Anwita Pandey
Aristotle and Beyond : Persuasion as the Basis of Law and Diplomacy
This article examines the indispensable role of persuasion in shaping law, diplomacy, and political life. It argues that persuasion, rather than mere assertion or force, is the foundation of justice and peace. Drawing on classical philosophy and modern relevance, the paper demonstrates that persuasion is not secondary to power, it is power itself. It is persuasion that transforms power into legitimacy, conflict into concord, and mere survival into shared human order.
At the very core of diplomacy and law lies the art of persuasion the ability to negotiate and shape outcomes. This is illuminated by the enduring Aristotelian triad of ethos, pathos, and logos.
Picture a CEO who literally led a company into bankruptcy and is giving a keynote speech about financial foresight and visionary leadership. Even if their words are logically sound, would you really take their advice seriously?
According to Aristotle, you wouldn’t.
As per Aristotle’s Rhetoric, there are three pillars of pisteis, i.e., “persuaders” or “means of persuasion”:
Ethos, which refers to the character of the speaker.
Pathos, which refers to the emotional state of the listener.
Logos, which refers to the argument itself.
A great real-world demonstration of ethos, pathos, and logos in action can be found in the U.S. Supreme Court case Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka (1954), when the Court dismantled racial segregation in all public schools. The ruling was not just based on constitutional reasoning it was persuasion through logos and pathos, grounded in psychology. Psychologists Mamie Clark and Kenneth Clark presented the doll test, where they presented African American children with two dolls, one white and one Black, and asked:
“Which doll is the nice doll?”
“Which doll is the bad doll?”
“Which doll looks like you?”
Most children attributed the positive traits to the white doll and the negative ones to the Black doll. This use of pathos appealed to the emotional conscience of the nation and became instrumental in producing one of the most significant rulings in U.S. history: Brown v. Board of Education (1954).
The art of diplomacy is, at its core, the art of persuasion. Whether it’s in moments of quiet negotiation or global crisis, the fate of nations often hinges on words. The Cuban Missile Crisis, for instance, did not end with missiles fired but with arguments exchanged—leaders weighing credibility (ethos), appealing to fear and hope (pathos), and calculating the logic of mutual destruction (logos).
Yet another key element of diplomacy is Kairos the ability to seize the urgency of the moment—and telos, the clarity of purpose to secure peace rather than war. Persuasion was not an accessory to these talks; it was the very mechanism that, rightly timed and rightly aimed, pulled humanity back from the brink of nuclear war.
Most of these concepts are backed by research, so let’s try to understand them from a psychological perspective. The Yale Attitude Change Approach’s basic model can be described as “who said what to whom.” This supports the concept that a communicator’s credibility affects persuasion.
Hovland and Weiss’s research in 1951 studied “the effects of credibility of source on acquisition and retention of communication material.” They presented identical content but attributed the material to sources considered to be of “high trustworthiness” or of “low trustworthiness.” This demonstrated that messages from high-credibility sources were more persuasive than the same messages from low-credibility sources.
This showcases that when people hear a message from a credible source, they are immediately more persuaded than if they hear the same message from a non-credible source. This supports ethos, as credibility clearly influences initial persuasion. (Although it is important to note that the “sleeper effect” showed that, over time, the impact of source credibility diminished, and the message’s content became more influential.)
The Janis and Feshbach (1953) study provides empirical backing to Aristotle’s concept of pathos, showing that emotional appeal more specifically fear has a measurable effect on persuasive outcomes, depending on how it is presented and balanced. “The overall effectiveness of a persuasive communication will tend to be reduced by the use of a strong fear appeal, if it evokes a high degree of emotional tension without adequately satisfying the need for reassurance.”
The central route involves thinking about the merits of the argument and weighing the pros and cons. When we are persuaded through the central route, this demonstrates that persuasion engaging reasoned evaluation leans strongly on logos.
And it is here that we see that ethos, pathos, and logos are not abstract categories but rather forces that continue to govern persuasion the constant structure that sustains justice and secures peace. The law derives its force not from the text of its codes but from its ability to persuade citizens of its legitimacy, just like the success of diplomacy lies not in agreements signed but in its ability to persuade nations of their shared purpose.
As Aristotle himself said, “It is of great importance in politics to know how to persuade.” In many ways, everything I have stated returns to that same truth: law, diplomacy, and politics find their strength not in power, but in persuasion.
About the contributor: Anwita Pandey is a Grade 12 student and the current school captain of Ambience Public School, Gurugram. She has completed courses in politics and diplomacy from Yale, Harvard, and the University of London. She is also working with the M3M Foundation towards educational equity. She is a fellow of DFPGYF Diplomacy, Foreign Policy & Geopolitics Youth Fellowship- Cohort 2.0.
Disclaimer: All views expressed in the article belong solely to the author and not necessarily to the organisation.
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Acknowledgement: This article was posted by Shivashish Narayan, a visiting researcher at IMPRI.
