Sample Persuasive Outline using Monroe’s Motivated Sequence
Desalination in the Middle East
Specific Purpose: To persuade my audience that desalination in the Middle East as a water supplement is much
needed.
I. Attention
Imagine seeing a small child in the street who is starving. If you don’t help this child obtain nutrition, she
will turn to crime to get money for food. You must help her. This child is like the Middle East and its need
for water.
II. Need
A. Middle Easterners are currently getting their water from underground aquifers and from area rivers and streams
(show visual aid).
B. The existing water supply is dwindling fast. In a 1994 article in Audubon, Bruce Stutz says that the region’s
aquifers and rivers are drying out.
C. According to P. J. Vesilind of National Geographic, the area will soon break out in “water wars” because water is
now more precious than oil. In the same article in Audubon, Bruce Stutz (1994) says that there can be no
peace in the area until the water crisis is solved.
D. As the world’s “police force” and the nation that supplies most of the human power to the United Nations’
operations, the United States may soon be involved in these wars as well. Take, for example, the Persian
Gulf War.
(Transition: Now that we see there is such a problem, we need to find a solution.)
III. Satisfaction
