WHY STUDY POLITICAL LEADERS ? The big questions: What is a leader?

1. WHY STUDY POLITICAL LEADERS? The big questions: What is a leader? What do we mean when we say that leaders matter for outcomes? Why might the attributes of particular leaders (vs. political roles) be less important than we think? Why do social scientists not think too much of leaders? Under what conditions are specific leaders most likely to important to specific outcomes?

2. What exactly is a political leader? To what extent should we be looking at official titles to determine who the key political leaders in a society are? What functions do leaders perform that separate them from other types of important political actors (say, most members of the national legislature or a nation’s supreme judicial body)? What makes a leader a political leader vs. being an activist? Is a popular band leader who supports a cause a political leader? Is Sarah Palin or Martin Luther King? Do political leaders have to work within government? Do they have to be associated with a group?

3. Let’s try to nail things down a bit more precisely:What exactly is a political leader? The Concise Oxford English Dictionary defines a ‘leader’ as ‘the person who leads or commands a group, organization, or country’. ‘To lead’ means to ‘cause (a person or animal) to go with one by drawing them along; or to show (someone) the way to a destination by preceding or accompanying them’. Leaders are ‘identity entrepreneurs’ who are engaged in providing myths/visions to create, reshape or enhance national and other political cultures Leaders attempt to shape political life beyond the specific issues of the moment.

5. HOW DO WE KNOW HOW IMPORTANT LEADERS ARE? What is the difference between a specific leader being a sufficient cause of an outcome, versus being a necessary cause versus just having an influence on the outcome?(Example: The choice of George W. Bush to launch an invasion of Iraq… Was he influential, essential, or the main cause all by himself in the decision to invade Iraq for the second time in 2003?) Is it worth distinguishing between “eventful” (historically important contributors to outcomes) leaders and “event making” leaders who move history in an entirely different direction?(Example: Madison vs. Washington; Obama vs. Reagan) The bottom line: How much political leaders matters will very according to: (1) In how much their specific presence matters to specific decisions(2) How important their decision in the trajectory of their socieites

6. DO LEADERS REALLY MATTER AS MUCH AS WE TEND TO THINK THEY DO? Why might our common sense explanations of important historical outcomes give too much credit to specific leaders? Is this a case of our human tendency towards “reductionism” In other words, why do we seem to like easy answers? Is there a biological disposition to accept strong leadership and to hold that leadership accountable for outcomes? Why do leaders themselves overstate the role and capacity of leaders… especially in democracies like ours? Think about all those crazy presidential candidate promises Are Americans especially susceptible to the belief that certain individuals determine outcomes (vs. fate)? Think about Founder worship and the Constitution for a minute But then, isn’t the belief in “hero leaders”—especially political elites--un-American in some ways (because it would justify strong government)? Maybe this explains why our leaders seem so eager to talk about being aggressive towards other places

7. DO LEADERS MATTER AS MUCH AS WE TEND TO THINK THEY DO? Why have social scientists long been too skeptical of how much leaders matter? Or at least that we can study the topic well? This is the next slide, but let’s just say it now: Leaders often don’t matter very much, and they can be safely ignored for sometimes… Is 2012 in the US such a case? Why is it so challenging to study why leaders do what they do? What is the alternative to studying leaders, and why have most social scientists largely ignored what they see as the “idiosyncratic” qualities of leaders and concentrated on “structural” explanations of important historical events? Social scientists like to predict rather than just explain past behavior… We look for trends, not specifics…. Thus, social science tend to look at widespread, recurring, and measurable phenomena rather than the unique qualities of individual leaders to explain things

8. WHEN/WHICH LEADERS TEND TO MATTER MOST?: FOUR FACTORS What times and types of situations increase the influence of individual leaders? (Example: What political times lead some presidents to be considered “great”?) How does the institutional“location” of an leader in the political order impact her importance to outcomes?(Example: Why is it easier to be a more consequential prime minister in British politics than is the case with American presidents?) Why do variations among leaders’ personal strengths and limitationsimpact their influence on outcomes? Example: How do you think Pres. Obama’s background and personality traits impact his leadership and decisionmaking? Example: Does the US primary system pick the best leadership qualities? And from Halamet al.: How do cultures of followership impact when leaders matter? This article mostly explains what effective leadership is (in democracies), but their argument raises the question of how societies and times differ in their openness to being shaped by leaders.