Thought Manipulation: The Use and Abuse of Psychological Trickery (9 page)

This chapter sketches a model to classify different kinds of manipulative strategies. It proposes to categorize manipulations according to criteria related to sensitive issues for the open society in general and the liberal philosophy in particular. The chief purpose is to create a lexicon to facilitate better political and ethical discussions regarding manipulative behavior and its implications on our social life.

In principle, the open society has always defended the individual’s liberty, autonomy, and independence. Therefore, it seems that almost any moral-political discussion under the liberal umbrella needs to examine the connection between the problem at hand and the ability of the individuals involved to freely choose their actions. Of course, it is extremely important in the case of manipulation.

My first criterion will be the intentions of a rational manipulator concerning the target’s freedom of choice. I propose distinguishing between two types of manipulation:

1. Limiting manipulations. These manipulations are intended to limit a target by maneuvering the target toward one specific option or reducing the number of options that he considers while making a decision.

2. Expanding manipulations. These manipulations are intended to open a target’s mind by maneuvering the target to expand his “field of vision” toward open possibilities while making decisions.

Categorizing manipulation according to limited or expanded choices is insufficient. It omits a unique characteristic of manipulative behavior: trickery. Of course, trickery can manifest itself in many variations that might affect the target on different levels. Therefore, any categorization of manipulation according to various ends should be cross-referenced with classification according to different means to achieve the ends. Is such classification possible?

The difficulty is that manipulative behavior is a sweeping phenomenon encompassing infinite means, including temptation, distraction, and intimidation. Therefore, in order to cope with the classification problem, which seems impossible at first, we need to employ a simple device. Let us take a close look at the phenomenon.

Manipulative behavior can be quite a sophisticated motivating action that appears in many forms, shapes, and disguises. A rational manipulator, while choosing his strategy, considers several means and methods of influence, everything from fear and intimidation to pity and flattery. However, we should not forget that all such means remain geared toward the generation of a motivating effect.

The thrust is that focusing on the motivating effect “miraculously” enables us to distinguish between two types of manipulative strategies: emotional and intellectual. The first one is geared toward maneuvering the target to act impulsively while the second one is geared toward maneuvering the target to “choose” his actions out of biased, subjective considerations. Hence, the motivating effect criterion enables us to distinguish between two kinds of manipulations:

1. Emotional manipulations. These manipulations are geared toward maneuvering the target to act impulsively, reflexively, and automatically.

2. Intellectual manipulations. These manipulations are geared toward maneuvering the target to act from reason and consideration of some sort.

It is important to emphasize that, in both types of manipulations, the means could be emotional, intellectual, or both. The difference lies in the motivating effect.

It is clear that argumentation and reasoning can motivate a person to act impulsively. Good examples include “killing” jokes, such as the story about the Jewish rabbi who refuses to bury a dog in a Jewish ceremony. However, after receiving a considerable sum of money, our rabbi suddenly reverses his verdict and declares, “It comes to my attention that this dog is actually a Jewish dog and, therefore, deserves a full ceremony in accordance with orthodox Jewish law.”

Of course, the manipulator is the joke-teller while the target is his audience. Under the assumption that a “real” laugh is an impulsive reaction, jokes can be classified as emotional manipulations. However, entertainment can enfold hidden political messages. Indeed, many jokes and caricatures make fun of Jewish people by drawing frightening pictures of them. These confusing messages intend to give the impression that Jewish people are inhuman and, therefore, introduce to the listener a reason to vote for Jew-hating political candidates. Accordingly, in the final account we face an intellectual manipulation: “Jews are not human. Therefore, I shall vote for the leader who knows how to ‘solve’ this ‘bothersome’ problem.”

The differences between the two types of manipulation, emotional and intellectual, lie in the motivating effect. Emotional manipulations are meant to confuse and limit the target’s ability to provide any logical explanation for his actions, while intellectual manipulations are built to supply the target with an adequate rationalization to behave in a way that the manipulator wants. Combining the classification of means with that of ends enables us to distinguish between four types of manipulation, as shown in Table 1:

Certainly, this model does not encompass all possible manipulations. The ability to distinguish between intellectual and emotional manipulations can be extremely difficult. To facilitate discussion and bypass this obstacle, most examples in this book begin in the laboratory of a rational manipulator. I will assume that in each case the intention was to manipulate and that the manipulator decided in advance which motivating effect he wished to create: emotional or intellectual.

Of course, to remain exclusively in the laboratory of a rational manipulator is insufficient because reality is dynamic, complex, and unpredictable. Each strategy, as sophisticated as it could be, can lead to many unintended consequences. The evaluation of possible outcomes and implications in deciphering a manipulative interaction will help me present the challenges that manipulation embodies to passionate advocates of the open society.

NOTES

1. I borrowed this idea, emotional versus intellectual, from Fried and Agassi [
Paranoia: A Study in Diagnosis
(Dordrecht: D. Reidel Publishing Company. 76)]. The authors use this distinction to differentiate between different kinds of mental sicknesses. At first blush, it seems that the two subjects, demarcating mental illnesses and classifying manipulative strategies, are disconnected. However, mental patients are often enough labeled as human beings who have had their decision-making process damaged, and manipulative behavior is motivated by external hidden interference in the decision-making process of a target. Therefore, it is not so hard to find the parallel.

2. I assume that there are other proposals to classify manipulations. For example, Maoz (“Framing the National Interest: The Manipulation of Foreign Policy Decisions in Group Settings,” World Politics, 43 (1990): 92–94), writing on the subject of political manipulation, proposes different classifications. I do not claim that my proposal is the best available way to classify manipulations. My hope is that my proposal, the model presented here, will suffice as an efficient methodological instrument to introduce problems and dilemmas via the analysis of manipulative strategies and their ramifications.

CHAPTER 5

Introducing Manipulations That Limit Us

“Limiting manipulations” aim at narrowing the target’s perception of available options. Usually, the intention is to maneuver him to operate toward one specific goal. I have proposed to distinguish between two types of manipulations: emotional and intellectual. The first one is geared toward maneuvering the target to act impulsively, automatically, and almost without any sense of consideration. The second one is geared toward convincing the target to act in a way that the manipulator favors.

Chapters 6, 7, and 8 present manipulative strategies in three areas: advertisements, politics, and leadership. Advertisers are considered professional manufacturers of manipulations. Politics is regarded as the art of manipulation. Leadership is associated with the expertise of changing and even manipulating minds.

The chapter on advertisements introduces the problem of manipulative advertising in a free society. It presents the excessive view that manipulative advertising maneuvers us to be obsessive consumers without almost any power to object. On the other hand, however, it explains the dangers of governmental regulation and censorship on advertising in the marketplace. It also explores the various motivations, techniques, and strategies of advertisers operating in a free market and emphasizes that the free market does not provide ideal conditions for experimentations in manipulation and human design. The free market, which is never completely free, has its own restraints that limit the massive production of manipulation. However, the discussion challenges the view that a free market system is the best available system to protect us, the consumers, from damaging influences.

The chapter on politics focuses on manipulative techniques designed to shift voters’ decisions at election time. It demonstrates how the sophisticated manipulator can manipulate minds, change election results, and play the system. It describes how difficult it is to determine the boundary between fair and unfair influence upon the voter and shows how a skilled politician can effectively use this limitation to advance his political ambitions. However, history shows that not every manipulative politician is a bad leader. There are politicians that employed sophisticated, unsophisticated, and even cheap manipulative strategies to climb all the way to the top, but nevertheless proved to be great leaders. This observation—or more precisely, painful observation—demonstrates how difficult is to distinguish between decent and indecent, desirable and undesirable, and legal and illegal manipulation.

The chapter on manipulative leadership distinguishes between intellectual leaders and political leaders. Intellectual leaders affect our minds through their scholarly, scientific, and intellectual works, such as books, discoveries, and innovations. Political leaders influence our life through their political actions. In both cases of leadership, it is our moral obligation to demand responsible leadership. The chapter focuses on tragic occurrences in human life, civil war and intractable conflict, and explains and challenges the view that in those desperate situations, only a drastic move by a strong leader can create beneficial change. It uses the controversial writings of the intellectual leader Niccolo Machiavelli to interpret a drastic move that led to a turning point in one of the most fixed struggles in the world: the Arab-Israeli conflict. It illustrates the story of Anwar Sadat, the former president of Egypt, and his diplomatic offensive, explaining how Sadat’s dramatic initiative in 1977 led to a peace agreement between Egypt and Israel. This striking story helps demonstrate one of Machiavelli’s most basic rules: that not every subversive political manipulation is morally inappropriate. My hope is that a multidimensional exploration of advertising, politics, and leadership will give the reader a broad overview on “limiting manipulations” and the challenges that they hold to believers in a free, liberal society.

NOTE

1. Gardner, H.,
Changing Minds: The Art and Science of Changing Our Own and Other People’s Minds
(Boston: Harvard Business School Press, 2006).

CHAPTER 6

Spotlight on Advertising: The Free Market and Manipulation

HYPNOSIS, COMPETITION, AND MANIPULATIONS

One need not be a professional to notice the distance between the practical functionality of material goods and the strategies used to sell them. Modern advertising is mainly focused on drawing associations from the physical qualities of products to the unfulfilled yearnings of potential consumers. These methods of influence qualify as manipulation.

Such an analysis of modern advertising techniques was emphasized and stretched almost to its limits by members of “the Frankfurt school of political thought.” Particularly, Erich Fromm, one of the prominent figures of the Frankfurt school who is well known for his psychoanalytic critique of society, compared modern advertising’s methods of influence to hypnosis:

“A vast sector of modern advertising is different; it does not appeal to reason but to emotion; like any other kind of hypnoid suggestion, it tries to impress its objects emotionally and then make them submit intellectually. This type of advertising impresses the customer by all sorts of means: by repetition of the same formula again and again; by the influence of an authoritative image, like that of a society lady or of a famous boxer, who smokes a certain brand of cigarette; by attracting the customer and at the same time weakening his critical abilities by the sex appeal of a pretty girl; by terrorizing him with the threat of “b.o.” or “halitosis;” or yet again by stimulating daydreams about a sudden change in one’s whole course of life brought about by buying a certain shirt or soap. All these methods are essentially irrational; they have nothing to do with the qualities of the merchandise, and they smother and kill the critical capacities of the customer like an opiate or outright hypnosis. They give him a certain satisfaction by their daydream qualities just as the movies do, but at the same time they increase his feeling of smallness and powerlessness.”