In this post, I’m going to address the question of how to persuade someone with power to make a sacrifice for the common good. It seems to me that this is one of the most intractable problems in history. For thousands of years, people with power have been more likely to impose their will on others than to shift positions through persuasion. Let’s start with some provocative voices on power and persuasion.
- “When the whole world is silent, even one voice becomes powerful.” Malala Yousafzai.
- “Mastering others is strength. Mastering yourself is true power.” Lao Tzu
- “All things are subject to interpretation. Whichever interpretation prevails at a given time is a function of power and not truth.” Friedrich Nietzsche
- “The power to question is the basis of all human progress.” Indira Gandhi
- “Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will.” Frederick Douglass
- “What is illiberal is not persuasion but imposition of one’s views.” Richard Dawkins
- “A heart can no more be forced to love than a stomach can be forced to digest food by persuasion.” Alfred Nobel
- “The triumph of persuasion over force is the sign of a civilized society.” Mark Skousen
From the first six quotes, one might conclude that power can take the form of self-mastery, speaking up, interpretation, questioning, demanding, and imposing. The dictionary defines power as the possession of control or command over others; perceived authority or power over people’s minds. The last two quotes question the ability to confront power through persuasion – even though that’s the mark of civilized society. Does that mean civilization, as we are taught to understand it, is an illusion?
I just read three books that shed light on that question: Deacon King Kong, by James McBride, How Beautiful We Were by Imbolo Mbue, and Dark Psychology: The Art of Persuasion and the Power of Manipulation by Alec Froning.
In the brilliant novel, Deacon King Kong, set in 1969 in Brooklyn, James McBride writes with cutting humor to carve open the deep wounds of the African American community. After cracking jokes, he unleashes insights that clarify the brewing rage that exists right below the cultural surface. He writes, “while phony versions of black and Latino life ruled the Broadway roost, making white writers rich, blacks and Latinos cleaned the apartments and dragged out the trash and made the music and filled the jails and functioned as local color.” For centuries, African American humor has been a mode of minimizing pain and expressing grief – a way to assert one’s humanity in the face of exploitation and mass murder. The sad truth in McBride’s book is that white power has prevailed for the last 400 years in America, and the fact remains there does not appear to be any real healing. No matter how persuasive the arguments may be for inclusion and equal rights, the gap between white and black opportunity only grows wider and deeper. No joking matter.
In the stunning novel, How Beautiful we Were, Imbolo Mbue writes the devastating story of a fictional African village in 1980. Mbue describes the account of officials of an American oil company coming to the village of Kosawa to meet with the locals whose children are dying from poisoned water dumped in the fields by their operations. The people try to persuade the company to leave and to restore their land. The officials say they are doing everything they can, but the locals aren’t buying it. They have heard too many promises and have seen too few programs in the decades the oil company has been decimating their environment and killing their children. Not surprisingly, the oil company has bought the support of the village head as well as the country’s dictator so they are free to act with impunity. In this compelling fable, Mbue not only reveals the ugly truths of power and corruption, but also exposes a nuanced exploration of what it takes to change the course of capitalism, colonialism, and insatiable greed. We find that persuasive words are not enough. Sadly, a desperate act of persuasion results in a violent reaction in which many people are killed.
The villagers exhaust every option to persuade the oil company to get off their land. They meet with journalists, publish articles to promote activism, travel to the capital to plead with government officials, AND consider taking up arms. She writes, “someday, when you’re old, you’ll see that the ones who came to kill us and the ones who’ll run to save us are the same. No matter their pretenses, they all arrive believing they have the power to take from us or give to us whatever will satisfy their endless wants.”
How Beautiful We Were charts the ways repression can transform basic human needs into radical acts. When people in power are indifferent to appeals for more humanity, their PR responses come across as hollow declarations that further enflame the victims. Virtue signaling can only fool a few people some of the time. Without the resources for adequate food, housing, transportation, and medical care people are left with few options short of revolution.
The question these books raise for me is: when confronted with overwhelming, disingenuous, and uneven power, why does persuasion feel pathetic? Many people familiar with Vietnam tried to persuade the US to leave in 1962. Many governments around the world tried to persuade the US not to invade Iraq in 2003. Many peace activists in Asia tried to persuade China to keep its hands off Hong Kong. Many people in the Ukraine tried to persuade Russia not to invade its territory. It would appear that many people in power simply don’t care as long as they can hold onto what they see as their assumed rights.
The New York Times columnist, Ezra Klein, put another spin on power. He writes,
“The American economy runs on poverty, or at least the constant threat of it. Americans like their goods cheap and their services plentiful and the two of them, together, require a sprawling labor force willing to work tough jobs at crummy wages. On the right, the barest glimmer of worker power is treated as a policy emergency, and the whip of poverty, not the lure of higher wages, is the appropriate response.”
Yes, power pathologies come into play in government, corporations, not-for-profit organizations, social clubs, communities, and families. As individuals, if persuasion seems rather hopeless, how do we respond with dignity. One of my favorite writers, Margaret Renkl, tells the story of how the honesty of a courageous woman fighting for her life against glioblastoma calls us to consider our own power against despair, our own power to reverse injustice. The woman writes,
“To be restored to wholeness, to stay hopeful that healing — whatever that means to us — is possible.” “I believe in these things. I believe in it for me, for you, and for all of humanity. And for this earth we have misused and abused.” “I think about how my purpose may be the same in death as it continues to be in life — surrendering to the hope that our weaknesses can be made strong, that what is broken can be made whole.”
I encourage you to read the entire article at: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/14/opinion/nashville-food-project.html?action=click&module=Opinion&pgtype=Homepage
The third book I read related to this issue of persuasion and power was Dark Psychology: The Art of Persuasion and the Power of Manipulation by Alec Froning. Although I didn’t find the book particularly substantive, I was struck by his conception of a dark, psychological triad: Narcissism, Machiavellianism, and Psychopathy. Narcissists are completely driven by self-interest. A Machiavellian personality cunningly manipulates others in order to assume more power over them. And a psychopathic personality uses aggressive means to acquire and maintain dominance over others. It seems to me those three types compose a rather wicked combination for those who want to obtain power and abuse it. The triad also highlights how difficult it is to persuade those driven by a dark psychology to change course.
So returning to the original question of this post: how to persuade someone with power to make a sacrifice for the common good?
Frankly, I’m not sure there is a good answer. What inspires me, however, are the words and actions of people mentioned in this post:
- I feel challenged by Malala who showed us that one voice can be powerful.
- I feel motivated by Lao Tzu who implores us to first master ourselves.
- I feel determined to inquire deeply by Nietzsche who reminds us that what we read about historical events may be less about truth and more about interpretations made by people in power at the time.
- I feel inspired by the words of Indira Gandhi who pushes us to ask questions.
- I feel chastened by Frederick Douglass who asserts that people won’t concede power without us demanding that they do so.
- I feel humbled by Alfred Nobel who suggests that persuasion has its limits.
- I feel hopeful that, with collective action over time, we can create a more civilized society.
- I feel moved by Margaret Renkl’s story of a young, powerful woman who, facing death, still believes that we can be restored to wholeness and that what is broken can be made whole.
I’m also encouraged by the prominent, but precarious, coalition that Israel just formed to oust its Prime Minister, Bad Boy Bibi, who has clung to power and dominated politics for the last 12 years. The coalition consists of right-wingers, centrists, Muslims and Jews from no less than eight different factions. Remarkably, this coalition was persuaded to join forces in order to defeat dark power.
Hopefully, these voices and actions will help us to develop our powers of persuasion to the point where we might shift the hearts and minds of people in power to sacrifice for the common good. May it be so.
Also published on Medium.
You’re the man Ricky!