The paper provides evidence that linguistic strategies based on the implicit encoding of information are effective means of deceptive argumentation and manipulation, as they can ease the acceptance of doubtful arguments by distracting addressees’ attention and by encouraging shallow processing of doubtful contents. The persuasive and manipulative functions of these rhetorical strategies are observed in commercial and political propaganda. Linguistic implicit strategies are divided into two main categories: the implicit encoding of content, mainly represented by implicatures and vague expressions, and the implicit encoding of responsibility, mainly represented by presuppositions and topics. The paper also suggests that the amount of persuasive implicitness contained in texts can be measured. For this purpose, a measuring model is proposed and applied to some Italian political speeches. The possible social usefulness of this approach is showed by sketching the operation of a website in which the measuring model is used to monitor contemporary political speeches.

This paper presents the application of a quantitative model for measuring the impact of manipulative implicit linguistic strategies on a small comparable corpus of Italian, German and French political discourses. The aim is to show the cross-linguistic applicability of the model, originally developed and put to test on Italian. Furthermore, the analysis allows a quantitative and qualitative comparison of the three comparable corpora: some statistical correlations and tendencies in the frequency and type of linguistic implicit strategies are presented and put in relation not only with the language, but also with the political orientation of the speaker and with other parameters (context, subject, rhetorical style). Results show that the model can be applied to multiple languages and that inter- and intra-linguistic tendencies in the use of manipulative implicit linguistic strategies can be appreciated.

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