Blog

When I wrote my previous post, I was not aware of how big the story about the Hungarian election would become. In both the United States and the West generally the resounding defeat of Viktor Orban was hailed by many as a harbinger of change. A signal that rightism and populism – which had pockmarked the West – were on their way out and that centrism and moderation were on their way back in. I also pointed out that what had happened in Hungary reflected a triumph of fed-up followers over a leader who had long been confirmed as corrupt as callous.

All of which raises the question of how replicable the Hungarian model really is. Should we assume that what happened in Hungary is, for example, a signal that the far-right party in Germany, the AfD – which in recent years has been stunningly successful – is similarly fated to have seen its better days? Or, for that matter that not only are Donald Trump’s approval ratings at all time lows, but that Trumpism itself is part of America’s past, not its future or even its present.

Counterintuitively, Hungary had four advantages that, for example, the United States might not enjoy, especially not at the national level. For Hungarians to defeat their autocratic leader they had to have:

• An election that – despite their country’s being termed an illiberal democracy – was reasonably free and fair.   
• A massive turnout so the prime minister’s defeat resounded throughout the country as throughout the world.
• A landslide victory with Orban’s opponent winning by so large a margin that his victory was indisputable.     
• A single candidate around whom Hungarians could coalesce. Peter Magyar was their man, and he will become their next prime minister. But… Magyar came to national attention through a highly atypical set of circumstances that, among other things, involved personal, political, and financial scandal.  (Remember… context matters!)  

If we Americans are sufficiently vigilant, we might well have free and fair elections both in 2026 and in 2028. If we Americans are sufficiently engaged, we might well have high voter turnouts both times over. And if we Americans better remember what we have in common rather than what drives us apart we might well also bestow on some candidates’ major victories.

Which brings us to the final criterion: will the opposition produce candidates – around whom the American people can coalesce? Will Democrats stop their infighting? Will Democrats get their act together? Will Democrats unite around platforms that are clear, consistent, and coherent? Most importantly, will Democrats produce a single presidential candidate who is as clever as charismatic as qualified?

Evidence is growing that Americans long to be led by someone other than Trump – or his toadies. But for him and his minions to be tossed sooner rather than later into the dustbin of history will require of Democrats a level of innovation and cooperation that is not yet in evidence.

Viktor Orban has been Prime Minister of Hungary for sixteen years. For most of this time he governed the country, or ruled it, not with an iron fist but with a heavy hand. He was an autocrat or, if you prefer, an illiberal democrat or, if you prefer, a kleptocrat or, if you prefer, a crony capitalist. He was in any case a right-wing leader who by every western account was corrupt as well as inept; was chummier with the likes of Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump than with those of Kier Starmer and Emmanual Macron; and was more of a destroyer of democratic institutions than a protector of them.

So, in the weeks before yesterday’s national elections liberals both within Hungary and without had three major concerns, First, would Orban win yet another term as prime minister? Second, if he lost, would he lose by a large margin or by a small one? (The second would allow him more easily to defy the result.) And third, if he lost, even if decisively, would he agree to go or would he fight his defeat?

For at least the last ten years Orban’s leadership was unwavering and unrelenting both at home and abroad. At every turn he made clear that he was no friend of Europe, or of the West generally, or of any Hungarian who was opposed to his person, his politics, or his policies. Moreover, for most of his time in office his people, his followers, most Hungarians, were content to go where he led. Or, if they were not, they were not so malcontent as actively to resist him.

Yesterday this changed – in a big way. Orban was not just defeated at the polls by his opponent, Peter Magyar. Orban was defeated in a landslide. He was defeated by enormous numbers of people who previously were willing to follow his lead, but willing to do so no longer.

For Hungarians – and for others who closely watched – one could however argue that yesterday’s biggest surprise was not what Hungarian voters did, but what their prime minister did. Instead of resisting the outcome or even defying it, Orban acknowledged his defeat rather early and relatively graciously.

A large part of the high anxiety shared in recent years by the numberless Americans who not only intensely dislike President Donald Trump but who intensely fear him – fear above all that he will do permanent damage to America’s democratic political system – is first that he will rig the November 2026 and 2028 elections and second that even if he and his fellow Republicans are defeated by the electorate, they will not quit their posts.

Hard to believe that I’m writing this. But we might have hit on a moment in which Hungarians, including Orban, are our leaders and we the American people, including Trump, are their followers.  Notice that I write “might.”

It happens I’m currently teaching a course (locally) based on the first book I ever wrote. In my many years of teaching I’ve never taught All the President’s Kin: Their Political Roles. But somehow, I thought it time to revive the subject – that is, the subject of how important political roles have been played in the modern presidency by various members of president’s families. (Think, for example, of Jared Kushner, son in law of the incumbent president.) In fact, since the time of President John Kennedy, so important have these roles been that we can say that no presidency since his has been without one or another family member playing a critical part either during the presidential campaign, or during the president’s tenure in the White House, or both.  

Imagine my astonishment when within an hour or two of concluding yesterday’s class I learned that while we were in session First Lady Melania Trump had made an unannounced but nevertheless formal, televised, and scripted appearance from a podium in the White House, apparently for the sole purpose of denying anything more than “casual” ties to Jeffrey Epstein and his accomplice, Ghislaine Maxwell. What motivated the president’s wife to make this statement in this way at this time, I cannot say. I can, however, say that up to now no First Lady has ever felt the need to deny that she was “a victim” of a convicted sex offender.

By and large America’s First Ladies have carried out whatever their vague duties capably and honorably. Moreover, in the modern presidency presidents’ wives have been highly visible, closely scrutinized, and expected to perform impeccably both stylistically and substantively.

The ways in which they served the country have varied widely, of course. Jacqueline Kennedy was an altogether different sort of First Lady from Rosalynn Carter, as was Lady Bird Johnson from Patricia Nixon from Hillary Clinton. Some, I might add, derived their powerful political clout from their exceedingly close relationships with their husbands – such as Mrs. Carter and Nancy Reagan. Others were somewhat more distant from the president but nevertheless had a significant and generally positive impact, for instance, Barbara Bush.

Moreover, nearly all modern First Ladies have been highly popular with the American people. Nearly all have ranked among the most widely admired women in the United States, and nearly all were thought well of in their position. In 2005, for example, Gallup reported that fully 85% of the American people approved of the way Laura Bush was doing her job.

Which brings us to Melania Trump – whose approval ratings are, let’s not mince words, terrible. CNN data expert, Harry Enten, put it bluntly when he said this week that based on a survey conducted in late March, her numbers were “absolutely awful.” Melania Trump, he went on, “is breaking records in ways you don’t want to break records,” adding that “the American people really don’t care for her.”  To add to her humiliation, the recent movie that was all about her, and only about her, titled, cleverly, “Melania,” has widely been seen as both a critical and commercial fiasco. (The film cost some $75 million to make and market and so far, has earned back a scant $17 million.)

Every First Lady from Jacqueline Kennedy to Jill Biden has performed some sort of function and therefore has had some sort of impact. In some cases, this impact was domestic, for example, Mrs. Kennedy was known to have been a superb White House hostess who held glittering events that brought together people with different political views and from all walks of life. In other cases, this impact was relational, for example, Mrs. Reagan was so close to her husband that he and she were effectively one. Nancy was her Ronnie’s political as well as personal mainstay, his alter ego. In still other cases this impact was civic or philanthropic, for example, in the case of Mrs. Johnson and Barbara Bush. And in still other cases First Ladies were barrier breakers – examples are Hillary Clinton, a major political force in her own right; and Michelle Obama who, by her own testimony with some difficulty, broke the racial barrier.   

Melania Trump has been none of these things. Intensely private, even secretive, she is not known for having made even a single significant civic or philanthropic contribution either during her first term in the White House or now, during her second. Further, she appears to have a marriage in which husband and wife go their separate ways, so that if she provides the president with support of any kind, even as a modest ballast, we the American people are unaware of it.

Melania Trump is a beautiful woman who is invariably immaculately turned out. But she is rarely seen and nearly never heard. Moreover, what she cares about is as opaque today as it was when Donald Trump first came to our collective attention. If Mrs. Trump has ever contributed anything positive to the national conversation or to our collective welfare, it remains a well-kept secret. Of course, she still might. But time is running out. Her days in the White House, like those of her husband, are numbered.  

Yes, I refer here to Donald J. Trump. And no, I do not refer here to the president’s politics or his policies. Neither at home nor abroad.

Instead, my reference is to his manners. He is the most ill-mannered leader, in any sector, that I at least am familiar with. His public displays of coarseness and rudeness, along with his vulgarities, are in a class by themselves.

Trump’s social media post of yesterday morning was so radical a departure from the norm, from how previous American presidents have conducted themselves in any circumstance – not to speak of on the most important, the holiest, day on the Christian calendar – that we must wonder if, as some experts have argued, Trump is becoming senile. Maybe. But his use of language, his choice of words, while shocking, was no more than a continuation of, an extension of, an exaggeration of, behaviors that have long since been transgressive.

Let’s be clear though. If Trump is a one-man wrecking ball – a leader who wrecks our civility as he does our civics – we have only ourselves to blame. It is we the people who for years have tolerated his lying and cheating, as it is we the people who have long since put up with a president who – on Easter Sunday, 2026 –  chose to write this:

Tuesday will be Power Plant Day, and Bridge Day, all wrapped up in one, in Iran. There will be nothing like it!!! Open the Fuckin’ Strait, you crazy bastards, or you’ll be living in Hell – JUST WATCH! Praise be to Allah.

Evil Leadership – The leader and at least some followers commit atrocities. They use pain as an instrument of power. The harm done to men, women and children is severe rather than slight. This harm can be physical, or psychological, or it can be both. *

While the world’s attention is largely on the war in the Middle East, the war in Ukraine grinds on. So my focus today is on the evil leadership of Russian President Vladimir Putin – which, now year in, year out, continues. I do not even refer here to the pain that Putin’s unprovoked attack in February 2022 daily inflicts on Ukrainians. I refer instead to the pain that his unprovoked attack daily inflicts on Russians. On his own people, his followers.  

The information in this post is from a report published in January by the bipartisan, nonprofit Center for Strategic and International Studies. ** The report details the cruelties that are regularly inflicted on men who serve in the Russian military – who serve in the military for the sole purpose of fueling the war by Russia against Ukraine.

Since the war started Russian forces have suffered nearly 1.2 million casualties, “more losses than any major power in any war since World War II.” Ironically, Russia has nearly nothing to show for its losses. Even in their most prominent offensives, Russian soldiers are managing to advance at an average rate of between 15 and 70 meters per day, “slower than almost any major offensive campaign in any war in the last century.” Meanwhile, while Russia has not so far buckled, and while it is, courtesy of the war in the Middle East, being gifted by climbing oil prices, its economy nevertheless is showing severe strains.

My point is not, however, the inadequacy of Putin’s performance as a wartime leader. It is the cruelty of Putin’s performance as a wartime leader.*** In Russia’s military, men reportedly fear their ostensible friends more than they do their ostensible foes. Specifically, unless they are able and willing to pay their way out of their predicament, they can be and often are abused by their superiors. For corruption in Russia’s military is rampant and so, in consequence, is brutality. Hundreds of videos are now being circulated on Russian social media that reveal horrific punishments by superiors extorting money from their subordinates. “Soldiers report being locked in cages, electrocuted and sexually assaulted. Those wounded, but lucky enough to survive must pay thousands more to be declared unfit for service, or they’re forced to literally limp into battle.”  

The specifics are these. If a Russian soldier pays the equivalent of $2,000, he will be assigned away from the front line. If a Russian soldier pays the equivalent of $6,000, he will be assigned to the rear of his unit. And, if a soldier can pay the staggering Russian equivalent of $12,000, he will be given a fraudulent discharge on medical grounds.  

How does such a thing happen? How does it happen that in a country such as Russia – whose population is more than 75% European – the regime is able totally to tyrannize its people?  The answer is it’s something of a mystery. But its roots lie in the human condition. And… in Russia’s geography, history, ideology, religion, and tradition as each of these pertains to relations between leaders and followers.

——————————————————————–

*Definition in Barbara Kellerman, Bad Leadership: What It Is, How It Happens, Why It Matters (Harvard Business School Press, 2004).

** https://www.csis.org/analysis/russias-grinding-war-ukraine

*** https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/russian-corruption-fuels-massive-casualties-in-ukraine

The number of Saturday’s No Kings Day protesters was estimated to be about eight million. In my previous post I said that this would suffice for the third No Kings Day to be assessed a success. Which it was. At a minimum it was among the largest public protests in American history. Given that a year ago no one had heard of such a thing as No Kings, that’s quite a feat.

However, as I also pointed out, the day’s agenda was amorphous, deliberately so. As the name “No Kings” suggests, the demonstrations were more anti-President Donald Trump than they were pro anything.  Which of course raises the question of whether the protesters have enough in common effectively to promote a more precise political agenda. An agenda more expansive than dumping Trump.

At the same time as preparations for this third No Kings Day were getting into high gear, two reports confirmed what many of us suspected: that democracy is in decline not just in the United Sates but around the world.

The titles of the two reports say it all. Sweden’s V-Dem’s is named “Unraveling the Democratic Era.” And America’s Freedom House’s is named, “The Growing Shadow of Autocracy.” Freedom House found that in 2025 “global freedom declined for the 20^th consecutive year.” And V-Dem found that the world has never seen as many countries that, simultaneously, are “autocratizing.” Moreover, the United States is Exhibit A. Legislative constraints on the American executive are at historic lows. And U.S. democracy overall is at the level it was more than a half century ago, before the 1964 Civil Rights Act.  

Which raises two questions: Why is this happening and can anything be done to reverse the trend? Our tendency has been to blame the political establishment for whatever it is that ails us. Specifically, followers have blamed democratic political leaders for what has gone wrong. And followers have imagined that getting autocratic political leaders – ones more disposed to use an iron fist than a velvet glove – will or at least might ameliorate the situations in which they find themselves.

Let’s get tell it like it is: ordinary people both in the United States and in democracies elsewhere in the world are experiencing frustration that is morphing slowly but certainly into fury. Specifically, increasingly, followers are furious that the middle class status to which they aspired seems out of reach; that affordable housing is difficult, even impossible to come by; that their college degrees are perilously close to being worthless; and that while their struggles are mounting the leadership class – those at or near the top of the heap – are enjoying lifestyles of the rich and famous.

Who constitutes the leadership class? Leaders in every sector. Most obviously in the private sector where enormous wealth is being accumulated at dizzying speeds. But in other sectors as well, including in the public one where rampant corruption increasingly seems – certainly in the United States, during the time of Trump – not the exception but the rule.

Reports such as those recently issued by V-Dem and Freedom House are as valuable as they are depressing. But they do not adequately address the root of the problem. Which is not just that democracy is in decline, but that capitalism is failing. One could in fact argue – and I do – that democracy is in decline precisely because capitalism is failing.*

——————————————-

  *The first chapter of my most recent book is titled, “Democracy in Decline and Capitalism in Question.” (Leadership from Bad to Worse: What Happens When Bad Festers, Oxford University Press, 2024.)

There’s a debate about how much today’s No Kings Day will matter.  It’s the third such event, the success of the previous two having already astonished not just the organizers, but America’s leadership class and the American people more generally.

What though do I mean by “success”? For now, I refer to the numbers, only to the numbers. To the surprisingly large, remarkably large turnout: some five million people for the first No Kings Day held last June, and some seven million people for the second No Kings Day held in October.  

It’s not a common occurrence that social movements emerge seemingly out of thin air. I’ve therefore considered the No King’s Day protests to be significant, a possible if not probable harbinger of a Republican rout to come. And I’ve thought of the primary initiators and coordinators of the No Kings movement (Leah Greenberg and Ezra Levin) as political players to be taken seriously. (For some of my earlier posts on these subjects see the links below.)

But the question that inevitably comes up is, notwithstanding their enormous size, do protests such as these make a difference? Given that they are amorphous in their political demands, and that they lack a clear and coherent political agenda, what can possibly be their tangible outcome? Will anything be different this Monday morning from last Monday morning? The king – the president of the United States, Donald J. Trump – will still be sitting on his Oval Office throne. And his subjects – most importantly Republican members of Congress – will continue as they have been, craven. So, what’s the point? Does it suffice to register distrust, displeasure, and dissatisfaction? Does it suffice to vent? Or are the protests fatally flawed for lack of a precise political plan?

To these questions I do not of course have clear answers. So I will simply venture the following. First, size matters. Harvard University’s Erica Chenowith has evidence for this, evidence that peaceful protests that reach a certain critical mass have measurable, concrete political outcomes. (See the BBC article describing her work, also linked below.) Second, for today’s No Kings Day to be assessed a success it will have to have one to two million more people protesting than the last one. Specifically, this time the crowd must be estimated to be at least eight if not nine or even ten million strong. And third, given that the next congressional election is now only half a year away, if the No Kings Day crowds are to have an actual impact they will have to translate, to transform, their indirect, performative passion into direct, political action. Not in the fullness of time – but in the next few months.

—————————

Followers in Flower

No King

Leah Greenberg and Ezra Levin, Leaders

2025 FOLLOWER(S) OF THE YEAR

The ‘3.5% rule’: How a small minority can change the world

The full title of Stanley Kubrick’s 1964 film – which is widely considered “one of the greatest and most influential films ever made” – is “Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Enjoy the Bomb.” If you’ve never seen it, I suggest you check it out. If you have seen it, could be worth a second viewing. Whatever your opinion of where we are now, the film reminds us of what we prefer to forget.

NOTE: I REGRET THE INTERMITTENT INTERRUPTIONS IN THIS SERIES. BLAME THE LACK OF MORE TIME – AND SO MANY OTHER INDIVIDUALS AND ISSUES ON WHICH I WANT TO COMMENT. BUT AS YOU SEE, THE VERY SHORT COURSE CONTINUES.

————————————–

As indicated in my post of last August 21, I am giving a very short course, specifically on this site, on the classics of leadership literature. (See the post for how “classic” is defined.)

The posts will be drawn from my edited collection, Leadership: Essential Selections on Power, Authority, and Influence (McGraw-Hill, 2010). While here I can provide only short bursts of texts, my hope is they will prompt you to dig deeper.

The selections are grouped into three parts. Part I comprises classics About Leadership. Part II is a compilation of Literature as Leadership. And Part III consists of selections by Leaders in Action. Leaders who have used words – written, oral, or both – as instruments of leadership.

Today’s leadership literacy classic is in Part II of the book, Literature as Leadership. The idea that writing can be an act of leadership at first seems astonishing. But it is not, or it should not be. After all, writing is communicating. It is using words to send a message, in this case about change. Specifically, every writer in this section of the book was a leader. An intellectual leader who sought to create change by so convincingly making their case that people would feel compelled to act.

The eight men and four women who fall into this category all set out to right what they deeply believed was a wrong. Remarkably they did. Moreover, they wrote so well that we read them still.

Today’s writer as leader – or, if you prefer, leader as writer – is Franz Fanon. Born into a middle-class family in Martinique, educated in France, and buried in Algeria, Fanon’s flame burned bright, but only briefly. A philosopher, a psychiatrist, and an activist as well as a writer he died at age 36 – though not before leaving behind a book that became a classic, The Wretched of the Earth.  

In the tumult of the late 1960s and early 1970s Fanon was what, decades later, the New York Times described as a “minor celebrity on the radical left.”* More recently however – most dramatically during the time of Trump – Fanon has become “an icon.” Especially on college campuses he is enlisted in agendas ranging from black nationalism and Islamism to cosmopolitanism. And he is admired for the extremity and consistency of his rage against, for example, colonialism and racial injustice.

In part Fanon is invoked so frequently because of his simplicity. His world view was Manichean: masters and slaves, colonizers and colonized, whites and blacks, the former free, the latter in chains if not physically then psychologically. As I earlier wrote, his “mission in life was to end gross inequity, once and for all, by using force if necessary to bring down those with power, authority, and influence in favor of those without.”**  

I include him in this short course on leadership literacy because The Wretched of the Earth is a leadership classic of a certain genre. It openly advocates the use of force to compel change. Specifically, change that is deemed not just desirable but necessary – such as ending colonialism and racial injustice. In fact, it was Fanon’s fury, and his unambiguous and unapologetic defense of violence to eliminate extreme inequity, that explains his influence on revolutionary leaders such as Cuba’s Che Guevara. And that explains his intellectual leadership even now.

                                                             *

Excerpts from Franz Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth – 1961

• Decolonization is always a violent event…. Decolonization is quite simply the substitution of one “species” of mankind by another. The substitution is unconditional, absolute, total, and seamless.  
• Decolonization, which sets out to change the order of the world, is clearly an agenda for total disorder.
• Decolonization is the encounter between two congenitally antagonistic forces.
• [This explains] why decolonization reeks of red-hot cannonballs and bloody knives. For the last can be first only after a murderous and decisive confrontation between the two protagonists. This determination to have the last move up to the front, to have them clamber up (too quickly, say some) the famous echelons of an organized society, can succeed only by resorting to every means, including, of course, to violence.

*https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/02/opinion/frantz-fanon-colonialism.html

**Kellerman, Leadership: Essential Selections. (As above.)

This post is for those of you who – like me – consider power part of a leader’s arsenal. It’s like authority, which is yet another part of the leader’s arsenal, as is influence.

When leaders have power, they can reward followers who follow. And they can punish followers who do not follow. Put directly, when leaders have power, they can, generally, compel compliance.

Which brings us to this story about the founding chef of a fabled, now defunct, Danish restaurant named Noma. It’s a story about the leader: the founding chef and employer, Rene Redzepi. And, equally, it’s a story about his followers: his employees, who he badly abused.  

Abuse in restaurant kitchens is no longer news. We’ve known about it for years. About physical abuse, psychological abuse, and sexual abuse. (For example, we’ve known since 2017 that the famous American chef, Mario Batali, routinely behaved badly toward those in his employ.) Still, the extent of Redzepi’s abusiveness, which more recently came to light, and the willingness of those in his employ to put up with it, is a reminder of the power of power.

Redzepi’s was so great that he was able physically to attack his employees and verbally to assault them – while getting those who suffered and witnessed the abuse to remain silent. The New York Times interviewed 35 of Redzepi’s former employees. They said that between 2009 and 2017 he was known for punching them in the face, jabbing them with kitchen implements, and slamming them against walls. They additionally “described lasting trauma from layers of psychological abuse, including intimidation, body shaming and public ridicule.” Further, there were threats to use his influence to get people blacklisted from other restaurants, or to have their families deported, or to get their relatives fired from jobs at other businesses.*

All of which must raise the question of why people put up with Rene Redzepi. Why did his employees remain in his employ? Why did they continue to follow their leader year after year when their leader was so bad?

Some were asked just this question and the answers they gave were revealing. Some said enduring the experience paid off for professional reasons. They said they learned a lot, had extraordinary experiences, and were able to hone their resumes in ways they could not have done otherwise. Others mentioned the group dynamic, saying that they put up with the abuse because everyone else did. And still others felt their reputation and self-esteem were at stake. As one person put it, “I swallowed it all, because I wanted to prove that I was a team player, that I could take it.”

Of course, not everyone was willing to put up with Rene Redzepi – some of his followers refused to continue to follow. A few reportedly fled mid-shift, in tears, and others were said just to have disappeared. But most stayed on, where they were, which is hard to understand. They were, after all, free to leave. To quit Redzepi’s establishment and go to another first-rate place where the environment was less toxic. So, why stay in such an awful workplace? Why continue to put up with such a bad boss?

Answering these questions requires more than a simple cost-benefit analysis. And more even than understanding the human condition. It requires we grasp that the context within which people are situated can explain not just their obeying authority but their kowtowing to power.

——————————————————————-

*The information in this post, and the quote, is from this piece: https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/07/dining/rene-redzepi-noma-abuse-allegations.html