Is it a promise or a threat?

In this paper we analyse the concepts of Promise (P) and Threat (T) and their inter-relations. Our objective is to study the uses of P and T in persuasion and to shed some light on related concepts such as requesting , ordering , giving prizes , punishing , etc. First, we show that some Ps and Ts are used for persuasion and some are conditional in nature. Using general definitions of P and T (along with the concepts of speech act and social commitment) and a broad notion of persuasion, four different typologies of P and T are introduced. They are distinguished on their conditional/non-conditional dimension and on their influencing/non-influencing aim. We then focus on Conditional Influencing Ps and Ts (CIPs and CITs) used in persuasion. CIPs and CITs are incentive-based influencing actions rooted on dependence and power relations. Moreover, in the CIP and CIT classes the concepts of threat and promise are closely connected: the CIP is always (though often covertly) accompanied by a CIT (“ if you do not do your homework I will not take you to the cinema ”), and vice versa. Next, we discuss the issue of why CIPs and CITs are credible. We also identify — beyond their surface, rhetorical form — a deeper difference: a ‘substantial’ threat consisting in a choice between two losses compared with a ‘substantial’ promise where the choice is between a gain and a missed-gain. In the article we present a pre-formal model as a basis for a computational treatment of these concepts.