## 1. Preliminaries


### 1.1 Ordinary versus Global Manipulation



Forms of influence like those listed above are commonplace in ordinary
life. This distinguishes them from forms of influence described as
"manipulation" in the free will literature. There, the
term "manipulation" typically refers to radical
programming or reprogramming of all or most of an agent's
beliefs, desires, and other mental states. Such global manipulation
(as we might call it) is also typically imagined as happening via
decidedly extra-ordinary methods, such as supernatural intervention,
direct neurological engineering, or radical programs of indoctrination
and psychological conditioning. Global manipulation is typically
thought to deprive its victim of free will. This common intuition
drives the "manipulation argument", which seeks to defend
incompatibilism by claiming that living in a deterministic universe is
analogous to having been the victim of global manipulation. (For a
detailed discussion of this argument, see the discussion of
manipulation arguments in the entry on
 arguments for incompatibilism.)



Despite the differences between what we might call "ordinary
manipulation" and the forms of manipulation in the free will
literature, it is still worth wondering about the relationship between
them. If global manipulation completely deprives its victim of free
will or autonomy, might more ordinary forms of manipulation do
something similar, but on a more limited scale? If Tonya succumbs to
one of Irving's tactics, should we regard her as being less
free--and perhaps less responsible--for doing *X*? So
far, few people have explored the connections between ordinary
manipulation and the forms of global manipulation discussed in the
free will literature. (Two exceptions are Long 2014 and Todd
2013).


### 1.2 Applications of a Theory of Ordinary Manipulation



Until recently, ordinary manipulation has seldom been the subject of
philosophical inquiry in its own right. However, the fact that it is
commonly thought to undermine the validity of consent has led to its
frequent mention in areas where the validity of consent is at
issue.



One such area is medical ethics, where proposed conditions for
autonomous informed consent often reference the need to ensure that
consent is not manipulated. In fact, one of the earliest sustained
philosophical discussions of manipulation appears in Ruth Faden, Tom
Beauchamp, and Nancy King's influential book, *A History and
Theory of Informed Consent* (1986). The view that manipulation
undermines the validity of consent is widely held among medical
ethicists. However, there is far less agreement about how to determine
whether a given form of influence is manipulative. Nowhere is this
lack of agreement more apparent than in recent discussions of
"nudges".



The concept of a nudge was introduced by Cass Sunstein and Richard
Thaler to refer to the deliberate introduction of subtle, non-coercive
influences into people's decision-making to get them to make
more optimal choices (Thaler & Sunstein 2009; Sunstein 2014). Some
nudges merely provide better and more comprehensible information;
these nudges might seem best characterized as influences that improve
the quality of rational deliberation. However, even with
"purely" informational nudges, one might worry that the
selection of *which* information is presented could be
manipulative; perhaps providing nutrition information on food
packaging nudges people to make food choices based on health
considerations rather than taste, for instance. More pressing concerns
arise with nudges that operate by psychological mechanisms whose
relationship to *rational* deliberation is questionable at
best. Many of these nudges exploit heuristics, reasoning and
decision-making biases, and other psychological processes that operate
outside of conscious awareness. For example, some evidence suggests
that patients are more likely to choose an operation if they are told
that it has a 90% survival rate rather than a 10% fatality rate. Would
it be manipulative for a surgeon to exploit this framing effect to
nudge the patient into making the decision that the surgeon thinks
best? Is it manipulative for a cafeteria manager to place healthier
food items at eye level to nudge customers into choosing them? The
question of whether and when nudges manipulate has sparked a lively
debate.



Some defenders of nudges suggest that because it is often impossible
to frame a decision without pointing the decision-maker in
*some* direction, there is nothing manipulative about framing
such decisions in one way rather than another. For example, physicians
must provide outcome information either in terms of fatality rate or
survival rate (and if they give both, they must give one first), and
cafeteria managers must choose something to put at eye level in the
displays. This being the case, why think that deliberately choosing
one way of framing the decision over another is manipulative? Some
defenders of nudges suggest that in cases where it is inevitable to
introduce a non-rational influence into decision-making, deliberately
doing so is not manipulative. But there are reasons to be wary of this
line of thought. Suppose that Jones is traveling to a job interview on
a subway car so crowded that it is inevitable that he will bump up
against his fellow passengers. Suppose that he capitalizes on this
fact to deliberately bump his rival job candidate (who is on the same
subway car) out the door just as it closes, thus ensuring that he will
be late for his interview. Clearly the fact that it was inevitable
that Jones's rival would be subjected to *some* bumping
does not excuse Jones for intentionally bumping his rival out the
door. Similarly, even if we inevitably introduce non-rational
influences into each other's decision-making, that fact seems
insufficient to prove that such influences can never be manipulative.
No doubt this analogy is imperfect, but it should suffice to call into
question the assumption that a deliberate nudge is not manipulative
simply because some nudging is inevitable. (For a similar argument,
see Douglass 2022.)



More nuanced discussions of whether nudges manipulate tend to focus
less on the inevitability of nudging in some direction or another, and
more on the mechanisms by which the nudging occurs, and the direction
in which it pushes the person being nudged. Although there is wide
agreement that some nudges can be manipulative, so far no consensus
has emerged about which nudges are manipulative or how to distinguish
manipulative from non-manipulative nudges. (For a sample of approaches
to the question of whether and when nudges manipulate, see
Blumenthal-Barby 2012; Blumenthal-Barby & Burroughs 2012; Saghai
2013; Wilkinson 2013; Hanna 2015; Moles 2015; and Nys & Engelen
2017. For arguments that nudges can be sometimes morally justified
even when they are manipulative, see Wilkinson 2017 and Nys &
Engelen 2017).



Questions about the legitimacy of nudges go beyond the medical
context. Thaler and Sunstein advocate their use by government,
employers, and other institutions besides the health care industry.
The use of nudges by government raises additional concerns, especially
about the paternalism behind them (Arneson 2015; White 2013).
Questions about other forms of manipulation in the political sphere
have also been raised by philosophers and political theorists. The
idea that political leaders might gain, retain, or consolidate
political power by means that we would now call manipulative can be
traced back at least as far back as ancient Greek figures like
Callicles and Thrasymachus. Niccolo Machiavelli not only details but
recommends political tactics that we would likely regard as
manipulative. More recent philosophical work on political manipulation
includes Robert Goodin's 1980 book on *Manipulatory
Politics* and Claudia Mills's important paper,
"Politics and Manipulation" (1995), as well as Dowding
(2016), Riker (1986), Ware (1981), Gorton (2016), Whitfield (2020),
and the papers collected in (Le Cheminant and Parrish 2011); for an
overview of this literature, see Noggle (2021).



In the field of business ethics, much philosophical attention has been
focused on the question of whether advertising is manipulative. The
economist John Kenneth Galbraith famously called advertising
"the manipulation of consumer desire" and compared being
the target of advertising with being



> 
> 
> assailed by demons which instilled in him a passion sometimes for silk
> shirts, sometimes for kitchenware, sometimes for chamber pots, and
> sometimes for orange squash. (Galbraith 1958)
> 
> 
> 



Several philosophers have made similar criticisms of advertising.
Often, these criticisms are limited to forms of advertising that do
not simply convey accurate factual information. As is the case with
purely informational nudges, the presentation of accurate information
in advertising might not be manipulative in and of itself, though
perhaps the selection of which information is presented might be
manipulative. Be that as it may, most advertising attempts to
influence consumer behavior by means other than or in addition to
purely providing accurate information. Such non-informational
advertising is the most apt target for worries about manipulation. Tom
Beauchamp and Roger Crisp have made influential arguments that such
advertising can be manipulative (Beauchamp 1984; Crisp 1987). Similar
criticisms claim that non-informational advertising can subvert
autonomy or improperly tamper with consumers' desires (e.g.,
Santilli 1983). Such critiques are either versions of or close
relatives to critiques of advertising as manipulation. On the other
side, Robert Arrington argues that, as a matter of fact, advertising
very seldom manipulates its audience or undermines its
audience's autonomy (Arrington 1982). Michael Phillips has
marshalled a large body of empirical evidence to argue that while some
advertising is manipulative, its critics vastly overestimate its power
to influence consumers (Phillips 1997).


### 1.3 Two Questions about Manipulation



As will be apparent from our discussion so far, two main questions
need to be answered by any satisfactory theory of manipulation.



One question--call it the *identification
question*--concerns definition and identification: How can we
identify which forms of influence are manipulative and which are not?
A satisfactory answer would presumably involve a general definition of
manipulation, which explains what the diverse forms of manipulative
influence have in common. In addition to illuminating how the various
instances of manipulation are manifestations of a single more basic
phenomenon, an answer to the identification question should also
provide criteria for determining whether a given instance of influence
is manipulative. Such an analysis might, of course, show that some of
the phenomena that we were pre-theoretically inclined to count as
manipulation are relevantly different from clear cases of
manipulation, so that we might be led to revise our usage of the term
"manipulation."



A second question--call it the *evaluation
question*--concerns morality: How should we evaluate the
moral status of manipulation? A satisfactory answer to this question
should tell us whether manipulation is always immoral. And if
manipulation is not always immoral, it should tell us how to determine
*when* manipulation is immoral. But more importantly, a
satisfactory answer to the evaluation question should explain
*why* manipulation is immoral when it is immoral. What feature
of manipulation makes it immoral in those situations when it is
immoral?



Although the identification and evaluation questions are distinct,
they are not entirely independent. Any analysis of why manipulation is
immoral (when it is immoral) will presuppose some account of what
manipulation is. Thus, our answer to the identification question will
constrain our answer to the evaluation question. But an answer to the
identification question might do more than *constrain* our
answer to the evaluation question: it might also *guide* it. If
an account of manipulation identifies its underlying characteristic as
being relevantly similar to some other thing that we have independent
grounds for regarding as morally wrong, then we would likely want to
argue that manipulation is wrong for similar reasons. Finally, we
might need to adjust our answers to one or both questions if they
together imply implausible consequences. For example, if we define
manipulation as every form of influence besides rational persuasion or
coercion, and then claim that the wrongness of manipulation is
absolute, we will be forced to conclude that no form of influence
besides rational persuasion is ever morally legitimate. This is a
radical conclusion that few would be willing to accept, but it is a
conclusion that results from combining a certain answer to the
identification question with a certain answer to the evaluation
question.


## 2. Answering the Identification Question



A number of accounts of manipulation have been put forward. They can
be grouped roughly into three main categories: those that characterize
manipulation as an influence that bypasses reason; those that treat it
as a form of trickery, and those that treat it as a form of pressure.
These are rough categories, and a single theory might fit into more
than one of them. But they are useful groupings nonetheless.


### 2.1 Manipulation as Bypassing Reason



Manipulation is often said to "bypass" the target's
rational deliberation. It is not always clear, however, whether this
claim is meant as a definition of manipulation or merely as a
statement about manipulation (perhaps one that partly explains its
moral status). But let us consider whether the idea that manipulation
bypasses reason can serve as a definition of manipulation.



The thought that manipulative influences bypass the target's
capacity for rational deliberation is appealing for at least two
reasons. First, it seems reasonable to think that because manipulation
differs from rational persuasion, it must influence behavior by means
that do not engage the target's rational capacities. Second, it
seems intuitive to describe forms of influence that do clearly bypass
the target's capacity for rational deliberation as manipulative.
For example, suppose that subliminal advertising worked in the way
that it is commonly--though probably
inaccurately--portrayed, so that being exposed to a subliminal
message urging you to "Drink Coke" could influence your
behavior without engaging your mechanisms of rational deliberation.
Intuitively such an influence would seem to be a clear case of
manipulation.



Subliminal advertising tactics--along with hypnosis and
behavioral conditioning--are commonly portrayed as effective
methods to influence others without their knowledge and thus without
engaging their capacities for rational deliberation. The effectiveness
of such tactics is almost certainly wildly exaggerated in the popular
(and sometimes philosophical) imagination. However, if we imagine them
working as well as they are sometimes portrayed, then they would
constitute clear examples of what it might mean to say that
manipulation bypasses reason. Thus, we might understand manipulation
in terms of bypassing rational deliberation, and understand
"bypassing rational deliberation" in terms of exploiting
psychological mechanisms or techniques that can generate behavior
without any input from rational deliberation.



Another way that manipulation might bypass rational deliberation would
be for it to appeal to non-conscious motivations. Eric Cave explores
this idea in a pair of papers (Cave 2007, 2014) on what he calls
"motive manipulation." Cave distinguishes between
"concerns," which are conscious pro-attitudes, and
unconscious "non-concern motives." He then defines motive
manipulation as influence that operates by engaging unconscious
non-concern motives. This theory clearly implies that appeals to
non-conscious motives, as well as influences that operate via
"quasi-hypnotic techniques" and "crude behavioral
conditioning" are manipulative (Cave 2014: 188). Although Cave
himself does not claim that all forms of manipulation are of this sort
(Cave 2007: 130), would such a claim be plausible? Or could we add the
appeal to non-conscious motives to the list of psychological
mechanisms that bypass reason, and define manipulation in terms of
exploiting such mechanisms?



Unfortunately, this approach faces a serious problem. If we define
manipulation in terms of bypassing rational deliberation, and then use
the appeal to unconscious motives and exaggerated portrayals of
hypnosis and subliminal advertising to illustrate what it means to
bypass rational deliberation, we will set a very high bar for
something to count as manipulation. This bar would be too high to
count any of Irving's tactics as manipulation, since none of
them completely bypasses Tonya's capacity for rational
deliberation in the way that subliminal advertising, hypnosis,
conditioning, or the appeal to unconscious motives would appear to
do.



Perhaps a more promising account of what it might mean for
manipulation to bypass reason would construe manipulation as an
influence that is covert in a way that allows it to bypass reason.
Certainly, if an influence is covert and thus escapes one's
notice, then it would also seem to escape any conscious reasoning
process. An early version of the idea that manipulation is best
characterized as covert influence was suggested by the political
theorist Alan Ware (1981). Ware characterizes manipulation as an
influence on the target which is covert in the sense that the target
lacks knowledge or understanding of how she is being influenced.



A more recent version of this view was put forward by Daniel Susser,
Beate Roessler, and Helen Nissenbaum, who write that:
"manipulation is hidden influence. ... Covertly influencing
someone--imposing a hidden influence--means influencing them
in a way they aren't consciously aware of, and in a way they
couldn't easily become aware of" (Susser et al., 2019: 4).
Alan Strudler suggests that "a sufficient even though not
exhaustive characterization of manipulation" is that it involves
changing a person's behavior "through a chain of events
that has the desired effect only because the person is unaware of that
chain" (Strudler 2005: 459).



This sort of view works well with influences like subliminal
advertising. But it would also appear to apply to other sorts of
psychological influences that bypass conscious attention, such as
priming effects and the decision-making biases and other processes
that involve unconscious, fast processing made famous by the work of
Daniel Kahneman, Amos Tversky, and colleagues (see Kahneman 2013 for
an overview). However, it faces obstacles in dealing with other clear
cases of manipulation. Many manipulative influences, such as peer
pressure, nagging, emotional appeals, guilt trips, do not appear to be
hidden influences. Indeed, it is difficult not to be aware of an
attempted influence when that influence takes the form of nagging,
peer pressure, or a guilt trip.



Perhaps, though, it is not the influence itself that must be covert in
order for it to bypass reason in the relevant sense. Perhaps it is
sufficient that the intent behind it must be covert. On this view, the
influence itself may not bypass conscious attention. Yet it might
still be the case that the covertness of the intent behind it renders
it less likely to trigger rational scrutiny by the target. Even if I
am aware of the attempt to influence me, if I am unaware of your true
intentions, I might fail to engage in rational deliberation about
whether I should try to resist your influence.



Such a view is defended by Radim Belohrad (2019), who claims that



> 
> 
> In manipulation, the influencer is keen to create an impression that
> her motives are very different from what she projects. ... The
> manipulator always projects intentions that differ from her real
> intentions. (2019: 457-459)
> 
> 
> 



Along similar lines, Gregory Whitfield (2020) claims that



> 
> An act of manipulation is any intentional attempt by an agent (A) to
> cause another agent (B) to will/prefer/intend/act other than what A
> takes B's will, preference or intention to be, where A does so
> utilizing methods that obscure and render deniable A's
> intentions vis-a-vis B (2020: 11).
> 



It is certainly true that manipulators often keep their true
intentions hidden. Iago wants Othello to think that he intends to be
his friend, rather than the agent of his destruction. Exaggerating the
benefits of doing what the manipulator wants, while understating the
advantages of other options (tactic 2 on our list) probably works
best, if at all, if the target falsely believes that the manipulator
intends to provide objective advice. However, there are other examples
of manipulation where the intent does not seem to be hidden. The
intent of a teenager nagging for a new cellphone is quite
transparent--to get the parent to provide the new phone.
Similarly, when adolescents engage in peer pressure to get a fellow to
smoke, their intention--to get the target to smoke--is quite
transparent. Targets of guilt trips often--perhaps
typically--know exactly what the guilt tripper intends to get the
target to do. Perhaps anticipating these worries, Whitfield allows
manipulation to occur when the manipulator has merely achieved
"plausible deniability" about his true intentions. It is
not entirely clear, though, whether this feature allows the theory to
escape the problem of forms of manipulation like nagging and peer
pressure. It is certainly not obvious that such tactics only work, or
only count as manipulation, if their users can plausibly deny their
intentions.



Perhaps we might characterize manipulation not in terms of bypassing
deliberation altogether, but in terms of bypassing *rational*
deliberation, that is, by introducing non-rational influences into the
deliberative process. Thus, we might follow Joseph Raz in claiming
that



> 
> 
> manipulation, unlike coercion, does not interfere with a
> person's options. Instead it perverts the way that person
> reaches decisions, forms preference, or adopts goals. (Raz 1988:
> 377)
> 
> 
> 



Treating manipulation as bypassing *rational* deliberation, and
then characterizing "bypassing rational deliberation" in
terms of introducing non-rational influences into deliberation, would
cohere nicely with the observation that manipulation is a contrary of
rational persuasion.



Despite its appeal, this approach faces a significant challenge: Many
forms of non-rational influence do not seem to be manipulative. For
example, graphic portrayals of the dangers of smoking or texting while
driving are not obviously manipulative even when they impart no new
information to the target (Blumenthal-Barby 2012). In addition, moral
persuasion often involves non-rational influence. Appeals to the
Golden Rule invite the interlocutor to imagine how it would
*feel* to be on the receiving end of the action under
consideration. It is difficult to believe that all such appeals are
inherently manipulative, even when they appeal more to the feelings
than to facts (of which the interlocutor may already be aware).
Finally, consider something as innocuous as dressing up before going
on a date or an interview. Presumably, the purpose of such
"impression management" is to convey a certain impression
to the audience. Yet dressing up on a single occasion provides little
if any *rational* basis for conclusions about what the
well-dressed person is really like day in and day out. Thus,
impression management of this sort seems to be an attempt at
non-rational influence. Yet it seems odd to count it as
manipulation--especially if we treat "manipulation"
as having a connotation of being immoral. Of course, we might avoid
this problem by defining "manipulation" in a morally
neutral way, and then claiming that these forms of manipulation are
not immoral, while others are. But this would merely move the problem
without solving it, for now we would want to know what distinguishes
immoral forms of manipulation from those that are not immoral.



Perhaps we could address this problem by defining reason more broadly,
so that appeals to emotions could count as forms of rational
persuasion. Such a move might be independently motivated by the
rejection of what some critics regard as the hyper-cognitivist radical
separation of reason from emotion. However, it is not clear that
allowing emotional appeals to count as rational persuasion will get us
very far in defining manipulation in terms of bypassing reason. For
while we will have avoided the implausible implication that all
appeals to emotion are *ipso facto* manipulative, we now face
the question of which appeals to emotion are manipulative and which
are not. And that is close to the very question that the idea of
bypassing reason was supposed to help us answer.



Thus, despite the plausibility of the claim that manipulation bypasses
the target's capacities for rational deliberation, using this
claim to *define* manipulation faces serious challenges: If we
take "bypassing" very literally, then the account seems to
miss many examples of genuine manipulation. But if we loosen our
understanding of "bypassing reason" so that it applies to
any non-rational form of influence, then it seems to count as
manipulative many forms of influence that do not seem manipulative.
And if we fix *that* problem by adopting a conception of reason
according to which appeals to the emotions are not *ipso facto*
non-rational, then we are left with the original problem of
determining which appeals to the emotions are manipulative and which
are not. Perhaps there is a way to characterize "bypassing
reason" that can undergird a plausible definition of
manipulation in terms of bypassing reason. But the most obvious ways
to define "bypassing reason" face serious problems.



Nevertheless, even if defining manipulation in terms of bypassing
reason turns out to be a dead end, it is still possible that
manipulation really does bypass reason in *some* sense. But it
may turn out that we need an independent definition of manipulation
before we can determine in *what* sense manipulation bypasses
reason. Some writers, such as Cass Sunstein and Jason Hanna, seem to
have such an approach in mind when they initially characterize
manipulation in terms of bypassing or subverting reason, but then go
on to gloss "bypassing or subverting" in terms of some
other account of manipulation (Sunstein 2016: 82-89; Hanna
2015).



However, a recent argument by Moti Gorin raises questions for the
claim that manipulation bypasses reason--even when that claim is
not being used to define what manipulation is (Gorin 2014a). Gorin
argues that manipulation can occur even when the target is offered
only good reasons. His argument turns largely on examples like this:
James wishes for Jacques's death, since this would enable James
to inherit a large fortune. James knows that Jacques believes that (1)
God exists, and that (2) if God did not exist, life would be
meaningless, and he would have no reason to go on living. James
provides Jacques with rational arguments against the existence of God.
These arguments fully engage Jacques's rational faculties, and
consequently Jacques concludes that God does not exist. Jacques
promptly commits suicide--just as Jack had hoped he would. As
Gorin notes, James's activities do not appear to have bypassed,
subverted, or otherwise been detrimental to Jacques's capacity
for reason--indeed, James depended on Jacques's ability to
employ his rational faculties to draw (what James regarded as) the
correct conclusion from his arguments. If we accept Gorin's
characterization of James's actions as manipulative, then his
example poses a significant challenge to the claim that manipulation
always bypasses the target's capacity for rational
deliberation.


### 2.2 Manipulation as Trickery



A second approach to manipulation treats it as a form of trickery, and
ties it conceptually to deception. The connection between manipulation
and deception is a common theme in both non-philosophical and
philosophical discussions of manipulation. In his 1980 book
*Manipulatory Politics*, Robert Goodin argues that manipulation
is inherently deceptive, and offers this test for whether an influence
is manipulative: "1. Is the interference deceptive? 2. Is the
interference contrary to the putative will of those subject to
it?" (Goodin, 1980: 35). In the literature on advertising, the
charge that (at least some) advertising is manipulative often rests on
the claim that it creates false beliefs or misleading associations
(e.g., linking the vitality of the Marlboro man to a product which
causes lung cancer). Similarly, in his discussion of promises, T. M.
Scanlon condemns manipulation as a means of inducing false beliefs and
expectations (Scanlon 1998: 298-322). Shlomo Cohen offers a
somewhat different account of the relationship between manipulation
and deception, according to which the distinction lies in the methods
by which the target is induced to adopt a false belief (Cohen 2018).
But even on this more nuanced view, there is still a strong connection
between manipulation and deception.



Other views in this family treat manipulation as a broader category of
which deception is a special case. Whereas deception is the deliberate
attempt to trick someone into adopting a faulty belief, these versions
of the trickery account see manipulation as the deliberate attempt to
trick someone into adopting any faulty mental state--belief,
desire, emotion, etc.



An early example of this version of the trickery approach to
manipulation can be found in a 1980 paper by Vance Kasten, who writes
that



> 
> 
> manipulation occurs when there is a difference in kind between what
> one intends to do and what one actually does, when that difference is
> traceable to another in such a way that the victim may be said to have
> been misled. (Kasten 1980: 54)
> 
> 
> 



Although many of Kasten's examples of misleading involve
deception, he also includes examples in which manipulation involves
inducing the target to have inappropriate emotions like guilt. More
recently, Robert Noggle has defended a version of this more expansive
approach, writing that



> 
> 
> There are certain norms or ideals that govern beliefs, desires, and
> emotions. Manipulative action is the attempt to get someone's
> beliefs, desires, or emotions to violate these norms, to fall short of
> these ideals. (Noggle 1996: 44)
> 
> 
> 



The norms or ideals in question will vary by mental state: a belief
falls short of its ideal if it is false; a pattern of attention falls
short of its ideal if excessive attention is being paid to something
less relevant for choice at hand; an emotion falls short of its ideal
if it is not appropriate to the situation (Noggle 1996: 44-47).




In a similar vein, Anne Barnhill writes that



> 
> 
> manipulation is directly influencing someone's beliefs, desires,
> or emotions such that she falls short of ideals for belief, desire, or
> emotion in ways typically not in her self-interest *or likely not
> in her self-interest in the present context*. (Barnhill 2014: 73,
> emphasis original; for a similar view, see Hanna 2015)
> 
> 
> 



Claudia Mills offers a theory that can be considered as either a
version of, or a close relative to, the trickery account:



> 
> 
> We might say, then, that manipulation in some way purports to be
> offering good reasons, when in fact it does not. A manipulator tries
> to change another's beliefs and desires by offering her bad
> reasons, disguised as good, or faulty arguments, disguised as
> sound--where the manipulator himself knows these to be bad
> reasons and faulty arguments (Mills 1995: 100; see Benn 1967 and Gorin
> 2014b for somewhat similar ideas).
> 
> 
> 



A similar picture of manipulation emerges from the work of the
political theorist Keith Dowding (2016, 2018). Dowding does not
attempt to characterize manipulation directly. Rather, he proposes
ideal conditions for persuasion in a deliberative
democracy--conditions that would exclude manipulation. These
conditions prohibit appealing to reasons that the persuader does not
accept, and appealing to emotions that the persuader does not share.
These prohibitions seem to suggest a characterization of manipulation
as the attempt to influence the target by appealing to what the
manipulator sees as bad reasons or inappropriate emotions. This
picture of manipulation is either a version of, or a close cousin to,
the picture of the manipulator as trying to trick the target into
making choices based on faulty beliefs or inappropriate emotions.



Thus, while all versions of the trickery view retain the connection
between manipulation and deception, some extend it to include tricking
the target into adopting *any* faulty mental state, including
beliefs, desires, emotions, etc. This view might be further expanded
by adopting Michael Cholbi's observation that the phenomenon of
ego depletion might induce targets of manipulation to form faulty
intentions (that is, intentions that do not reflect their considered
values) because their resistance to temptation has been worn down
(Cholbi 2014).



The trickery view can be motivated by appeal to various examples, one
especially fruitful set of which is Shakespeare's
*Othello*. It seems natural to describe Shakespeare's
character Iago as a manipulator. The activities in virtue of which he
merits this label seem to involve various forms of trickery. For
example, through insinuation, innuendo and cleverly arranging
circumstances (like a strategically placed handkerchief) he tricks
Othello into suspecting--and then believing--that his new
bride Desdemona has been unfaithful. He then plays on Othello's
insecurities and other emotions to lead him into an irrational
jealousy and rage that both overshadow his love for Desdemona and
cloud his judgment about how to react. The trickery view accounts for
our sense that Iago manipulates Othello by noting that Iago tricks him
into adopting various faulty mental states--false beliefs,
unwarranted suspicions, irrational emotions, and so on.



Proponents of the trickery view disagree over several details, most
notably how to define a *faulty* mental state. Some proponents
of the trickery view argue that manipulation occurs when the
influencer attempts to induce *what the influencer regards as*
a faulty mental state into the target's deliberations (Mills
1995; Noggle 1996; this idea is built into Dowding's account).
Others argue that we should define manipulation in terms of the
attempt to introduce an *objectively* faulty mental state into
the target's deliberations (Hanna 2015: 634; see also Sunstein
2016: 89). Anne Barnhill suggests that our usage of the term
"manipulation" is inconsistent on the question of whose
standards determine whether the influencer attempts to induce the
target to adopt a faulty mental state (Barnhill 2014).



Although the trickery account has considerable appeal, it faces an
important challenge: It apparently fails to count as manipulative a
whole class of tactics that seem, intuitively, to be manipulative.
Tactics like charm, peer pressure, and emotional blackmail (tactics 1,
5, and 9) do not seem to involve trickery. Yet it seems quite natural
to regard them as examples of manipulation.


### 2.3 Manipulation as Pressure



A third way to characterize manipulation is to treat it as a kind of
pressure to do as the influencer wishes. On this account, tactics like
emotional blackmail and peer pressure are paradigm cases of
manipulation, since they exert pressure on the target by imposing
costs for failing to do what the manipulator wishes. One rationale for
treating manipulation as a form of pressure is the observation that
manipulation is neither rational persuasion nor coercion. It seems
plausible, then, to suppose that there is a continuum between rational
persuasion and coercion with regard to the level of pressure being
exerted, with rational persuasion exerting no pressure, coercion
exerting maximum pressure, and the middle region, manipulation,
exerting pressure that falls short of being coercive. In this way, we
might arrive at the idea that manipulation is a form of pressure that
does not rise to the level of coercion.



One of the earliest philosophical accounts of manipulation, by Ruth
Faden, Tom Beauchamp, and Nancy King, has this structure. They begin
by contrasting using rational persuasion to convince a patient to take
a medically necessary drug with simply coercing him to take it. Then
they observe that



> 
> 
> There are many in-between cases: For example, suppose the physician
> has made clear that he or she will be upset with the patient if the
> patient does not take the drug, and the patient is intimidated.
> Although the patient is not convinced that it is the best course to
> take the medication, ... the patient agrees to take the drug
> because it appears that acceptance will foster a better relationship
> with the doctor... Here the patient performs the action ...
> under a heavy *measure* of control by the physician's
> role, authority, and indeed prescription. Unlike the first case, the
> patient does not find it overwhelmingly difficult to resist the
> physician's proposal, but, unlike the second case, it is
> nonetheless awkward and difficult to resist this rather
> "controlling" physician. (Faden, Beauchamp, & King
> 1986: 258)
> 
> 
> 



They claim that such "in between" cases constitute
manipulation. However, they do not claim that *all* forms of
manipulation fall into the middle region of this continuum; they also
count forms of deception, indoctrination, and seduction as
manipulative, and claim that



> 
> 
> some manipulative strategies can be as controlling as coercion or as
> noncontrolling as persuasion; other manipulations fall somewhere
> between these endpoints. (Faden, Beauchamp, & King 1986: 259)
> 
> 
> 



Nevertheless, the idea that at least some forms of manipulation
involve pressure has been very influential.



Joel Feinberg offers a similar account of manipulation. He writes that
many techniques for getting someone to act in a certain way



> 
> 
> can be placed on a spectrum of force running from compulsion proper,
> at one extreme, through compulsive pressure, coercion proper, and
> coercive pressure, to manipulation, persuasion, enticement, and simple
> requests at the other extreme. The line between forcing to act and
> merely getting to act is drawn somewhere in the manipulation or
> persuasion part of the scale. (Feinberg 1989: 189)
> 
> 
> 



Michael Kligman and Charles Culver offer a similar account:



> 
> 
> The attempt to influence *B*'s behavior takes on a
> manipulative character when ... *A*'s primary intent
> is no longer to convince *B*, in a good faith manner, that
> acting as desired by *A* would be in keeping with
> *B*'s rational assessments of outcome; [but rather] to
> procure or engineer the needed assent by bringing pressure to bear, in
> a deliberate and calculated way, on what he presume to be the
> manipulable features of *B*'s motivational system.
> (Kligman & Culver 1992: 186-187)
> 
> 
> 



Kligman and Culver go on to distinguish this manipulative pressure
from coercion by claiming that the latter, unlike the former, involves
"sufficiently strong incentives ... that it would be
unreasonable to expect any rational person not to so act"
(Kligman & Culver 1992: 187). More recently, Marcia Baron and
Allen Wood have also discussed forms of manipulation that seem best
characterized as forms of pressure (Baron 2003; Wood 2014).



Although we can treat the idea that manipulation consists of a form of
pressure as a full-fledged theory of manipulation, most of the authors
just cited hold only that some forms of manipulation consist of
pressure. In particular, most agree with Faden, Beauchamp, and King,
that other forms of manipulation are more akin to deception. Thus, it
is somewhat artificial to speak of the pressure model as a theory
meant to cover all forms of manipulation. It is more accurate to
regard the pressure model as claiming that exerting non-coercive
pressure is sufficient (but perhaps not necessary) for an influence to
count as manipulative.


### 2.4 Disjunctive, Hybrid, and Other Views



Our discussion of the trickery and pressure accounts highlights a
rather striking fact: If we survey the tactics that seem intuitively
to be examples of manipulation, we find tactics that seem best
described as forms of trickery as well as tactics that seem best
described as forms of pressure. This is puzzling, since, on the face
of it, trickery and pressure seem rather dissimilar. What should we
make of the fact that we use the same
concept--manipulation--to refer to methods of influence that
seem to operate by such dissimilar mechanisms?



Several responses are possible. First, it is possible that the common
usage of term "manipulation" refers to such a diverse set
of phenomena that no single analysis will capture every form of
influence to which the term is commonly applied. Felicia Ackerman
argues that the term "manipulation" exhibits
"combinatorial vagueness": while it is connected to
features like inhibition of rational deliberation, unethicalness,
deceptiveness, playing upon non-rational impulses, shrewdness,
pressure, etc., "no condition on the list is sufficient,
... and no single condition ... is even necessary" for
an instance of influence to be manipulative (Ackerman 1995:
337-38).



Second, we might hold that the concept of manipulation is not vague
but rather disjunctive, so that manipulation consists of
*either* trickery *or* pressure. Indeed, in one of the
earliest philosophical analyses of manipulation, Joel Rudinow takes
this approach. Rudinow begins with the following thesis:



> 
> 
> *A* attempts to manipulate *S* iff *A* attempts
> to influence *S*'s behavior by means of deception or
> pressure or by playing on a supposed weakness of *S*. (Rudinow
> 1978: 343)
> 
> 
> 



He goes on to claim that that the use of pressure is manipulative only
if the would-be manipulator directs it at some supposed weakness in
his target that will render the target unable to resist it; this leads
him to finalize his definition in terms of "deception or by
playing upon a supposed weakness" of the target, with the second
disjunct meant to cover pressure-based tactics (Rudinow 1978: 346).
Several other philosophers have followed Rudinow's disjunctive
approach to defining manipulation (Tomlinson 1986; Sher 2011; Mandava
& Millum 2013). Indeed, as we have noted, it is common for people
who discuss manipulative pressure to claim that manipulation comes in
other forms as well.



A somewhat different version of the disjunctive strategy might begin
with the pressure account's continuum pressure of between
rational persuasion and coercion, but go on to add a second dimension
consisting of a continuum between rational persuasion and outright
lying. We might then define manipulation in terms of a two-dimensional
space bounded by rational persuasion, outright lying, and coercion. A
strategy like this is suggested by Sapir Handelman, although he adds a
third dimension that measures the level of "control" that
a given form of influence exerts (Handelman 2009).



Patricia Greenspan suggests that manipulation is a sort of hybrid
between coercion and deception. She writes that



> 
> 
> cases of manipulation seem to have a foot in both of the usual
> categories of intentional interference with another agent's
> autonomy, coercion and deception, but partly as a result, they do not
> fit squarely in either category. (Greenspan 2003: 157)
> 
> 
> 



Thus, we might characterize her view as a "conjunctive"
theory of manipulation, according to which it contains elements of
*both* pressure *and* deception. It certainly seems true
that manipulators often use both pressure and deception. For example,
a manipulator who employs peer pressure might also exaggerate the
extent to which the target's peers will disapprove of her if she
chooses the option that the manipulator wants her not to choose.
However, we can also point to relatively pure cases of manipulative
pressure or manipulative trickery: Indeed, all of the items on the
list above can be imagined as involving either pure pressure or pure
trickery. The apparent existence of cases of manipulation that involve
only deception or only pressure seems to be a problem for
Greenspan's hybrid view.



Strategies for characterizing manipulation that combine the trickery
and pressure accounts are appealing because they seem to do a better
job than either the trickery or pressure account alone in accounting
for the wide variety of tactics that seem intuitively to count as
manipulation. However, this wider coverage comes at a price. If the
disjunctive approach simply puts an "or" between the
trickery and pressure accounts, then it will leave unanswered the
question of what, if anything, makes all forms of manipulation
manifestations of the same phenomenon. Of course, it is possible that
this question cannot be answered because, as a matter of fact, there
are two irreducibly different forms of manipulation. But this seems
like a conclusion that we should accept only reluctantly, after having
made a good faith effort to determine whether there really is anything
in common between pressure-based manipulation and trickery-based
manipulation. (For a recent attempt to locate a common feature of
manipulative pressure and manipulative trickery, see Noggle 2020).



One possible answer to this challenge might be drawn from Marcia
Baron's important paper on "Manipulativeness", which
diagnoses the underlying moral wrong in manipulation in terms of an
Aristotelian vice. She suggests treating manipulativeness as the vice
of excess with regard to "to what extent--and how and when
and to whom and for what sorts of ends--to seek to influence
others' conduct" (Baron 2003: 48). On her view,
manipulativeness is at the opposite extreme from the vice of



> 
> 
> refraining from offering potentially helpful counsel; or refraining
> from trying to stop someone from doing something very dangerous, for
> example, from driving home from one's house while drunk. (Baron
> 2003: 48)
> 
> 
> 



Perhaps, then, we can understand the underlying similarity between
trickery- and pressure-based manipulation as manifestations of a
common vice, as different ways of going wrong with regard to how and
how much we should try to influence those around us.



Although Baron's remarks about the mind-set of the manipulator
are insightful and instructive, it is unclear whether they suffice to
answer the characterization question. For it is unclear whether, by
themselves, they can distinguish manipulation from other forms of
excess with regard to influence, such as coercion.



The idea that manipulation should be characterized at least in part by
reference to the mindset of the manipulator also appears in recent
work by Michael Klenk (2022). According to Klenk, the manipulator
influences negligently: manipulation involves influencing someone by
some method while disregarding whether that method reveals reasons for
the target to do, think, or feel as the manipulator wishes (Klenk
2022: 97). While this view requires a certain mindset from the
manipulator, it also has some affinities for the trickery view,
inasmuch as the negligence required is negligence with regard to
whether the influence tricks the target into changing how he feels,
acts, or thinks for a bad reason or no reason at all. A hybrid view
along these lines might allow us to integrate some of Baron's
insights about the manipulator's mindset with a more specific
characterization of the sort of influence to which that mindset
leads.


## 3. Answering the Evaluation Question



A complete answer to the evaluation question should tell us about the
sort of wrongfulness that manipulation possesses: Is it absolutely
immoral, *pro tanto* immoral, *prima facie* immoral,
etc.? It should also tell us *when* manipulation is immoral if
it is not always immoral. Finally, a satisfactory answer to the
evaluation question should tell us *why* it is immoral in cases
when it is immoral.


### 3.1 Is Manipulation Always Wrong?



Suppose that Tonya is a captured terrorist who has hidden a bomb in
the city and that her preferred course of action is to keep its
location secret until it explodes. And suppose that Irving is an FBI
interrogator who wants Tonya to reveal the bomb's location
before it explodes. How would this way filling in the details of the
case change our moral assessment of the various ways that Irving might
induce Tonya to change her mind?



One rather extreme answer would be: "not at all". This
hardline view would hold that manipulation is always morally wrong, no
matter what the consequences. Inasmuch as this hardline view resembles
Kant's notorious hardline position that lying is always wrong,
one might look to Kant's ethics for considerations to support
it. But just as hardly anyone accepts Kant's hardline position
against lying, the hardline view against manipulation also seems short
on defenders.



A less extreme position would be that while manipulation is always
*pro tanto* wrong, other moral considerations can sometimes
outweigh the *pro tanto* wrongness of manipulation. Thus, we
might think that manipulation is always wrong to some extent, but that
countervailing moral factors might sometimes suffice to make
manipulation justified on balance. What might such factors include?
One obvious candidate would be consequences--for example, the
fact that Irving's successful manipulation of Tonya would save
many innocent lives. Non-consequentialist factors might also be
thought to be countervailing considerations: Perhaps the immorality of
Tonya's character, or the fact that she is acting on an evil
desire or intention, is a countervailing factor that can outweigh the
*pro tanto* wrongness of Irving's manipulation. It is
important to note that, on this view, the fact that an action involves
manipulation is always a moral reason to avoid it, even if stronger
countervailing considerations render it not wrong on balance. For
example, even if Irving's manipulation of Terrorist Tonya is not
wrong on balance (e.g., because of the innocent lives that will be
saved), if Irving can get Tonya to reveal the bomb's location
without manipulation (or anything else that is comparably immoral),
then it would be morally better to avoid manipulating her.



By contrast, we might hold that manipulation is merely *prima
facie* immoral. On this view, there is a presumption that
manipulation is immoral, but this presumption can be defeated in some
situations. When the presumption *is* defeated, manipulation is
not wrong at all (i.e., not even *pro tanto* wrong). On this
view, we might say that while manipulation is usually wrong, it is not
wrong at all in the terrorist scenario. On this view, not only is
Irving's manipulation of Terrorist Tonya not wrong on balance,
but there is not even any moral reason for him to choose a
non-manipulative method of getting Tonya to reveal the bomb's
location if one is available.



A more complex--but, perhaps, ultimately more
plausible--view would combine the *prima facie* and
*pro tanto* approaches. Such a view would hold that
manipulation is *prima facie* immoral, but that when it is
wrong, the wrongness is *pro tanto* rather than absolute. On
this view, there are situations in which the presumption against
manipulation is defeated and manipulation is not even *pro
tanto* wrong. Perhaps bluffing in poker is like this. But where
the presumption is not defeated, the wrongness of manipulation is only
*pro tanto*, and thus able to be outweighed by sufficiently
weighty countervailing moral considerations. In such cases, even if it
is not wrong on balance to manipulate, it would still be morally
preferable to avoid manipulation in favor of some other, morally
legitimate, form of influence. Manipulating a friend into refraining
from sending a text to rekindle an abusive relationship might be an
example where the *pro tanto* wrongness of manipulation is
outweighed by other considerations. In such a case, it seems plausible
to maintain that it would be morally preferable to use reason rather
than manipulation to get one's friend to see that sending the
text would be a mistake, even if the facts of the situation would
justify resorting to manipulation. A view along these lines has been
defended by Marcia Baron (2014: 116-17). Although this view is
far less absolute than the hardline view, it retains the claim that
manipulation is *prima facie* wrong, so that there is always a
presumption that it is immoral, though this presumption is sometimes
defeated. It is also compatible with the idea that the term
"manipulation" has built into it a connotation of moral
dis-approbation.



However, the claim that manipulation is presumptively wrong might be
challenged. One might argue that "manipulation" is, or at
least should be, a morally neutral term without even the presumption
of immorality. On this view, whether a given instance of manipulation
is immoral will always depend on the facts of the situation, and the
term itself includes (or should include) no presumption one way or the
other. Clearly there are non-moralized notions of manipulation. When
we speak of a scientist manipulating variables in an experiment, or a
pilot manipulating the plane's controls, our use of the term is
devoid of any hint of moral opprobrium. In the social sciences, we can
find cases of the term "manipulation" being used in a
morally neutral way even when another person is the target of
manipulation. For example, several papers by the evolutionary
psychologist David M. Buss and colleagues use the term
"manipulation" more or less as a synonym for
"influence" in their discussions of how humans influence
the behavior of other humans (D.M. Buss 1992; D.M. Buss et al. 1987).
Of course, pointing out morally neutral usages of
"manipulation" does not really settle the question of
whether we should prefer a moralized or a non-moralized notion of
manipulation. An argument for preferring a non-moralized notion of
manipulation is provided by Allen Wood, who writes that



> 
> 
> If we think that moral argument should proceed not merely by invoking
> our pro- or con- sentiments, or appealing to our unargued intuitions,
> but instead by identifying objective facts about a situation that give
> us good reasons for condemning or approving certain things, then we
> would generally do much better to use a non-moralized sense of words
> like "coercion", "manipulation", and
> "exploitation"--a sense in which these words can be
> used to refer to such objective facts. (Wood 2014: 19-20)
> 
> 
> 



No matter how we answer the question of whether manipulation in
general is absolutely immoral, *prima facie* immoral, *pro
tanto* immoral, or not even presumptively immoral, there are
clearly situations in which manipulation is immoral. Any complete
answer to the evaluation question must explain why manipulation is
immoral in those cases where it is immoral. In addition, any view that
holds that manipulation is only *pro tanto* and/or *prima
facie* immoral should tell us what sorts of considerations can
defeat the presumption that it is immoral and/or outweigh its *pro
tanto* immorality. Several accounts have been offered to identify
the source of the moral wrongfulness of manipulation (when it is
wrong).


### 3.2 Manipulation and Harm



Perhaps the most straightforward way to explain the wrongfulness of
manipulation (when it is wrong) would point to the harm done to its
targets. Manipulation is commonly used aggressively, as a way to harm
the manipulator's target, or at least to benefit the manipulator
at the target's expense. The harmfulness of manipulation seems
especially salient in manipulative relationships, where manipulation
may lead to subordination and even abuse. The more minor economic harm
of the extraction of money from consumers might be cited as a
wrong-making feature of manipulative advertising, and there has been
some discussion of how manipulation might lead targets to enter into
exploitative contracts. Systematic political manipulation may weaken
democratic institutions and perhaps even lead to tyranny.



But not all instances of manipulation harm their victims. In fact,
manipulation sometimes benefits its target. If the harm to the victim
is the only wrong-making feature of manipulation, then paternalistic
or beneficent manipulation could never be even *pro tanto*
wrong. But this claim strikes most people as implausible. To see this,
consider that the debate about whether paternalistic nudges are
wrongfully manipulative is not settled simply by pointing out that
they benefit their targets. The fact that it seems possible for an act
to be wrongfully manipulative, even though it benefits (and is
intended to benefit) the target, presumably explains why there are
few, if any, defenses of the claim that manipulation is wrong
*only* when and because it harms the target. Nevertheless, it
seems plausible to hold that when manipulation does harm its target,
this harm adds to the wrongness of the manipulative behavior.


### 3.3 Manipulation and Autonomy



Another natural way to account for the wrongness of manipulation would
be to claim that it violates, undermines, or is otherwise antithetical
to the target's personal autonomy. Manipulation, by definition,
influences decision-making by means that--unlike rational
persuasion--do not seem to be autonomy-preserving. Thus, it is
natural to regard it as interfering with autonomous decision-making.
The idea that manipulation is wrong because it undermines autonomous
choice is implicit in discussions of manipulation as a potential
invalidator of consent. But even outside of discussions of autonomous
consent, the claim that manipulation is immoral because it undermines
autonomy is commonly made (and perhaps even more commonly
assumed).



However, there are reasons for caution about tying the moral status of
manipulation too tightly to its effects on autonomy. One can imagine
cases where it is not obvious that manipulation undermines autonomy.
One can even imagine cases where manipulation might enhance the
target's overall autonomy. For example, a teacher might
manipulate a student into taking a class which ultimately enhances her
autonomy by opening new career options, improving her skills of
critical self-reflection, etc. We might also imagine cases where
manipulation is used to support the target's autonomous choice.
Suppose that Tonya has autonomously decided to leave an abusive
partner, but that she is now tempted to go back. If Irving resorts to
a manipulative tactic designed to keep her from backsliding on her
autonomous choice to leave her abuser, then his action might seem less
like undermining Tonya's autonomy and more like supporting
it.



One might respond that these examples do not undermine the claim that
manipulation is wrong when and because it undermines autonomy because
these autonomy-enhancing instances of manipulation are not wrong.
However, this response faces a complication: Consider the case where
Irving manipulates Tonya into resisting the temptation to backslide on
her resolution to leave her abusive partner. It seems plausible to say
that Irving's manipulation in this case is not wrong on balance.
But it also seems plausible to say that it was nevertheless *pro
tanto* wrong, since it seems plausible to think that it would have
been morally preferable for Irving to find some non-manipulative way
to help Tonya avoid backsliding. But this judgment seems inconsistent
with the claim that manipulation is wrong when and because it
undermines autonomy. Of course, it is open to defenders of the
autonomy account of the wrongness of manipulation to bite the bullet
here and deny that autonomy-enhancing manipulation is even *pro
tanto* immoral.



Alternatively--and perhaps more plausibly--the defender of
the autonomy account of the wrongness of manipulation might concede
that Irving's autonomy-enhancing manipulation of Tonya is
*pro tanto* wrong. But she might explain this by claiming that
while the manipulation is autonomy-enhancing overall, it nevertheless
undermines Tonya's autonomy in the short term. The fact that
Irving's manipulation undermines Tonya's autonomy
temporarily explains why it is *pro tanto* immoral--and
why it would be morally better for Irving to find a non-manipulative
way to help Tonya avoid backsliding. But the fact that the
manipulation enhances Tonya's autonomy overall explains why it
is not immoral on balance. Of course, this strategy will not appeal to
those who hold that it is wrong to undermine a person's autonomy
even when doing so enhances that same person's overall
autonomy.



A more significant threat to the link between manipulation and
autonomy appears in an influential paper by Sarah Buss. She argues
that "when we are obligated to refrain from manipulation or
deceiving one another, this has relatively little to do with the value
of autonomy" (S. Buss 2005: 208). Buss's argument has two
parts. First, she claims that manipulation does not, in fact, deprive
its victim of the ability to make choices; indeed, it typically
presupposes that the target will make her own choice. But if the
manipulation does not take away the target's choice, Buss
maintains, it does not undermine her autonomy. (For a similar
argument, see Long 2014). Second, Buss argues that it is false to
claim that an autonomous agent would rationally reject being subjected
to manipulative influences. To support this claim, Buss argues that
manipulation and deception are "pervasive forms of human
interaction which are often quite benign and even valuable" (S.
Buss 2005: 224). Her most notable example is the cultivation of
romantic love, which often involves--and may even
require--significant amounts of behavior that is aptly described
as manipulation.



Defenders of the link between autonomy and the wrongness of
manipulation are not without potential replies to Buss's
intriguing argument. For one thing, it seems possible to craft a
notion of autonomy according to which having false information (or
other faulty mental states) or being subjected to pressure (even when
it does not rise to the level of coercion) compromise a person's
autonomy. Even though false beliefs about how to achieve one's
ends may not compromise one's authentic values or one's
powers of practical reasoning, they do seem to compromise one's
ability to achieve one's autonomously-chosen ends, and it is
plausible to regard this as a diminishment of (some form of) autonomy.
Moreover, the defender of the link between autonomy and the wrongness
of manipulation might simply deny that the forms of manipulation to
which an autonomous agent would consent (for example, those required
by romantic love) are *wrongful* cases of manipulation.


### 3.4 Manipulation and Treating Persons as Things



Several accounts of manipulation tie its moral status to the fact that
it influences behavior by methods that seem analogous to how one might
operate a tool or a device. On this view, manipulation involves
treating the target as a device to be operated rather than an agent to
be reasoned with. As Claudia Mills puts it,



> 
> 
> a manipulator is interested in reasons not as logical justifiers but
> as causal levers. For the manipulator, reasons are tools, and bad
> reasons can work as well as, or better than, a good one. (Mills 1995:
> 100-101)
> 
> 
> 



The point here is that a manipulator treats his target not as a fellow
rational agent, for that would require giving good reasons for doing
as the manipulator proposes. Instead, the manipulator treats his
target as a being whose behavior is to be elicited by pressing the
most effective "causal levers".



Of course, the idea that treating a person as a mere object is immoral
is a prominent feature of Kant's account of respect for persons
(see the entry on
 respect).
 Thus, it would be natural to appeal to Kantian ideas to help
elaborate the idea that manipulation is wrong because of the way that
it treats its target. As Thomas E. Hill writes,



> 
> 
> The idea that one should try to reason with others rather than to
> manipulate them by nonrational techniques is manifest in Kant's
> discussion of the duty to respect others. (Hill 1980: 96)
> 
> 
> 



Although
 Kant's moral philosophy
 is a natural place to look for the idea that the wrongfulness of
manipulation derives from a failure to treat the target as a person,
there are potential drawbacks to tying the account too tightly to
Kant. For Kant's notion of rational agency appears to be of the
hyper-cognitive, hyper-intellectual variety. Hence, if it is unethical
to fail to treat someone as *that* kind of rational agent, we
might be pushed toward the conclusion that the only acceptable basis
for human interaction is the kind of coldly intellectual rational
persuasion that excludes any appeal to emotions. But as we saw
earlier, there are good reasons for regarding such a conclusion as
implausible.



These considerations certainly do not entail that it is hopeless to
look to some notion of treating persons as things for an account of
the wrongfulness of manipulation. But they do suggest that more work
must be done before the claim that manipulation is wrong because it
treats a person as a mere thing can be regarded as much more than a
platitude.


### 3.5 Other Suggestions



Although harm, autonomy, and treating persons as things are the most
prominent suggestions about what makes manipulation wrong when it is
wrong, one can find other suggestions in the literature. For example,
Marcia Baron's virtue-theoretic account of manipulativeness
suggests that we might account for what is wrong about manipulation in
terms of the character of the manipulator (Baron 2003). Patricia
Greenspan suggests that when manipulation is immoral, it is because it
violates the terms of the relationship between the manipulator and his
target--terms that will vary according to the nature of the
relationship between them (Greenspan 2003). Such a view
suggests--plausibly--that the moral status of a given
instance of manipulation will depend at least in part on the nature of
the relationship between the influencer and the target of the
influence.


## 4. Further Issues



In addition to answering the identification and evaluation questions,
a complete theory of manipulation should address several further
issues.


### 4.1 Manipulating Persons versus Manipulating Situations



Discussions of manipulation often distinguish between cases where the
manipulator influences his target directly, and cases where the
manipulator influences the target's behavior by arranging the
target's environment in ways that induce her to act one way
rather than another. Consider Joel Rudinow's example of a
malingerer who manipulates a psychiatrist into admitting him to the
psychiatric ward (Rudinow 1978). He does this by fooling a police
officer into thinking he is about to commit suicide. The police
officer brings him to the ward, reports that he is suicidal, and
requests that he be admitted. Although the psychiatrist is not fooled,
her hospital's rules force her to admit the malingerer at the
police officer's request. It seems clear that the malingerer has
manipulated the police officer by tricking him into adopting a faulty
belief. But the psychiatrist, while not falling for the feigned
suicide attempt and thus not adopting any faulty beliefs, is
nevertheless induced to do what she did not want to do. Although it
seems correct to say that the psychiatrist was manipulated, this form
of manipulation seems different from what was done to the police
officer. By feigning a suicide attempt, the malingerer has tampered
with the police officer's beliefs. But he has maneuvered the
psychiatrist into admitting him, not by tampering with her
psychological states, but rather by "gaming the system",
as we might say.



In his book, *The Art of Political Manipulation* (Riker 1986)
the political scientist William Riker calls the latter form of
manipulation "heresthetic," and characterizes it as
"structuring the world so you can win" (1986: ix). His
focus is on political tactics like gerrymandering, poison pill
amendments, and strategic voting, all of which are often described as
manipulation, and all of which seem more like what Rudinow's
malingerer does to the psychiatrist than what he does to the police
officer.



In a similar way, the sociologists Donald Warwick and Herbert Kelman
distinguish between "environmental" and
"psychic" manipulation (Warwick & Kelman 1973). Their
work influenced Faden, Beauchamp, and King's seminal
philosophical account of manipulation, which makes a similar
distinction (Faden, Beauchamp, & King 1986: 355-68). Anne
Barnhill distinguishes between manipulation that "changes the
options available to the person or changes the situation she's
in, and thereby changes her attitudes" on the one hand, and
manipulation that "changes a person's attitudes directly
without changing the options available to her or the surrounding
situation" on the other (Barnhill 2014: 53). Drawing a similar
distinction, Claudia Mills writes



> 
> 
> If *A* wants to get *B* to do act x, there are two
> general strategies that *A* might undertake. *A* might
> change, or propose to change, the external or objective features of
> *B*'s choice situation; or alternatively, *A*
> might try to alter certain internal or subjective features of
> *B*'s choice situation. While some writers might call
> both strategies manipulative, at least in certain circumstances, I
> prefer to reserve the label *manipulation* for a subset of
> morally problematic actions falling in the second category. (Mills
> 1995: 97)
> 
> 
> 



Although Rudinow's case provides a clear contrast between what
we might call psychological manipulation and situational manipulation,
this distinction--or at least its importance--is not always
so clear. Consider
 tactic 9
 above, where Irving threatens to withdraw his friendship if Tonya
does not do as Irving wishes. Is this direct psychological
manipulation, or situational manipulation? The criterion offered by
Barnhill and others counts it as situational manipulation, since
Irving changes Tonya's choice situation so that doing Y and
retaining Irving's friendship is no longer an option. But how is
this tactic any less of a direct interference with Tonya's
decision than if Irving had engaged in some form of deception? Why
would it be more like what the malingerer does to the police officer
than what he does to the psychiatrist?



This is not to deny that there is a difference between psychological
and situational manipulation. Instead, it is to ask what that
difference is, and why it might matter. Presumably, the distinction is
meant to differentiate between tactics that affect a target's
behavior by directly tampering with her psychology and those that do
not. But if this is the distinction, then it seems plausible to think
that Irving's use of emotional blackmail is at least as direct a
tampering with Tonya's psychology as, say, Iago's dropping
of the handkerchief in a location where it will trick Othello into
becoming inappropriately suspicious. Yet criteria like those proposed
by Mills and Barnhill seem to imply that these two forms of
manipulation are on opposite sides of that distinction.



Nevertheless, there does seem something importantly different between
what the malingerer in Rudinow's example does to the police
officer and what he does to the psychiatrist. But much work remains to
be done to provide a well-motivated account of that difference. Such
an account should not only get the intuitively right answers in cases
of direct pressure (like emotional blackmail) and indirect deception
(like Iago's dropping the handkerchief), but it should also
explain whether and why the distinction makes a moral difference.


### 4.2 Manipulation and Intent



Some views of manipulation seem to suggest, if not require, that
manipulators have fairly complex intentions--such as the
intention to lead the target astray--for manipulation to occur.
Marcia Baron and Kate Manne offer compelling reasons to think that
such requirements are too strong. Baron argues that manipulation can
occur even if the manipulator only has



> 
> 
> a combination of intent and recklessness: the aim of getting the other
> person do what one wants, together with recklessness in the way that
> one goes about reaching that goal. (Baron 2014: 103)
> 
> 
> 



She goes on to argue that the manipulator need not be aware that she
has that intention (Baron 2014, 101). Manne agrees; to support this
claim, she offers the example of Joan, who gives extravagant gifts to
relatives who pay her less attention than (she thinks) they should
(Manne 2014, 225). Manne tells Joan's story in such a way that
it seems plausible to say both that Joan's gift-giving is a
manipulative attempt to make her relatives feel guilty, and that Joan
does not consciously intend to make her relatives feel guilty. If
Manne's description of her example is correct, then it seems
that Joan can manipulate her relatives into feeling guilty without
having any conscious intention of making them feel guilty. (Later,
Manne [2014, 235] goes even farther, suggesting that "people can
even behave manipulatively despite consciously intending not
to.") Of course, those who hold that manipulation requires more
conscious intention than Manne allows might simply deny that
Joan's behavior is manipulative. Nevertheless, the arguments
offered by Baron and Manne raise important questions about the level
of conscious intentionality required for an action to be
manipulative.



The question of what sort of intention is required for an act to count
as manipulative has practical implications for assessing the behavior
of children, who sometimes behave in ways that seem aptly described as
manipulative even when they are too young to have the complicated
intentions that some theories of manipulation might require. Similar
worries arise for assessing the behavior of people for whom
manipulativeness has become a habit, or a part of their personalities.
Indeed, certain personality disorders--such as borderline
personality disorder and antisocial personality disorder--are
often characterized by manipulativeness, as is the so-called
Machiavellian personality type (Christie & Geis 1970). As
professor of psychiatric nursing Len Bowers writes,



> 
> 
> the manipulative behaviour of some personality-disordered (PD)
> patients is consistent and frequent. It is an integral part of their
> interpersonal style, a part of the very disorder itself. (Bowers 2003:
> 329; see also Potter 2006)
> 
> 
> 



In such cases, one wonders what level of intentionality lies behind
behavior that we would otherwise think of as manipulative. Even if we
are inclined to regard childhood or certain personality disorders as
factors that mitigate the blameworthiness of manipulative behavior, it
would seem counterintuitive for a theory of manipulation to say that
children and persons with personality disorders are incapable of
acting manipulatively.


### 4.3 Manipulation, Vulnerability, and Oppression



The idea that manipulation can be a tool for the powerful to oppress
the less powerful is not new, even if the term
"manipulation" has not always been used to express it.
Marxian notions of ideology and false consciousness as mechanisms that
facilitate the exploitation of workers by capital clearly resemble the
concept of manipulation as it is being used here. (Allen Wood explores
some of these connections in Wood 2014.) More recently, the concept of
"gas lighting" has become a common feature of feminist
theorizing about how the patriarchy manipulates women into doubting
their own judgments about reality. On a smaller scale, a bevy of
self-help books focus on how manipulative tactics can be used to
create and maintain subordination within relationships (Braiker 2004;
Simon 2010; Kole 2016).



A relative lack of socio-political power is almost certainly one
source of vulnerability to manipulation. But there are likely others
as well. The trickery model of manipulation suggests that people who
are less intellectually sophisticated are especially vulnerable to
trickery and therefore to manipulation. The pressure model suggests
that financial, social, and emotional desperation may make one
especially vulnerable to pressures created by threats to worsen an
already tenuous situation. Moreover, some forms of manipulation, like
so-called "negging" (tactic 6) and gaslighting
 (tactic 8)
 may work to increase the target's vulnerability to further
manipulation.



However, it may also be true that manipulation is a tempting tool for
use by the vulnerable against the powerful. As Patricia Greenspan
notes,



> 
> 
> manipulation is often recommended as a strategy particularly for
> women, or simply is treated as characteristic of women, at least in a
> world where women cannot act openly to achieve their ends. A further
> argument for manipulation in these cases appeals to the limits on what
> is possible in a position of subordination. (Greenspan 2003: 156)
> 
> 
> 



Similarly, Len Bowers observes that



> 
> 
> it is possible to interpret manipulation as a normal response to
> incarceration, rather than as being a pathological style of
> behavior,
> 
> 
> 
> ...
> 
> 
> 
> manipulative strategies may be viewed as a low-key way of fighting
> back at a system which has deprived the prisoner of normal freedom.
> (Bowers 2003: 330)
> 
> 
> 



Finally, it seems likely that one reason why children often resort to
manipulative tactics is that they often lack any other (or any other
equally effective) way to get what they want.



It is also worth noting that the idea that the idea that manipulation
undermines autonomous choice might itself be used, somewhat
paradoxically, to undermine autonomous choice, especially among the
non-elite. This point is comes out forcefully in a comment by Sarah
Skwire (2015, Other Internet Resources) on George Akerlof and Robert
Shiller's book, *Phishing for Phools* (Akerlof &
Shiller 2015). Akerlof and Shiller discuss a number of advertising,
sales, and marketing practices that they deem manipulative. Skwire
suggests that the reason why Akerlof and Shiller call these practices
manipulative is that consumers subjected to them make choices that
Akerlof and Shiller think are sufficiently irrational that they would
only be made under the influence of manipulation. Skwire writes that
this approach to detecting manipulation demonstrates "contempt
for the decisions made by people who are poorer and from a lower
social class than the authors" (Skwire 2015, Other Internet
Resources). In short, she suggests that Akerlof and Shiller are too
quick to suspect manipulation in cases where people make different
decisions from the ones they think best. Whether or not we agree with
Skwire's criticisms of Akerlof and Shiller, her point serves as
a cautionary one: Even if we accept that manipulation undermines
autonomous choice, we must be careful not to use that as a reason to
suspect that people who make different choices from what we think are
best must therefore be victims of manipulation. It would be
ironic--and unjust--to use the idea that manipulation is a
wrongful interference with autonomy as a weapon to delegitimize the
autonomous choices of people with whom we disagree or whose
situations, needs, and values we do not understand.