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The Dictator's Handbook: Why Bad Behavior is Almost Always Good Politics Paperback – July 31, 2012

by Bruce Bueno de Mesquita (Author), Alastair Smith (Author)

4.6 2,232 ratings

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A groundbreaking new theory of the real rules of politics: leaders do whatever keeps them in power, regardless of the national interest.

As featured on the viral video Rules for Rulers, which has been viewed over 3 million times.

Bruce Bueno de Mesquita and Alastair Smith's canonical book on political science turned conventional wisdom on its head. They started from a single assertion: Leaders do whatever keeps them in power. They don't care about the "national interest"-or even their subjects-unless they have to.

This clever and accessible book shows that democracy is essentially just a convenient fiction. Governments do not differ in kind but only in the number of essential supporters, or backs that need scratching. The size of this group determines almost everything about politics: what leaders can get away with, and the quality of life or misery under them. The picture the authors paint is not pretty. But it just may be the truth, which is a good starting point for anyone seeking to improve human governance.

Print length

352 pages
Language

English
Publisher

PublicAffairs
Publication date

July 31, 2012
Dimensions

5.5 x 1 x 8.25 inches
ISBN-10

1610391845
ISBN-13

978-1610391849
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Editorial Reviews

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Simply the best book on politics written.... Every citizen should read this book.―CGP Grey

A lucidly written, shrewdly argued meditation on how democrats and dictators preserve political authority...Bueno de Mesquita and Smith are polymathic, drawing on economics, history, and political science to make their points...The reader will be hard-pressed to find a single government that doesn't largely operate according to Messrs. Bueno de Mesquita and Smith's model. So the next time a hand-wringing politician, Democrat or Republican, claims to be taking a position for the 'good of his country,'remember to replace the word 'country' with 'career.'―Wall Street Journal

Machiavelli's The Prince has a new rival. It's The Dictator's Handbook by Bruce Bueno de Mesquita and Alastair Smith.... This is a fantastically thought-provoking read. I found myself not wanting to agree but actually, for the most part, being convinced that the cynical analysis is the true one.―Enlightenment Economics

In this fascinating book Bueno de Mesquita and Smith spin out their view of governance: that all successful leaders, dictators and democrats, can best be understood as almost entirely driven by their own political survival-a view they characterize as 'cynical, but we fear accurate.' Yet as we follow the authors through their brilliant historical assessments of leaders' choices-from Caesar to Tammany Hall and the Green Bay Packers-we gradually realize that their brand of cynicism yields extremely realistic guidance about spreading the rule of law, decent government, and democracy. James Madison would have loved this book.―R. James Woolsey Director of Central Intelligence, 1993-1995, and Chairman, Foundation for Defense of Democracies

In this book, Bruce Bueno de Mesquita and Alastair Smith teach us to see dictatorship as just another form of politics, and from this perspective they deepen our understanding of all political systems.―Roger Myerson, Glen A. Lloyd Distinguished Service Professor of Economics at the University of Chicago

About the Author

Bruce Bueno de Mesquita is the Julius Silver Professor of Politics and director of the Alexander Hamilton Center for Political Economy at New York University. He is the author of sixteen books, including The Predictioneer's Game.

Alastair Smith is professor of politics at New York University. The recipient of three grants from the National Science Foundation and author of three books, he was chosen as the 2005 Karl Deutsch Award winner, given biennially to the best international relations scholar under the age of forty. They are also the authors of The Spoils of War: Greed, Power, and the Conflicts That Made Our Greatest Presidents.

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ PublicAffairs; Reprint edition (July 31, 2012)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 352 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1610391845
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1610391849
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 11.1 ounces
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.5 x 1 x 8.25 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #255,786 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #85 in Non-US Legal Systems (Books)
- #160 in Fascism (Books)
- #865 in History & Theory of Politics

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4.6 2,232 ratings

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Bruce Bueno de Mesquita
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Bruce Bueno de Mesquita is Professor of Politics at New York University and a Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution.
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Joel Zigler

Excellent analysis of the motivations of politicians, but...

Reviewed in the United States on February 23, 2024

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This is an excellent book that explains why politicians do things that seem contrary to the good of the people they represent. I have purchased several copies for friends and they've been well received. But the latest edition had an added chapter regarding the Jan. 6 Capitol breach that seemed out-of-step with the teachings of the rest of the book. I'm wondering if the publisher required the content and tone of this addition. Regardless, I recommend this book for understanding the motivations of those in charge, whether dictators or democratically elected.

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Chris Larkin

Good Behavior is Bad Politics and How to Change That

Reviewed in the United States on July 23, 2014

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The Dictator's Handbook by Bruce Bueno de Mesquita and Alastair Smith is in many ways trying to be The Selfish Gene of political science. It's a mass appeal non-fiction book that advances a new theory of analysis in their respect fields written in a forceful charismatic style.

The basic theory of The Dictator's Handbook is Selectorate Theory. Selectorate Theory has three basic parts. The first is that leaders will do whatever they can to stay in power regardless of all other factors. The logic of this is that if the leader wouldn't do this, they would be replaced by someone who would.

The second part is that from the leader's point of view there are three groups of people. The first is the interchangables who is everyone is who has at least a nominal say in choosing the leader (such as all voters). For the most part, leaders don't really care about this group except to play against the other two groups (which are subsets of interchangables). The next group are the influential which is everyone who's say actually matters in choosing the leader (such as the majority party in a parliamentary election). The leader has to pay some attention to this group especially in democratic situations. The last and most important group are the essentials. The essentials are those whose support are vital to leader's continual existence as a leader (such as smallest group of voters that can change the outcome of an election). As the essentials have the power to make or break leaders, they are the central target of the leader's policies. From this, political decisions can be understood as the leader trying to stay in power against rivals by using these groups.

The other main focus of the book is the difference between autocratic and democratic leaders. Generally the difference is the different size of the respective regime's influential and essentials. An autocratic leader only has a small group of influentials and essentials. Therefore, it's quite easy to win their loyalty with direct private rewards typically in the form of large gifts or corruption. A democratic leader however has a large group of influential and essentials. So large in fact, there isn't enough resources for the leader to earn their loyalty with direct private rewards. Therefore, a democratic leader must use broad public policies that indirectly benefit the influentials and essentials. These policies often have the side effect of being pretty good for interchangables and those who have no say at all. That's why democracy leads to better conditions for all. However ultimately there's no fundamental difference between the leaders of autocracies and democracies, just the situation.

From all of this, the authors discuss how leaders acquire power, stay in power, get money, get foreign aid, deal with revolution, and wage war. It then ends with how to help make autocracies become democracies, and improve American democracy. The book is downright dripping with realpolitik. Everything that isn't about a leader's continued existence as a leader is treated while not irrelevant, much less important. Social programs sincerely for the general good are treated as discretionary spending by the leader out of surplus funds which otherwise could have been pocketed. These programs also have a very hit or miss record as seen by the author's Hall of Shame and Fame.

There's a tension in The Dictator's Handbook. The authors take a very cynical approach to politics and at times speak of dictators in an epic way such as Liberian dictator Samuel Doe's Scarface-like rise and fall of power. Their cynicism reaches it peak on foreign aid which is viewed as democratic leaders entrenching other country's autocratic leaders to the detriment of that country's people for their own political gain. They are also dismissive of the popular claim of democracies doesn't go to war. Instead democracies act like bullies quite able and willing to fight those much weaker than themselves. However, the authors do try to fight being labeled as cynics with appeals to better more democratic world. Ultimately their stance is “don't hate the player, hate the game.”

My biggest grip with the book is the lack of numbers. While this is a mass appeal non-fiction book, I would like a better idea of what numbers the authors consider democratic versus autocratic. It's quite clear that they don't view the pool of democratic influentials and essentials as 50%+1 as they often only will use numbers like 12% to 25% of the population in thought experiments for these groups. That said, a good rule of thumb seems to be if your nation's influential and essentials can fit in a large football stadium, you're an autocrat.

I would also like more discussion on non-nation politics. It's clear that the authors very much think these rules also apply to all leaders everywhere especially corporate ones which due to rigged elections is autocratic. However outside one example of Fiorina's regime of CEO of HP and a vague “the internet will help democratized corporations!” suggestion at the end, there isn't much discussion of this important angle. I would also like more hard numbers to back up conclusions, though the crunch to statement ratio is about par for most mass market non-fiction works. It may have seemed worse than it was as I was coming off Poor Economics's very number heavy, conclusion light approach.

Overall, I do really like The Dictator's Handbook. To be fair, I naturally have a very realpolitik approach to organizations so it's right up my alley. However, it's helped to fix and formulate some of opinions of various politics both in real life and in world building.

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Tiger CheeseSteak

2nd Edition Please

Reviewed in the United States on May 19, 2015

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Mesquita and Smith write a compelling book and engaging read comparable to “Freakonomics” in style. The authors seek to use simple economic logic to explain the staying power of dictators. This might be a foregone conclusion for many- dictators are synonymous with mean nasty people that take away free speech, freedom to assemble, they lower education and health standards, and lower access to political participation. Dictators simply stay in power because they take power away from everyone else and do their best to keep it that way.

The book begins with a “dictator” story of an elected city manager, Robert Rizzo, in the small town of Bell, California. The authors take away the ugly dictator mask and present the idea that anyone- even a Western, elected, white politician in small town USA can be dictator. Their thesis is that all leaders rely on people following them and they stay in power by keeping their following happy, not too powerful, and relying on them as the sole head-honcho. They authors divide the constituency into three parts- the nominal selectorate (pretty much everyone), the real selectorate (those who make a difference), and the winning coalition (those who tip the tide). They argue that the more nominal people are in the selectorate and the larger the winning coalition then the more the leader will reward the constituency with “good” behavior- or policies that provide quality public goods. When the selectorate is small and the winning coalition even smaller (a few generals) then the only thing a leader should do is provide benefits to that handful- they should not try to give benefits to the wider public. The underlying theme for the book is dispassionate leadership- leaders cannot afford to have values, feelings, or virtuous standards to live up to, there is no good or bad behavior. The authors want to drive home the limitation of incentives for leaders. If they want to stay in power their only measuring stick for good or bad is whether the real selectorate and winning coalition are big or small.

I found the book helpful to understand the staying power behind some things I never completely understood- like corrupt police forces and commodity boards. I find that the authors’ arguments hold up to an extent. I am convinced that for any analysis of a government or institution it is absolutely imperative to look at the size of the selectorate and the real coalition to see who is responsible for the leader staying in power and how many are unable to participate. One must understand if the leader has incentives to create more public goods or private goods for cronies.

The authors simply shoot themselves in the credibility foot by comparing and contrasting extremes on the winning coalition scale. For instance, to argue that smaller winning coalition governments have less incentives to provide public goods they compare Chile and Iran. In Iran they have earthquakes a lot but the government doesn’t have the incentives to make sure buildings can stand up to them. In Chile, a democracy, the people make sure the government is on top of making sure buildings can withstand big earthquakes. To show that dictatorships only care about the public to the extent they make the winning coalition happy they contrast primary education levels in Cuba and North Korea to Oxford and Paris. Castro and Kim Jong Il need to make sure the population can read and are healthy so they push buttons on the machines and go to work, but they don’t need Art majors or anyone studying sociology. To show how foreign aid and leaders of resource rich countries have their incentives distorted they present Pakistan. Pakistan has received a lot of aid, the dictator has stayed in power, yet poverty and the Taliban continue to persist.

When the argument relies on extremes the more the “facts” presented might rely on a wider range of correlations than the one suggested. Besides, no one is going to argue that Kim Jong Il, Saddam Hussein, Robert Mugabe, or any of the other figures that come to power wearing a military uniform with stars are not self-interested dictators that don’t care about anybody else. The interesting part of the argument is the possibility it presents for democratic leaders to engage in dictator-like behavior. The book presented only a few cases of this, and one of them ended in an arrest.

I hope the authors come out with a second edition. I feel there is much more to elaborate on in winning coalitions of democracies. I notice that absent from the evidence is a list of governments and the size of the winning coalition in proportion to the population they serve. I think the authors decided to step around the objectiveness of determining the selectorate and winning coalition size- because maybe it can get confusing and polarizing. It is easy to use examples like Saddam Hussein’s Iraq because there are clear lines- there is Saddam, then the sons, the generals, and everyone else. But, in our democracy, for instance, there is the media, celebrities, wealthy people, businesses, and tricky campaign finance laws that play a role in greying the lines between selectorates and the winning coalition. It seems there could be much more written about the relationship between these “tools” and the winning coalition.

Secondly, the chapter on foreign aid dealt mostly with US unilateral aid to dictators elucidating on the “alliance trap” and the “hypocrisy curse”. It is known and well understood that much of this aid, especially during the cold-war and to those providing military assistance is not actually for economic, political, or social development. Most aid and development assistance today, which is thought of as real honest development, is done through multilateral actors such as the World Bank, the IMF, the Millennium Development Institute, as well as a host of European agencies. The developing world often sees some of the agencies as agents of the West devising confusing plans that make their country weak and the West better off. A coalition analysis may bring more light to understanding what these agencies, including USAID, are doing and why.

On the second thesis- that there is no morality when it comes to a leader staying in power, I am more shocked than satisfied. There is no evidence presented. It is given as a self-evident postulate. I can see how a leader who wants to maintain office and status quo would be more beholden to the rules to maintaining power presented in the book. However, in democracies, and autocracies, a fair amount of leaders get where they are in order to change the status quo- they are driven by a moral imperative. Sometimes they come from the smallest losing coalition and through some struggle, and without making compromises, they change the interests and values of the other coalitions. Perhaps in the next edition the authors can provide a coalition analysis of Abraham Lincoln’s presidency from election to emancipation proclamation; the Eisenhower presidency from forbearance to 101st airborne deployed on US soil to ensure integration; or the inability pass stricter gun laws despite overwhelming popular support. These episodes are stories of adapting to coalition changes and/or changing coalitions through a leader’s own vigor. Leaders are not always victims of the limitations of their incentives- leaders are leaders because they change things up. I would be intrigued to delve into a book that elucidates on the dynamics of coalition change and the role of leadership; as well as a deeper coalition analysis of US foreign policy in the modern age, and multi-lateral development assistance.

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Jay

A must read for everyone

Reviewed in the United States on December 24, 2023

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This is just a great book--really tells you the way the world works. I'm an old professor (Cambridge and all that) and this book has it right! Everyone should read and get the point.

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WindowShopper

Good Concept

Reviewed in Germany on October 7, 2023

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I like the book a lot. It is rational. Giving a good overview that you can adopt and use. Buy it!

Johel

Para evitar o colapso da sua democracia.

Reviewed in Brazil on June 9, 2020

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Livro excelente. No primeiro capítulo, o autor apresenta um estudo de caso para demonstrar seu método de análise. Nos outros capítulos, desenvolve todas as repercussões de seu simples método.

O resultado é um aprendizado simples e profundo capaz de dar a sagacidade política necessária para você iniciar uma mudança positiva no mundo político.

Recomendo também o livro The Virtue of Nationalism para confrontar a visão bem intencionada do autor sobre imigração.

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Oscar Moriel

Van 2 copias que compro

Reviewed in Mexico on December 14, 2018

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Probablemente el mejor libro de politica que hay, es bueno leerlo en ingles para no perder contexto, pero es una lectura obligatoria para todo aquel que quiera opinar sobre politica, te ayuda a meterte en la cabeza de todos los lideres, desge gerentes empresariales, reyes, presidentes y dictadores.

Una vez terminando de leer este libro tendras un panorama mas objetivo de como funciona la politica en el mundo

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Jen

The masses outside of that coalition are irrelevant other than if they revolt Dictators have a very small key coalition (and the smaller and easily they are replaceable the better and cheaper for him ...

Reviewed in Canada on July 23, 2018

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Ok, so read the most insightful book I have come across in a long while - it's a modern day version of Machiavelli's "the prince".
The book is a cynical take about the real pragmatics and incentives of what goes on to stay in political power - not how it should be, but what it is.

The premise of the book is that the relative size, nature and power of the masses and your key supporters/ coalition determines how things work.
Leaders cannot rule unilaterally, they need backers who have to be (metaphorically) fed otherwise they will withdraw that support and governments fall. Ideology, values, religion, etc do set context, but the above frames what is possible and likely. The masses outside of that coalition are irrelevant other than if they revolt

Dictators have a very small key coalition (and the smaller and easily they are replaceable the better and cheaper for him to buy their support - i.e. bribe). Democracies have a large coalition (i.e. most of the population) so you stay in power by providing public goods people want as just too many to bribe.

Basically, money can be spent on 3 groups - yourself, the population, your key supporters.
You need to first spend just as much as necessary for the supporters to back you (but not too much on the others as limits how much you can skim).
The general population becomes an afterthought and so high taxes are a given except to the point it impedes the overall ability of the economy to produce revenue to exploit or risks revolt.

Basic rules to staying in power:
-Loyalty and replicability of support is key and the less beholden you are to them, the better.
-Pay them just enough to keep them loyal and keep the rest. Your advantage is you know where the cash is stashed. Mugabie, for example, knew to pay his military first.
-Need to control the flow of revenue – the most effective cash flow takes from the poor and pays your coalition as much as necessary – which is a huge part of why foreign aid is both ineffective and damaging.
Money taken from the coalition to give the poor actually risks losing your key support then threatening viability - don't be too cheap to them. The populace has no power to help you.

Other insight include:
-Revolts are ultimately determined by the willingness of the military to fire on their own citizens. It is an unpleasant task, so the cash has to be flowing, and when it is not they stand down / switch teams - USSR vs Tiananmen square highlighted this.
-Aid increases the willingness of the military to stand by a dictator (i.e. more likely to open fire).
-State bankruptcy for dictators is not an economic crisis but a political one – they lose power to pay off their supporters as people remain loyal only as long as it more profitable both now and later to do so.

Money should never be given to bail out dictators. Any aid should only ever be given AFTER a target is hit. As otherwise hitting a target (like handing over Bin Laden or alleviating hunger) means no more reason to keep being paid and or have no incentive to reform. Why make the poor better? that turns off future aid and was money not spend on the coalition /yourself.

-Dying dictators are not able to continue to pay so often a time of turbulence. Also explains why many dictators die soon after losing power (if not murdered) .

-Pragmatically the phrase “mortgaging our future” functionally means regretting it was not they who came up with a popular policy that kept the other side in power.

-Rigged elections actually serve a purpose - it is a means to show coalition members that they can be thrown out if don't toe the line.

-General misery for the populace actually makes it more important to get on your good side to get benefits to not live that way - increases value of being on the take - allowing a disasters impact to be greater (to the general population, not the coalition) is actually advantageous - more aid, more dependency on the leader. For democracies the opposite - demonstrates your failure to provide the public the goods/ leadership they expect

-When you are not dependent on an economic tax base but on resources like oil/diamonds or foreign aid, have very little reason to care about the general welfare. Clean drinking water and good roads matter less also when you don't need an economy.

-Low salaries of cops is not an accident, makes it necessary to demand brides/ exploit – they get the privilege to do so, but vulnerable to removal by corruption charges if misbehave.

The book was very insightful for the above and other ways. An economic approach is always prudent to understand how things actually work rather than how we would like it to work - you can't fix what you don't understand.

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B.B

A key to understand, past, present and future civil unrest.

Reviewed in France on October 28, 2019

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This books is a cynic analysis of political game and economic theory. This resounds with the excellent book of Turchin and Nevedov, Secular Cycles, who also exhibit how important small coalition of "essentials", the so-called elites are so critical to understand instability and political changes. Having finished this book, I really think that Democracy is a miracle, and very frailed to whistand internal tensions between heterogenous social groups that cannot stand each other. Those two books are key to understand, past, present and future civil unrest.

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