The Concept and Ethics of Manipulation
Published on 17. April 2025
Book
Hardback
251 pages
978-1-009-44344-9 (ISBN)
Description
Everyone is exposed to manipulation daily, and everyone manipulates too. The impact of manipulations in personal, social, and political life is enormous. Is this tragic? Is it avoidable? Is it always morally bad or regrettable? To answer these questions, we need a theory of manipulation. This book is the first comprehensive philosophical theory of manipulation. Shlomo Cohen offers a new theory on what manipulation is, distinguishing it from other kinds of influence, and assesses the basic moral status of manipulation. In contrast to prevailing views, he argues that manipulation, though often morally bad, is not inherently morally bad, and that alongside its dangers, it has a central role as a 'lubricant' of social frictions which helps to regulate social and political relations. His analysis offers a window to better understanding the ethics of the interplay of reason and power in human relations.
Reviews / Votes
'While manipulation has received greater attention over the last decade or so from philosophers as well as legal scholars and experts in the decision sciences, book-length treatments remain scarce. Cohen's book lands at the perfect time, and provides a novel philosophical approach to understanding the nature of manipulation as something that evades the traditional philosophical method of conceptual analysis. Cohen provocatively argues that manipulation has up to this point largely received a bad rap, with important implications for the way we live together in political society.' Moti Gorin, Colorado State University '... one wonders, after reading Cohen, how often ... decisions are themselves unconscious. Are we manipulated to be manipulators, by ourselves to ourselves? We must respect any book that leads to such questions. Cohen is quite mordant. His book is one for our time, a rough and tumble era without an aspirational character.' Christopher Giofreda, ThoughtfoxMore details
Language
English
Place of publication
Cambridge
United Kingdom
Illustrations
Worked examples or Exercises
Dimensions
Height: 235 mm
Width: 157 mm
Thickness: 18 mm
Weight
524 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-009-44344-9 (9781009443449)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Person
Shlomo Cohen is an Associate Professor of Philosophy at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Israel.
Content
1. An elusive concept; 2. Manipulation as conceptual metaphor; 3. Manipulation: the anatomy; 4. The moral status of manipulation; 5. Manipulation and respect for persons; 6. On manipulation in politics; Bibliography; Index.