Sharp power
Etymology
Coined in 2017 by Christopher Walker and Jessica Ludwig of the National Endowment for Democracy and popularized by The Economist. The word "sharp" evokes a piercing or cutting instrument, contrasting with the appeal of soft power and the force of hard power.
noun phrase · /SHARP POW-er/
A state’s use of manipulation, distraction, and covert influence to pierce and corrode another society from within.
What it names
The missing third term between soft and hard power — a name for influence that is neither attractive nor openly coercive, but deceptive and corrosive.
Example
Funding front groups and flooding foreign media with disinformation is sharp power — influence that punctures a rival’s institutions rather than winning its heart.
Related idea
Defined against the pair the app already holds: unlike soft power, which attracts through genuine appeal, sharp power only mimics openness in order to manipulate, exploiting the target’s freedoms against it.