Institute For The Future

Persuasion, Coercion, and MLK

For many years now, serious academic researchers have been looking closely at the concept, technologies, and implications of persuasion. This Spring, the Institute for the Future is embarking on a very exciting research program to look at the state of persuasion as it stands today, how persuasive technologies and techniques might evolve over the next ten years, and what persuasion will feel like in this world.

 

On the occasion of our nation’s recognition and celebration of Martin Luther King, the leader and icon of a movement of millions, who utterly transformed the racial dynamics and power structure in this country, I’d like to take the opportunity to reflect on some of his words and his mastery of the most fundamental persuasive technologies and skills—oral communication, an understanding of the motivations and values of human beings, and an unwavering commitment to a just purpose.

 

Growing up in Birmingham, Alabama, and being witness to even just the shadow of the lingering racism and cultural resistance to change that the Civil Rights Movement faced, there can be no doubt that even in an era of new understandings of persuasion and technologies to create targeted behavioral shifts, there will always be few substitutes for the combination of determination and daily grassroots work that ultimately leads to change.

 

Although every King speech was in some sense an act of persuasion, he said very little about it directly. However, in a speech in Montgomery in 1955, shortly after Rosa Parks was arrested for not giving up her seat on a city bus, King expresses how persuasion will play a role in the growing movement.

 

Standing beside love is always justice, and we are only using the tools of justice. Not only are we using the tools of persuasion, but we’ve come to see that we’ve got to use the tools of coercion. Not only is this thing a process of education, but it is also a process of legislation.

 

In this key early speech, King makes a distinction between the two nodes of the strategy that will ultimately lead to victory for the Civil rights Movement: persuasion and coercion, i.e. changing “hearts and minds,” and enacting new legislation. Persuasion is seen as the “soft power” and coercion as the hard force necessary to implement structural changes.

 

Over the years, the line between persuasion and coercion seems to have been blurring, as many of the techniques and “soft” tools of persuasion have been turned into “hard” technologies. A digital nudge on our mobile device can be very effective at changing behavior, but so can a digital lockdown on how we use software and share content on the web. Do we still call the first persuasion and the other coercion? Where else do you see this line being blurred?

 

Persuasion may not be any easier today than it was when Dr. King was trying to change the racial culture in the U.S., but the practice of persuasion seems much more complicated, and power of persuasion much more evasive.

 

While the Technology Horizons Program takes new persuasive technologies to be the core drivers for change, we must still understand what ends people are using persuasion for, what values are driving the development of new technologies, and how these technologies will come to matter in the lives of people.

 

We look forward to exploring this topic with you over the coming months.