I recommend this book. It is literally Woo ("winning over others") but in the best way. It's advice for the softest, least-scientific domain I can think of, namely navigating the social dynamics of life, including the poetics of other people's egos. Each "law" is illustrated vividly with examples from history and given caveats/inversions, so that it could be called "48 dynamics that you should think about if you want to engage in the social sphere more effectively". Of course, "laws of power" is better marketing. The author really sells it at the beginning, too — you don't have a choice but to engage in games of power: abstaining from power is itself a power play, and an inauthentic one at that.
I have mixed feelings about the book. On one had, I can see the value in all of the laws but on the other hand it seems that the author tries to force laws around past events and just make the laws "fit" the narrative.
It got a little boring after like 20 or something, so I just stopped reading it.
I was reading it through Audible, and the narrator had a great voice that brought the stories to life. I probably wouldn't have finished it either if I'd been eyeball-reading it.
Frankly, this looks like the playbook of sociopaths. I would use this book to figure out what bad actors would use to manipulate me.
If you want a book that teaches you how to get what you want while also not being a shit person I would recommend "How to win friends and influence people". The thrust of that book is that people helping each other results in mutual benefit that is greater than the sum of its parts.
I think of the laws more like "The 48 Laws of Humans". You don't have to be sociopathic to use these "laws" to your advantage.
For example, here are a few excerpts from the "Law 6 - Court Attention at all Costs" section:
"Barnum understood the fundamental truth about attracting attention: Once people’s eyes are on you, you have a special legitimacy. For Barnum, creating interest meant creating a crowd; as he later wrote, “Every crowd has a silver lining.” And crowds tend to act in conjunction. If one person stops to see your beggarman laying bricks in the street, more will do the same. They will gather like dust bunnies"
"Society craves larger-than-life figures, people who stand above the general
mediocrity. Never be afraid, then, of the qualities that set you apart and draw attention to you. Court controversy, even scandal. It is better to be attacked, even slandered, than ignored. All professions are ruled by this law, and all professionals must have a bit of the showman about them"
"The great scientist Thomas Edison knew that to raise money he had to remain in the public eye at any cost. Almost as important as the inventions themselves was how he presented them to the public and courted attention ... He did everything he could to make sure that he received more attention than his great rival Nikola Tesla, who may actually have been more brilliant than he was but whose name was far less known"
Yeah, it does look like that. But it's really not. It's really just about acknowledging and engaging authentically with power dynamics, which are unavoidable.
The darkest one I remember off the top of my head is something like "don't just beat your enemies, destroy them", where destroy = remove their ability to get back at you. This sounds sociopathic. But if you're doing something like fighting a war for survival or trying make sure that your firm is the one that survives the next filter, thinking this way will help you achieve your goals. Is it sociopathic to really try to win? Eh, I would say that someone who tells you not to try to win is playing a power game with you ;)
