"We use language for various purposes. We describe the world. We ask questions. We issue commands. We make agreements. And we try to persuade. Marketers and advertisers try to persuade people to buy products. Public relations specialists try to persuade people to have positive perceptions of organizations. Political consultants try to persuade people to support causes and candidates. Executives try to persuade people to work effectively, to agree to a contract, to accept a job, and so on. Parents try to persuade children to listen to them. Attorneys try to persuade people to favor their clients. All those activities have something important in common. Marketers, advertisers, public relations specialists, political consultants, executives, and lawyers, in fact all of us, are advocates either full time or part time. When we seek to convince someone, we are in the business of practical persuasion, of persuading people to change their minds or do things.
You might expect, given the number of people engaged in advocacy and the importance of what they do, that there would be a comprehensive, well-established theory of how to do it. You would be wrong. There is no such theory. People learn to be advocates by the seat of their pants.
We aim to remedy that. This paper is about developing effective advocacy strategies. It elaborates a novel theory that organizes and systematizes the process of constructing persuasive cases in support of desired conclusions."
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