The Psychology of Leadership Destabilization: An Analysis of the 2016 U.S. Presidential Debates

Abstract

When contesting for political office, leaders do not only seek to build their own following but also to engage in attacks to destabilize opponent leaders. However, research has yet to explore and explain the nature of attacks that seek to destabilize a leader's influence. Building on the identity leadership model which sees leadership as flowing from a leader's capacity to promote a sense of shared identity with followers, we argue that a leader can be destabilized if followers come to see the leader as defiling, devaluing, dividing, and destroying this shared sense of “us.” To explore these ideas, we analyzed the attack rhetoric used by Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump during the 2016 U.S. presidential debates to examine how they sought to subvert each other's leadership. Our analysis supports the proposed model and sheds light on the hitherto underexplored topic of leadership destabilization. Moreover, by helping us understand the ways in which principles of identity leadership can be weaponized to destabilize leadership, the analysis defines an important agenda for future research.

An Integrative Social Identity Model of Populist Leadership

“…Similarly, recent work on identity leadership has focused on understanding the aspects of identity entrepreneurship. For example, a study by Maskor et al (2021) analysed the attack rhetoric of Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton during the US 2016 Presidential Election. Whereas Trump portrayed Clinton in his rhetoric as the representative of the corrupt elites, Clinton tried to influence female voters by emphasizing Trump's misogynist comments and his inappropriate behaviour towards women.…”

“…Whereas Trump portrayed Clinton in his rhetoric as the representative of the corrupt elites, Clinton tried to influence female voters by emphasizing Trump's misogynist comments and his inappropriate behaviour towards women. Maskor et al (2021) thus proposed that in addition to creating a sense of us and them through rhetoric, leaders also engage in attack rhetoric towards their rivals, which leads to leadership destabilisation and potentially increases their social influence over the group which they are trying to mobilize. In the psychological sense, leaders can engage in defiling, devaluating, dividing, and destroying a shared sense of "us-ness" (Maskor et al, 2021; in the case of Trump and Clinton this was targeting the values and goals of 'Americans').…”

Identity leadership and mobilization strategies in repressive regimes: Czechoslovak Socialist Republic’s ‘Candlelight Demonstration’

“…Existing research has primarily focused on the rhetorical dimensions of identity leadership showing that leading group members can strategically engage in rhetorically defining and re-defining group categories and boundaries, influencing collective mobilization for particular courses of action (Maskor et al, 2020). For example, in the case of Bulgarian citizens mobilizing solidarity with their Jewish population, this was achieved through rhetorically constructing category inclusion (Jews as a part of a common ingroup) and group norms ('our' group supports those under attack), and through advancing category interests ('our' group will be harmed if Jews of our community are harmed) (Reicher et al, 2006).…”

“…Thus, social identity can be rhetorically crafted by leaders (e.g., 'us' versus 'them') and provide a basis for mobilization. Accordingly, shared social identity can also be a key resource for leaders to rhetorically destabilize their opposers by representing other candidates as acting against shared group identity, its norms, and interests (Maskor et al, 2020), as well as the moral basis for justifying hateful group behaviour (Rath, 2016).…”

Examining the role of Donald Trump and his supporters in the 2021 assault on the U.S. Capitol: A dual-agency model of identity leadership and engaged followership

“…A number of studies of this form are currently underway as part of a global effort to better understand the mechanics of identity leadership and the ways in which it can be directed, misdirected and derailed (e.g., Bracht et al, 2021;Maskor et al, 2020). Part of this work will also need to examine the attributions that we make to leaders and groups, and those that leaders themselves make, in the face of different collective outcomes (cf., Meindl et al, 1985).…”