Manipulation and Autonomy

Abstract

It is commonly thought that manipulation threatens personal autonomy. This chapter investigates different explanations of this threat. We begin by looking at different accounts of manipulation: First, those that suggest that manipulation imposes a distinctive form of pressure on the victim or that manipulators employ distinctive modes of interaction to bypass or subvert the victim’s decision-making. Second, those that suggest that manipulators possess distinctive character traits or distinctive intentions towards their victim. We then look at how these different accounts of manipulation relate to important themes in debates over personal autonomy: First, the suggestion that autonomous agency is best conceived of as a distinctive structure of internal attitudes that grant an agent distinctive authority within the motivational process. Second, the suggestion that autonomous agents inhabit distinctive external social relations with other agents.