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When the world’s two most powerful leaders meet face to face it’s news. It’s news even when nothing much happens. As was the case this week when American President Donald Trump met in Beijing with Chinese President Xi Jinping.

Summits – especially between leaders of superpowers – have a mixed record. Occasionally they result in breakthroughs, as did the several meetings between American President Ronald Reagan and Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev. Both then and now was wide agreement that the two leaders got on surprisingly well and that, together, they transformed the decades-long Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union into something considerably more cordial.*

More often though summits are exercises in pomp and circumstance on the one hand and futility on the other. They do not generally lead to breakthroughs either in politics or policies. When they do, they are in consequence of extensive and extended advance planning – the sort of preparation for which Trump is not, to understate it, well known.  

The summit just concluded was, then, neither a notable success nor a fearsome failure. Nor was it a surprise. But this is not to say that the meeting between Trump and Xi was meaningless, it was not. Here then three items to make meaning of.

First, the summit confirmed that the critical relationship between China and the United States is back on track. Closer at least on the surface to cordiality than animosity.

Second, Trump secured no significant gains. Certainly not on the all-important issue of the war with Iran. Or on the equally important issue of critical (or rare-earth) minerals – a singular asset on which China continues to have a chokehold. (Critical minerals are essential to making everything from munitions to renewable batteries. How China came to came to control the global supply is another story.)

Third, Xi reaffirmed his (implicit) claim to being the single most important leader – the single most powerful player – in the world. Which, as it happens, he is. History will testify that it is he not Trump who has by far the more impressive track record and that it is he not Trump who presides over a country that during his time in office has been relentlessly on the ascent. Moreover, in Beijing it was Xi not Trump who had the temerity to launch a shot across the bow. Out of the gate it was China that issued a stark warning to the American delegation not to interfere with, not to defend, Taiwan.

Xi has been in power in China since 2012. Moreover, unlike Trump, Xi has no opposition. In China Xi is in control of everyone and everything. Also, unlike Trump who will be out of power in two and a half years, in 2017 Xi arranged things so that he is leader for life.

His supreme self-confidence is, moreover, justified. He has much to be confident about. Within China Xi reigns supreme over an enormous country that has by most measures thrived beyond anyone’s imaginings. And without China he is a force that every other national leader in the world has no choice but to reckon with.

Xi casts himself as a Confucian and a custodian of Chinese civilization. Which, I might add, goes back not a mere, measly, hundreds of years but thousands. Xi with boundless assurance governs a country with over a billion people who from kindergarten through graduate school are taught “Xi Jinping’s Thought.” This thought is, make no mistake, communist. Unlike say, Russia’s president Vladimir Putin who is a not-so-secret capitalist, Xi is a deeply committed socialist. He is also, in keeping with previously prominent communists, including his revolutionary predecessor, Mao Zedong, an authoritarian leader to the point of being a totalitarian leader.   

So, if the summit favored China President Xi Jinping over American President Donald Trump no wonder. The former is a strongman who looks in the mirror and sees Superman. The latter in contrast is a strongman who looks in the mirror and thinks he sees Superman.

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*The fact that Gorbachev’s tenure finally succumbed to the collapse of the Soviet Union is another, arguably related, matter.

In September the University of Toronto Press will publish my next book. It’s titled Why We Follow Leaders – and Why We Don’t. These are the four questions to which the book provides answers. First, what are our rewards for following? Second, what are our punishments for not following? Third, what are our rewards for not following? Fourth, what are our punishments for following?

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This post is to the point. Here are four books – all published in the last few months – that are all about followers, not leaders.

*The first is about resistance – about how followers who refuse to do what they are ordered to do and, or supposed to do and, or expected to do, can defy both the system and those who are leading it. The book is by Gal Beckerman and is titled How to Be a Dissident.   

*The second is about the absence thereof – the absence of resistance. It’s about how (most) Germans who lived in Berlin from the beginning of World War II to the end followed. They conformed to and accommodated the Nazi regime. The book is by Ian Buruma and is titled, Stay Alive: Berlin 1939-1945.

*The third is a memoir by one of those rare birds who defied or tried to the second administration of Donald Trump – specifically, the dismantling of the United States Agency for International Development. The book is by Nicholas Enrich and is titled, Into the Wood Chipper: A Whistleblower’s Account of How the Trump Administration Shredded USAID.   

*The fourth is about how corporate scandals can end in backlash. About how when wrongdoing is uncovered – specifically about companies that are behemoths – they can and sometimes do provoke people to protest. The book is by Pepper Culpepper and Taeku Lee and is titled, Billionaire Backlash: The Age of Corporate Scandal and How It Could Save Democracy.

I lament that for every billion books about leadership there’s just one about followership. Books about followers though abound. We just need to look in the right places!

In September the University of Toronto Press will publish my next book. It’s titled Why We Follow Leaders – and Why We Don’t. These are the four questions to which the book provides answers. First, what are the rewards for following? Second, what are the punishments for not following? Third, what are the rewards for not following? Fourth, what are the punishments for following?

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This post is to the point. It’s about what happened in this week’s Indiana Republican primary.

In the last year the propensity of Congressional Republicans to religiously follow wherever Donald Trump led became even curiouser and curiouser. The president’s approval ratings sank. His war with Iran proved highly unpopular. Prices rose, most visibly at the pump. Trump (and his family) pocketed billions while many millions of Americans financially struggled. And his proclivity to glitzy self-aggrandizement reached new highs.   

Notwithstanding all of this, what became clear in Indiana is that Trump continues to control the Republican party. He continues to dominate both Republicans who are in office and Republicans who aspire to do the same. His penchant for revenge was why he backed primary challengers against all seven of the incumbent Republican state senators who had rejected Trump’s redistricting plan. The result? At least five of Trump’s toadies won.

The details of their wins – including an avalanche of cash – do not concern us here. What does concern us is how it happens that a leader so clearly flawed can control followers hellbent on not crossing him because they are hellbent on not being punished. In fact, they are hellbent on being rewarded, on securing the president’s blessing.  It all goes back to the voters, of course, to Trump’s MAGA base. This base is smaller than it used to be. But notwithstanding withering criticisms of the president by some MAGA elites, even now his base remains a potent political force that all Americans have to reckon with.

Republicans who hold political office are like Democrats who hold political office. They reap a range of rewards that include but are not limited to power, status and money. So, even in an environment as politically fraught as this one, holding political office remains an attractive or even very attractive professional option. Which is why Republic incumbents and aspirants continue to shill for a leader who, however problematic, still holds the cards. Donald Trump makes it plain that he will reward those who follow him and punish those who do not – which, whatever has gone down, he still has the power to do.

My post of two days ago was a response to Haig Patapan’s new book, The Modern Tyrant. While the book is very good, I took issue with the fact that Patapan skirts, so to speak, the gender issue. That he takes it as a given that a tyrant is a man – a “he” not a “she.”

I do not argue that this is wrong. I argue that we cannot or at least we should not make this assumption without discussion.  

For the purposes of this post, I accept the point. I accept that nearly all modern tyrants are men. Further, nearly all tyrants have always been men. Which inevitably raises the question of why. Why is it that some men tend to be tyrannical while hardly any women tend to be same – even when, as they occasionally are, in leadership roles? Is it that men, generally the physically stronger of our species, have historically been more able to be all-controlling? Or is it that men want it more than women? Want more fervently and frequently than women not merely to exercise power but to exercise total power over near everyone and everything.

Suffice here – this is a post not a book – to say that any attempt to answer questions about gender differences as they pertain to leadership and followership must begin with, and maybe even end with, the fact that we, we humans, are great apes. We humans are great apes who are extremely closely related to two other species of great apes: chimpanzees and bonobos. We three share a common ancestor as well as more than 96 percent of our DNA.

All well and good – though in a discussion about power the similarities and differences among the three species of great apes can be said to raise as many questions as give answers.  For chimpanzees are known, like humans, to be aggressive. Moreover, it is the male of the species who is nearly always the aggressor both within chimpanzee groups and without. Bonobos, in contrast, are far less aggressive. They don’t generally engage in warfare, and they don’t generally intentionally kill each other. Further, and to the point that I make here, unlike chimpanzees among whom males dominate, among bonobos it is females who typically reign supreme.

So, when males dominate aggression, especially but not exclusively physical aggression, is a predictable byproduct. In contrast, when females dominate, physical aggression is far less frequent. Therefore, while among bonobos there are instances in which dominant females form coalitions, particularly against problematic males, bonobos tend naturally toward more peaceable conflict resolution than chimpanzees. Which is to say that compared with chimpanzee leaders (who are males), bonobo leaders (who are females), are less naturally disposed to leading by exercising power and more naturally disposed to leading by exercising authority and influence.

Which returns us to humans. Humans share a common ancestor with chimpanzees and bonobos. Which means that we bear similarities to both species. However, when it comes to leadership and followership, a cursory look suggests that our resemblances to chimpanzees are significantly greater than to bonobos. Overwhelmingly our leaders are as they have always been – men not women. Which goes a long way toward explaining why overwhelmingly the modern tyrant is as tyrants have always been – men not women.

Several months ago, I was asked to endorse a book written by a colleague of mine, Haig Patapan. The book is titled: The Modern Tyrant: Authoritarian Leadership in Theory and Practice.

Patapan is Professor of Political Science at Australia’s Griffith University. Without hesitating I said yes to the publisher’s request, knowing that Patapan is a first-rate scholar and that most of what interests him interests me.* He, like me, writes about leadership; and he, like me, is interdisciplinary. Patapan tends to weave the classics through what he writes, for example, in this book he references Plato and Aristotle, religion and rhetoric. As I thought I would be, after reading The Modern Tyrant, I was glad to provide the blurb – a highly enthusiastic one.

I would do so again. But it is also true that since my initial reading of the book, I’ve become more sensitive to the fact that Patapan omitted from his discussion any substantive reference to gender. Throughout his book he assumes that tyrants are men and he refers to them as “he.” Patapan does address the gender issue – though only in a single footnote. The note reads as follows: “I refer to tyrants throughout as ‘he’ as they have been predominantly male. Whether this is an historical accident or reflects deeper psychological, institutional or cultural factors is an important question that has not received the scholarly at tension it deserves.” (p.5)

 It’s true that as it pertains to power, authority, and influence, the issue of gender has been severely shortchanged, including among academics. Or, better, as in Patapan’s book, gender is a given. It is a given – an assumption – that as it pertains to power women are an endnote. And it is a given – an assumption – that as it pertains to combat women are similarly no more than a sidebar. Why? For the simple reason that men are virtually always the tyrants and men are virtually always the aggressors.

We are so used to men being the tyrants or the despots, the totalitarians or the authoritarians, the invaders or the attackers that we refer to them, effectively mindlessly, as “strongmen.” Not – for example, when referencing Russia or China, Turkey or Egypt, North Korea or Cuba or Sudan, as “strongwomen.”

During the heyday of the women’s rights movement (in the late 1960s and early 1970s) attention was paid to the fact that nearly always it was men who made war. Further was the widespread idea that if only women ruled the world, the world would be different. It would be better. But nothing much came of it. Overwhelmingly, everywhere in the world, and in every sector, it is still men who do the leading and women the following. And, overwhelmingly, it is still men who employ force. They do so first to attain and then to maintain, control.   

Hard then to blame Patapan for using “he” – never “she” or even “they” – when writing about the modern tyrant. So far as we know it was not President Putin’s mother who decided to launch an unprovoked attack on Ukraine. Nor was it his erstwhile wife, nor either of his two daughters, nor any of the several other women in his life. It was Putin. Putin whose advisors and close cronies have always been male. Putin who, during his 25 years in power, has presented himself as nothing so much as very, very virile. As All-Man All the Time.**

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*The Modern Tyrant was published in 2026 by Edinburgh University Press.

**https://www.gettyimages.com/search/2/image?phrase=putin+no+shirt&tracked_gsrp_landing=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.gettyimages.com%2Fphotos%2Fputin-no-shirt

For months, even years, he was front page news. But now, with occasional exceptions, he has, at least in the United States, receded deep into the background.

Nevertheless, he plows on. He plows on, continues, against all odds, to lead his impossibly beleaguered country. He plows on, continues, against all odds, to lead his troops into battle against an ostensibly formidable military foe. He plows on, continues, against all odds, to lead a coalition of the willing, a retinue of his reliable allies. He plows on, continues, against all odds, to lead a revolution in battlefield technologies. He plows on, continues, against all odds, to weaken his opponent economically, to bleed it so that it cannot continue indefinitely to fight. He plows on, continues, against all odds, to play his part as a beacon of democracy in a world in which such beacons are in short supply. He plows on, continues, against all odds, to circle the globe to make his case, to shake hands with anyone anywhere who might provide him and his followers with critical military, financial, political, and technological support.

When the history of this period is written Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky will be one of the very, very few political leaders who proved the real deal. A good leader who was exceedingly, exceptionally effective and reasonably, relatively ethical.   

Those among us who are students of leadership would do well to move him from background to foreground. Zelensky continues to stand the test of time. He is a political leader who defies the odds. Who remains true to his mission and who continues faithfully to do everything in his power to keep his followers, his country, as strong, independent, determined and democratic as possible under its impossibly difficult circumstance.

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.