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The Persuaders: The hidden industry that wants to change your mind
Every day, many people will try to change your mind, but they won’t reason with you. Instead, you’ll be nudged, anchored, incentivised and manipulated in barely noticeable ways. It’s a profound shift in the way we interact with one another. Philosopher James Garvey explores the hidden story of persuasion and the men and women in the business of changing our minds. From the covert PR used to start the first Gulf War to the neuromarketing of products to appeal to our unconscious minds, he reveals the dark arts practised by professional persuaders.How did we end up with a world where beliefs are mass-produced by lobbyists and PR firms? Could Google or Facebook swing elections? Are new kinds of persuasion making us less likely to live happy, decent lives in an open, peaceful world? Is it too late, or can we learn to listen to reason again? The Persuaders is a call to think again about how we think now.
309 pages, Kindle Edition
First published June 9, 2015
30 people are currently reading
361 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 26 of 26 reviews
August 20, 2016
Always Irrational
James Garvey's account of modern persuasive techniques is not persuasive. Though he elaborates these practices well, and the book is very informative, he has an academic's repulsion at human nature and how malleable it is. You know you're in trouble from the premise. As a philosopher, he is a champion of reason, but is shocked by how little reason affects people nowadays. We have been highjacked, don't you know, by a veritable army of hidden persuaders who want to short-circuit your reason and influence you to do things you may not want to do.
Garvey hates the modern world with all its intrusions and seems to think we are heading straight to non- rational hell. All I can say is, where do you think we've been? I mean, c'mon - religion - rational, right? All those wonderful St. Augustine reasons for why our fate is wrapped up with Jesus. The perfectly rational Roman Empire? Home of murder, torture, crucifixion, empire. slavery, etc. Or perhaps the British Empire? More slavery, racism, eugenics, coolies, etc. I'm afraid the modern world, which he despises for its consumerism, is less violent, more rational, and much more progressive than the less modern world. He should read the UN Progress on Goals (eliminating poverty and hunger, reducing disease, etc) which has been remarkably successful in the last 20 years. Perhaps Pinker's The Better Angels of Our Nature, which shows a profound collapse in violence in the last 100 years.
I'm afraid he is a Guardian reading, progress denying moaner who can't stand the fact that academic reasoning appears obsolete even to him. That he has only recently discovered Behavioural Economics and modern marketing shows what an ostrich he is. And his cure? Teach Aristotle again! Fight the intrusion. New, proscriptive legislation. I mean. c'mon. It begins as a useful survey and collapses into a polemic about loss of freedom. Wake up James - we were NEVER rational and never will be.
James Garvey's account of modern persuasive techniques is not persuasive. Though he elaborates these practices well, and the book is very informative, he has an academic's repulsion at human nature and how malleable it is. You know you're in trouble from the premise. As a philosopher, he is a champion of reason, but is shocked by how little reason affects people nowadays. We have been highjacked, don't you know, by a veritable army of hidden persuaders who want to short-circuit your reason and influence you to do things you may not want to do.
Garvey hates the modern world with all its intrusions and seems to think we are heading straight to non- rational hell. All I can say is, where do you think we've been? I mean, c'mon - religion - rational, right? All those wonderful St. Augustine reasons for why our fate is wrapped up with Jesus. The perfectly rational Roman Empire? Home of murder, torture, crucifixion, empire. slavery, etc. Or perhaps the British Empire? More slavery, racism, eugenics, coolies, etc. I'm afraid the modern world, which he despises for its consumerism, is less violent, more rational, and much more progressive than the less modern world. He should read the UN Progress on Goals (eliminating poverty and hunger, reducing disease, etc) which has been remarkably successful in the last 20 years. Perhaps Pinker's The Better Angels of Our Nature, which shows a profound collapse in violence in the last 100 years.
I'm afraid he is a Guardian reading, progress denying moaner who can't stand the fact that academic reasoning appears obsolete even to him. That he has only recently discovered Behavioural Economics and modern marketing shows what an ostrich he is. And his cure? Teach Aristotle again! Fight the intrusion. New, proscriptive legislation. I mean. c'mon. It begins as a useful survey and collapses into a polemic about loss of freedom. Wake up James - we were NEVER rational and never will be.
December 24, 2019
The Persuaders starts as a history of PR, finishes as a history of advertising and in the middle takes a frustrating detour into summarising other books I’ve read, particularly Nudge and Thinking Fast and Slow. The insights from those books are fascinating and if you haven’t read them, maybe they add something here, but I found myself skipping quite a bit.
The history sections are well worth reading though with unbelievable examples of manipulation that people have got away with. It’s an intriguing and unanswered question - what to do with the knowledge of how consumers are targeted - but at least this book illuminates the lengths (or possibly depths) companies will go to in order to sell you their product.
The history sections are well worth reading though with unbelievable examples of manipulation that people have got away with. It’s an intriguing and unanswered question - what to do with the knowledge of how consumers are targeted - but at least this book illuminates the lengths (or possibly depths) companies will go to in order to sell you their product.
July 16, 2021
Somewhat prose-y, but makes very well the point it wants to make. I know that because I'm one of those Garvey is criticising in the book. But because I work more in business products, I probably don't inflict as much damage to the body politic as some others. But the tactics are familiar to me, some in fact more than familiar. Which is also why I'm convinced of the conclusion of sorts that Garvey arrives at: Something needs to be done, and educating ourselves is probably the best place to start.
Am I hopeful? Truthfully, no. But I buy the argument, and liked the book. We need writing like this, that is willing to make us do the hard work and think about how we are being influenced without our knowledge.
If I have one gripe, it is that the writer, fully capable of going there, stops just short of attacking the capitalistic system that directly incentivises the persuading that's going on. I would have read that chapter with interest.
Recommended. Read.
Am I hopeful? Truthfully, no. But I buy the argument, and liked the book. We need writing like this, that is willing to make us do the hard work and think about how we are being influenced without our knowledge.
If I have one gripe, it is that the writer, fully capable of going there, stops just short of attacking the capitalistic system that directly incentivises the persuading that's going on. I would have read that chapter with interest.
Recommended. Read.
February 18, 2024
Just a very quick word - this book is a great read. It gives insights into how advertising and persuasion changed and helps understand why the current political nightmares around the world are possible and how it's intertwined with how advertising has changed during the past century - and how we thus got used to certain patterns of persuasion that have nothing to do with ratio and everything with emotions.
Read it! It will make you a more enlightened person!
Read it! It will make you a more enlightened person!
December 11, 2017
Very interesting -but also a bit scary- book. This book helps you to understand how you are being influenced every day, and how irrational most of our choices are. Hopefully, being aware of these methods helps with being less susceptible to it.
April 17, 2021
This book is a decent book. I don't know why I'm not really satisfied after reading this book. I already knew about unconscious mind effects our behaviors so while reading this book I didn't gain much information that I hadn't known before. So I'd give this book two stars out of five. I'd recommend you to read other psychology books (especially about unconsciousness) or other philosophy books rather than reading this one. I'm sorry but thay was my honest opinion. The writing itself is so great tho it's just the content is not that mindblowing for me.
December 14, 2016
Thoroughly fascinating and totally terrifying. If you've ever wondered how the hell we ended up in the post-truth world we inhabit today, this is a good introduction.
We are constantly manipulated in our everyday lives. Whether the ability to reason is something we've lost, or something we've never really had, being at least vaguely aware of the methods used to make us spend our money or cast our votes gives us some small defence against them.
Essential reading.
We are constantly manipulated in our everyday lives. Whether the ability to reason is something we've lost, or something we've never really had, being at least vaguely aware of the methods used to make us spend our money or cast our votes gives us some small defence against them.
Essential reading.
June 2, 2023
I had read this book back in June 2020 and have been wanting to write a review on this book in goodreads for so long but somehow never had the time to get down to it (though I HAD reviewed this book already in my blog some time ago)
I thought this book is very relevant in this day and age when truth can be made subjective (depending on whichever way you wanna argue) and we can no longer tell what is right and what is wrong anymore. If biological sex can be made subjective, you bet I better read on the techniques utilized by persuaders in trying to change our mind. So that if they ever employ that technique on me, I can spot it straightaway. And this is exactly the value of this book - opening up our minds on how we can be so easily manipulated by advertisers and PR agencies until we can make decisions that sometimes go against all our better judgment.
After reading this book, I will never look at any statement, commercial, campaign and trend in the same way again.
In this book, I learned that once upon a time, people placed a lot of emphasis on reasoning and logical thinking. It was a time when advertisement industry and PR firms were not yet around. The intellectual culture, and the effect of the Renaissance enlightenment were a dominant presence back then and very profoundly felt. People organized debates in clubs all over the country (in the UK) to examine facts and contexts of any issue. Debates became a source of entertainment in pubs/salons at that time (circa 1700s). People cultivated oratory skills and nurtured their intellect the way our people currently cultivate superficial beauty and hedonistic lifestyle.
But around the early 1900s… something changed. We found out that we can influence people faster and more effectively by bypassing their brain and manipulating their psychology. It started around the time when the tobacco industry wanted to sell cigarettes to women. At that time, only men smoked tobacco and for women to smoke in public was taboo. A PR firm was hired to create a campaign for getting women to smoke. They associated the act of public smoking by women with the suffragette movement of women’s equal rights and freedom. They hired a lot of young women to light “the torch of freedom” (the cigarette was the torch and lighting it symbolised freedom) while walking on Fifth Avenue on Easter Sunday.
By associating certain generally good ideas like love/freedom/justice/empowerment with any (woke) agenda that we want to propagate, that agenda can be made to look positive because it is all about love/freedom/justice/empowerment... when in fact, the agenda/product etc has got nothing to do with those ideas at all.
When it comes to product marketing, when you associate your brand with prestige and elegance and wealth, people will buy your product more.Now advertisement is no longer about promoting your products in a factual manner … but by giving your products the right kind of symbolism, slogans and association. And they keep repeating the slogans, symbolisms, and associations ad nauseum, ad infinitum.
And the amazing thing is, it works!
Because apparently, reasoning with people won’t change their minds, according to this book. Or even if reasoning does change people’s minds, the route to that is longer and harder and the result is not always guaranteed. How many times have we debated a certain issue back and forth with one another only to end up sticking to our original stance anyway? So these days, most persuaders have discarded the method of appealing to your reason. Instead they use symbolism, associations, emotionalism (anger/fear/ confusion/)…. and they find that many people are willing to let their brains be hijacked unresistingly.
Real life examples that I could think of:
1)Want oil from Iraq? Let’s create a story of how Saddam Hussein was a bad dictator and how the American people were going to free the people of Iraq from his dictatorship. Saddam is associated with everything bad. American soldiers are associated with being saviors and heroes! (When actually during the reign of Saddam Hussein the people of Iraq were more prosperous than now. )
Let's create a story of the existence of weapon of mass destruction to justify any action or agenda of ours and repeat them multiple times. Because studies have shown that if you repeat a lie enough times, people start to believe it! What a scary world we are living in!
2) This book also has taught me how the social media can be used to manipulate our perception and swing votes during election or referendum like Brexit.
We are living in a world that makes it hard for us to know what to believe anymore.
And I feel like this book points that out very clearly and very successfully.
So, 5 solid stars from me!
I thought this book is very relevant in this day and age when truth can be made subjective (depending on whichever way you wanna argue) and we can no longer tell what is right and what is wrong anymore. If biological sex can be made subjective, you bet I better read on the techniques utilized by persuaders in trying to change our mind. So that if they ever employ that technique on me, I can spot it straightaway. And this is exactly the value of this book - opening up our minds on how we can be so easily manipulated by advertisers and PR agencies until we can make decisions that sometimes go against all our better judgment.
After reading this book, I will never look at any statement, commercial, campaign and trend in the same way again.
In this book, I learned that once upon a time, people placed a lot of emphasis on reasoning and logical thinking. It was a time when advertisement industry and PR firms were not yet around. The intellectual culture, and the effect of the Renaissance enlightenment were a dominant presence back then and very profoundly felt. People organized debates in clubs all over the country (in the UK) to examine facts and contexts of any issue. Debates became a source of entertainment in pubs/salons at that time (circa 1700s). People cultivated oratory skills and nurtured their intellect the way our people currently cultivate superficial beauty and hedonistic lifestyle.
But around the early 1900s… something changed. We found out that we can influence people faster and more effectively by bypassing their brain and manipulating their psychology. It started around the time when the tobacco industry wanted to sell cigarettes to women. At that time, only men smoked tobacco and for women to smoke in public was taboo. A PR firm was hired to create a campaign for getting women to smoke. They associated the act of public smoking by women with the suffragette movement of women’s equal rights and freedom. They hired a lot of young women to light “the torch of freedom” (the cigarette was the torch and lighting it symbolised freedom) while walking on Fifth Avenue on Easter Sunday.
By associating certain generally good ideas like love/freedom/justice/empowerment with any (woke) agenda that we want to propagate, that agenda can be made to look positive because it is all about love/freedom/justice/empowerment... when in fact, the agenda/product etc has got nothing to do with those ideas at all.
When it comes to product marketing, when you associate your brand with prestige and elegance and wealth, people will buy your product more.Now advertisement is no longer about promoting your products in a factual manner … but by giving your products the right kind of symbolism, slogans and association. And they keep repeating the slogans, symbolisms, and associations ad nauseum, ad infinitum.
And the amazing thing is, it works!
Because apparently, reasoning with people won’t change their minds, according to this book. Or even if reasoning does change people’s minds, the route to that is longer and harder and the result is not always guaranteed. How many times have we debated a certain issue back and forth with one another only to end up sticking to our original stance anyway? So these days, most persuaders have discarded the method of appealing to your reason. Instead they use symbolism, associations, emotionalism (anger/fear/ confusion/)…. and they find that many people are willing to let their brains be hijacked unresistingly.
Real life examples that I could think of:
1)Want oil from Iraq? Let’s create a story of how Saddam Hussein was a bad dictator and how the American people were going to free the people of Iraq from his dictatorship. Saddam is associated with everything bad. American soldiers are associated with being saviors and heroes! (When actually during the reign of Saddam Hussein the people of Iraq were more prosperous than now. )
Let's create a story of the existence of weapon of mass destruction to justify any action or agenda of ours and repeat them multiple times. Because studies have shown that if you repeat a lie enough times, people start to believe it! What a scary world we are living in!
2) This book also has taught me how the social media can be used to manipulate our perception and swing votes during election or referendum like Brexit.
We are living in a world that makes it hard for us to know what to believe anymore.
And I feel like this book points that out very clearly and very successfully.
So, 5 solid stars from me!
February 8, 2026
The Wilde Amazon
Three Stars
Competent writer although much of the content is borrowed from other well-known sources.
customer
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Two Stars
Riddled with logical and explanatory gaps you could fit a small elephant through.
Ewa Murzyn
///////
Interesting but infuriating at the same time. I appreciated the authors use of Le Bon, Festinger, and Milgram, because it put me on his wavelength.
I was a war of Persuasion and Psychological Conditioning and Manipulation, and the book added to my understanding.
Infuriating?
Sorry, but it seems the author, or his proof reader has been manipulated by Political Correctness and Feminism. Everything was her, or she, as if male readers did not exist. Otherwise very worth a read.
G. Webster
///////
There's quite a lot I already knew here but not everyone is a Politics graduate. There are also some contentious claims but generally it is wise to get these issues out in the open.
Those who want to persuade others have their work cut out with people like me, especially when they rely on machine learning. A computer can only work with information it is programmed to use.
We don't all fit cosily into groups based on things like comments or likes on Facebook, or what we re-tweet. We get advertising for things we don't want or even for things we've never heard of. Much the same works with all sorts of information.
Elisa
January 3, 2018
Erudite and reasoned, but loses its way after a while, I feel. The fault, essentially, is that the book strays beyond its brief - describing the challenge posed to society by the persuasion industry - into suggesting remedies. Which, sadly, are vague bordering on ineffectual. (Fwiw, I’d argue for a combination of existential philosophy literacy and Dewey problem-solving educational curriculum - in short, free thinking. But it is much easier to say it than to do it.)
The sections about Facebook, Google and elections are unintentionally hilarious - and, incidentally, a marker that we still have no idea what ‘democracy’ is up against, given that the allegations levelled against the Russia are (a) very much at the lower end of the scale, and (b) only marginally less elegant that what has been tried by/in other countries in the past.
The sections about Facebook, Google and elections are unintentionally hilarious - and, incidentally, a marker that we still have no idea what ‘democracy’ is up against, given that the allegations levelled against the Russia are (a) very much at the lower end of the scale, and (b) only marginally less elegant that what has been tried by/in other countries in the past.
August 17, 2020
If you're an MBA and have already been through multiple concepts around the irrationality of the human race and its more recent exploitation in the consumerist world, then you will not find anything new in quite some pages. BUT, the book does more than just that in its own merit. Personally, I gained a fresh perspective on how much of what happens around us is startlingly engineered for us not just as advertisements, but from politics & policies to urinals in public toilets.
My favourite segment was the one about argumentation & reasoning, what it meant in the times of Socrates & Aristotle, and what it means to us now & how the power of reasoning is lost on us somehow in the times in between.
The book reflects on the future course humanity could take if things stay the way they are & we stay the way we are which was not expected of it. So, that was a bonus.
My favourite segment was the one about argumentation & reasoning, what it meant in the times of Socrates & Aristotle, and what it means to us now & how the power of reasoning is lost on us somehow in the times in between.
The book reflects on the future course humanity could take if things stay the way they are & we stay the way we are which was not expected of it. So, that was a bonus.
January 15, 2020
A reasonably informative, if slightly disjointed, look at the origin, growth and insidiousness of the public relations industry. Its use of framing through the psychology of wording was particularly interesting, things which seem obvious in hindsight like energy companies talking about “exploding energy sources” instead of “drilling for oil” or the opposition referencing “illegal aliens” instead of “undocumented workers”.
The use of paid actors pretending to be vocal supporters at political rallies shouldn’t be a surprise. Neither should we be unaware of the concerned use of message discipline and repetition.
The illusion of truth is a scary one we should all be mindful of. That humans find messages they’ve encountered before more believable than new ones.
The use of paid actors pretending to be vocal supporters at political rallies shouldn’t be a surprise. Neither should we be unaware of the concerned use of message discipline and repetition.
The illusion of truth is a scary one we should all be mindful of. That humans find messages they’ve encountered before more believable than new ones.
October 24, 2017
This book makes one review their critical thinking skills. I like how he divided the chapters into various ways we can be manipulated and ways to think through these "scams". He also has a chapter on the fact that we have lost the ability to debate. When I went to school everyone was taught debating skills. I wonder now if the schools offer it as choice on the curriculum but not mandatory.
January 10, 2018
I didn't find this book the easiest of reads, but the content itself was interesting, and really scary.
My brain hurts when I think about all of this too much, but then I think, how can I not think about it.
I honestly don't know what is real anymore, and this book will not help me feel anymore secure in my thoughts!
My brain hurts when I think about all of this too much, but then I think, how can I not think about it.
I honestly don't know what is real anymore, and this book will not help me feel anymore secure in my thoughts!
May 10, 2017
Really interesting and engaging all the way through. Get the balance of information and complexity and interest pretty much spot on.
July 3, 2017
Great book - add a lot of reasons to the way advertisers, politicians, companies act especially in the way they go about selling their ideas, products.
May 15, 2021
Highly satisfying read. Lucid, compelling, important.
March 25, 2023
Very interesting but chapters were too long and the book tests were impossible so that killed my vibe
May 2, 2023
I liked it but I would like it more if it wasn’t for school
October 23, 2019
Actual rate: 3.5
Brought this book (worth RM79.90) for RM19.90 @ BookXcess PJ. I'm one happy customer! Now, about the book, if you're new to the world of persuasion, this book is a good way of learning the basics. If you're already familiar with it, there's not much here that you haven't already heard before. Because I've read Dan Ariely's Predictably Irrational, Robert Cialdini's Influence and parts of Daniel Kahneman's Thinking, Fast and Slow - must-read books - some of the information, scientific researches and arguments stated in this book are not new to me. Not to say that it's a bad book (it's not) just that it's a primer. By the way, his historical and current examples are superb, scary, and mind-boggling. His view from philosophical perspectives is refreshing, deep and thoughtful.
If I were to retitle this book, I will put it as "The Persuaders: How We Let the PR Industry Control Our Minds." To read my review of James Garvey's The Persuaders: The Hidden Industry that Wants to Change Your Mind (2016), CLICK HERE: https://www.richardangelus.me/2018/11...
Brought this book (worth RM79.90) for RM19.90 @ BookXcess PJ. I'm one happy customer! Now, about the book, if you're new to the world of persuasion, this book is a good way of learning the basics. If you're already familiar with it, there's not much here that you haven't already heard before. Because I've read Dan Ariely's Predictably Irrational, Robert Cialdini's Influence and parts of Daniel Kahneman's Thinking, Fast and Slow - must-read books - some of the information, scientific researches and arguments stated in this book are not new to me. Not to say that it's a bad book (it's not) just that it's a primer. By the way, his historical and current examples are superb, scary, and mind-boggling. His view from philosophical perspectives is refreshing, deep and thoughtful.
If I were to retitle this book, I will put it as "The Persuaders: How We Let the PR Industry Control Our Minds." To read my review of James Garvey's The Persuaders: The Hidden Industry that Wants to Change Your Mind (2016), CLICK HERE: https://www.richardangelus.me/2018/11...
January 9, 2017
This raises some very very complex problems that strike at the heart at the very feasibility of democracy. Questions of choice and what constitutes freedom will be left lingering after finishing this book, and it's only the tip of the iceberg on the subject of human malleability and the exploitation and capitalization upon our natural human cognitive weaknesses. This should be required reading for anyone interested in understanding one the main and criminally under emphasized subjects contributing to our country and world as is. Read it.
July 28, 2016
I will never shop the same, watch ads the same, sign a petition or listen to a politician without questioning. This book is championing the need to be a critical thinker always. Highly recommended. This book is entertaining, enlightening and frightening.
September 15, 2016
Great book, absolutely frightening.
April 16, 2016
Fascinating look into how debate and free thought has been leeched away.
September 22, 2017
(4.5 Stars!)
From Freud to framing to nudging and neuro-marketing Garvey delves deep into the murky and fascinating world of the people who try and persuade us, particularly in the field of politics and advertising realms where they appear to have an inexhaustible list of different words and ways of lying and deceitfulness.
From classical Greek philosophy to the high rises of Madison Avenue and the inside of the White House we find a disturbing history and trend of persuaders, almost willing to resort to anything in order to get across their intention. He looks into the work of people like Ernest Dichter, Daniel Kahneman and Vance Packard’s seminal “The Hidden Persuaders” amongst many others. Garvey also touches upon the sinister world and power of current social networking sites and the frightening power they have and what they can and have used it for?...
This is a really well written book, heaving with some fascinating history and manipulation and put me very much in mind of Roman Krznaric’s excellent, “The Wonderbox” which mines similar terrain.
April 21, 2017
One of my grandads used to turn shops' carrier bags inside out because he refused to give them unpaid advertising. So it's in my genes to like this book.
It is good to stop and think about how much of what hits you every day is trying to influence you to shop, think or vote a certain way. Like Garvey, I am saddened to contemplate the near-death of reasoned argument. I was unaware of some of the history of spin, so this made fascinating reading. The Kuwait incident was particularly nasty. And I think we all know how pointless political interviews are - find out why they bother.
I will be keeping my loyalty cards, as I don't THINK I am pushed to spend at these shops just because I have a card. I probably won't continue trying to spend enough (£42) to get £5 back at Iceland!
It is good to stop and think about how much of what hits you every day is trying to influence you to shop, think or vote a certain way. Like Garvey, I am saddened to contemplate the near-death of reasoned argument. I was unaware of some of the history of spin, so this made fascinating reading. The Kuwait incident was particularly nasty. And I think we all know how pointless political interviews are - find out why they bother.
I will be keeping my loyalty cards, as I don't THINK I am pushed to spend at these shops just because I have a card. I probably won't continue trying to spend enough (£42) to get £5 back at Iceland!
Displaying 1 - 26 of 26 reviews