MISSION
Persuasion shapes civilization. AI makes it programmable.
RhetAI is a global coalition building the principles that ensure persuasive technologies serve humanity — advancing ethical persuasion as a central pillar of AI safety.
Mission
The RhetAI Coalition exists to:
- 1
Conduct and publish research into the persuasive power of generative artificial intelligence and emerging technologies;
- 2
Connect rhetoric and persuasion researchers, scholars, and faculty with industry to advocate for emerging technologies to be built on principles of ethical persuasion;
- 3
Advance rhetorical principles as a central pillar for AI safety and persuasive tech.
The case for rhetoric
AI safety cannot stop at technical alignment and factual accuracy. The systems now in everyday use are persuasive by design, and the risks they carry are psychological and societal as much as they are technical.
Technical alignment is not enough
Most AI safety work focuses on hallucinations, capability limits, and model behavior in the lab. None of it measures what a system does to a person's beliefs over months of daily conversation.
Persuasion is a psychological risk
Systems that adapt tone, timing, and framing to an individual can shift decisions about money, health, politics, and identity — at a scale and precision no human persuader has ever had.
It is also a societal risk
When influence becomes programmable, so does public opinion. Democratic deliberation depends on knowing who is arguing, on whose behalf, and with what evidence.
Rhetoric already has the tools
Two and a half thousand years of scholarship on ethical influence gives us vocabulary, tests, and standards the AI industry currently lacks. Our work is translation, not invention.
Core pillars
Democratic Rhetoric
Persuasive systems should argue in the open: audiences can see the appeal being made, evaluate it, and disagree with it. We define what that looks like in practice.
Ethical Persuasion
Persuasion itself is not the problem, but persuasion without principles is simply manipulation. Principles for ethical persuasion exist and must be implemented.
Multidisciplinary Coalition
Humanities scholars, computer scientists, and policy experts working in the same rooms. No single field can see the whole surface of persuasive AI.
Build the standards with us.
We welcome universities, researchers, nonprofits, AI companies and developers, industry leaders, policymakers, and funders to collaborate with us.
Universities & institutions
Join challenge teams, host working groups, and bring students into the field.
AI companies & developers
Pressure-test persuasion guardrails against research before they ship.
Policymakers
Use shared criteria and evidence when drafting rules for persuasive systems.