Why we need manifestos

Anne Frank

In recent years, many business thinkers have written books that are either identified as a “manifesto” or in fact function as one. With regard to the word’s original meaning, here is what the Online Etymology Dictionary suggests: “1644, from It. manifesto ‘public declaration explaining past actions and announcing the motive for forthcoming ones,’ originally ‘proof,’ from L. manifestus “ Manifestos are usually affirmations of faith in combination with a call to action.

The rhetorical structure of a manifesto does frames issues (injustices, errors, inhumanities, universal values) within a context, then advocates an action to correct what is wrong, replace what is unacceptable, etc. Authors of manifestos tend to be iconoclasts who exemplify moral as well as intellectual courage. However, rarely are they cynics despite what their impatience with timidity may suggest.

Here are some examples among business books:

The Checklist Manifesto: How to Get Things Right
Atul Gawande

The Cluetrain Manifesto: The End of Business as Usual
Christopher Locke, Rick Levine, Doc Searls, and David Weinberger

Linchpin: Are You Indispensable?
Seth Godin

Manifesto: Three Classic Essays on How to Change the World
Ernesto (Che) Guevara, Karl Marx, Friedrich Engels, and Rosa Luxemburg

You Are Not a Gadget: A Manifesto
Jaron Lanier

There are other documents, in my opinion, that also serve as manifestos and include By Gracious Powers, the poem written by Dietrich Bonhoeffer just before he was hanged by the Gestapo, as well as The Declaration of Independence, Anne Frank’s The Diary of a Young Girl, Martin Luther’s 95 Theses, and Martin Luther King, Jr.’s Letter from Birmingham Jail.

Throughout human history, heroic women and men have said, in effect, “Here I stand. This is what I believe. And I am prepared to accept whatever the consequences may be of my defiance.” They oppose what is wrong, what is evil, what is for them intolerable.

It is worth noting that, in The Divine Comedy, Dante reserved the last and worst ring in hell for those who, in a moral crisis, preserved their neutrality.