sufficient one. They emphasize that even in the more severe situations of social collapse there is ample room for an individual’s free choice. The liberals will not easily dismiss individuals from the burden of responsibility.

The “manipulative criticism” tactic can be very useful in creating the impression that there are compelling and even rational reasons to vote for the manipulator. The motivating message of the “critic contender” is that the existing policy is a complete disaster and that he is the natural candidate to lead society during a difficult time. The manipulative subtext is that not only is the present leadership confused, but that the contender himself does not have the simplest clue how to cope with such deep distresses. Indeed, here we face no more than a limited intellectual manipulation in that the motivating effect is created by a “rational” argument.

One of the most interesting questions is: What is the fate of a politician who uses the manipulative criticism tactics, wins the election, and has to prove “real” political qualifications? There are many scripts and countless examples in global politics in general and in the public life of countries in continuous crisis, such as Israel, in particular. At the one extreme, we find the critical rhetorician demonstrates himself as a failed statesman. His end might be in the gallows or, at least in a decent state, in losing his tenure in legitimate elections. On the other pole we find cases where the manipulative critic is discovered as a talented and successful leader. Of course, these extreme possibilities demonstrate the difficulties in discussing moral-political questions concerning manipulative behavior. Constitutional economists try to bypass the “leadership obstacle” by shifting ground. They do not trust politicians, but they do trust rules and constitution.

CONSTITUTION, RULES, AND MANIPULATION

Constitutional economics is a unique field in the liberal tradition. Constitutional economists, especially as liberals, emphasize our human limitations: vulnerability, limited mental capabilities, and imperfect knowledge. Society, which is a composite of imperfect human beings, has to follow rules in order to successfully cope with a complex, dynamic, and ever-changing world.