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The Psychology of Domination and Subordination: A Reader

A. G. Chernyavskaya

ANNOUNCEMENT

Any human community, from a married couple to large social groups, is organized according to a hierarchical principle. In other words, there are always relations of domination and subordination in it, some people impose their will on others. These relations are intertwined: the one who commands in one group (for example, in a family) very often turns out to be an executor, and even a slave in another (for example, in a totalitarian sect or in a party).

This reader contains fragments from scientific and journalistic works of various authors. They give a detailed idea of ​​the psychological mechanisms of domination and subordination in such communities of people as a political party, a religious sect, a criminal group, a prison camp, an unorganized crowd, a family. Knowledge of these mechanisms is very important for a correct understanding of those socio-psychological phenomena that take place in the post-Soviet period.

FOREWORD

Interest in psychology in modern post-Soviet society is natural. For several decades, the significance of the human personality, and even the very life of an individual, in the social, moral and political structure of society has been reduced to bureaucratic optimistic group, collective and class ideas. “One is nonsense, one is zero,” Mayakovsky explained to us. Why did the poet, who was able to feel subtly, who wrote tender and quivering love lyrics, a person who certainly felt like an individual (otherwise he would not have been able to suffer so much), nevertheless wrote these lines? The role of the proletarian tribune is perhaps quite sincere; the mask demanded by society, which assumed the complete destruction of the individual; the role and mask, in which the poet believed, forgetting to believe his soul, forced him to equate a single person to zero. Perhaps this was his personal tragedy. It became a tragedy for all those who were unable to consider themselves just a cog in a huge colossus, those who could not or did not want to accept the mechanisms of mass consciousness.

Now, but eighty years later, it has finally become apparent that there is another form of human relationship. Finally, we recognized that a person can be of value not only and not so much in whether he is able to lift "a simple five-inch log." The collective digging of pits is over, and we, post-Soviet people, are learning to feel like individuals, personalities. We learn this with difficulty, tearing off the "socialist" ideas about rights and obligations, about truth and lies, about the value and significance in our own lives. With the skin we peel off the social apathy and disbelief that has accumulated over decades. It is difficult: the gap between the noble slogans, the sweet speeches of politicians and the hard realities of everyday life, as before, is huge. But circumstances have changed. Life not only allows, it makes us aware of our own individual existence in this world, it forces us to rely on ourselves. Now we are learning to take responsibility for our lives, make decisions, navigate the world of human relations, and even our own inner world.

However, having realized the right to our own individuality and uniqueness, we still remain social beings connected with other people. We are forced to obey the laws of the society we have created or imposed on us and, whether we like it or not, we are forced to reckon with them. These laws are far from perfect, and can hardly be perfect at all. Therefore, the ability to understand the mechanisms, structures and motives of social leaders and those who are united in the masses, in the "population", gives a certain inner freedom, makes the life of an individual more efficient.

In this regard, it is necessary to consider the role that psychological factors play as active forces in the process of social development, and this leads to the problem of the interaction of psychological, economic and ideological factors. Any attempt to understand the attraction that fascism has for entire nations forces us to recognize the role of psychological factors. Here we are dealing with a political system, which, in essence, is not based on the rational forces of human self-interest. It awakens such diabolical forces in a person, in the existence of which we did not believe at all, or considered them to have disappeared long ago. Is there not, besides the innate desire for freedom, an instinctive craving for submission? If not, how can one explain the attraction that today for many, submission to the leader? Does obedience always arise in relation to explicit external authority, or is it possible to submit to internal authorities, such as duty and conscience, or other authorities like public opinion? Is submission a source of some hidden satisfaction, and if so, what is its essence?

Since Western humanistic philosophy and psychology entered our lives, we have had to answer many uncomfortable questions. Often we find in the works of humanist psychologists our own portraits that do not decorate us too much. But by reading them, we, at least, take a huge step towards acquiring our own maturity: we learn to be honest with ourselves. However, we learn many other things: to love and understand ourselves, to forgive ourselves for our own imperfections, to free ourselves from the authorities of power, to grow in ourselves, like a fragile plant, that very inner freedom that we are more afraid of than we want to have.

The book that we want to offer you is about the mechanisms of domination and submission. Apparently, these mechanisms are one of the universal forms of human relationships that arise at different hierarchical levels of human communities - from the family to the state.

Obviously, there can be no equality between people either economically, or physically, or psychologically. The system of power and subordination is inherent in any community and is probably the only expedient one that ensures the survival of the community. Consequently, the question is only about the forms of power and forms of subordination. We wanted to acquaint the reader not so much with the forms of power, for they are known to everyone, but with the psychological mechanisms that determine the activities of those who rule and those who are subject. The reader will be convinced how similar the mental activity of the two most terrible dictators of the century is. We would like the reader to understand something else: why was a revolution possible in Russia that overthrew not only the tsar, but also God, why the peoples of Germany and Russia, countries with centuries-old humanistic traditions, so easily followed Hitler and Stalin, not just blindly obeying out of fear of violence, but also adoring and idolizing the two criminals.

We believe that the work of Gustave Le Bon "Psychology of the masses" provides answers to these questions. It is no coincidence that this work was so carefully studied by Lenin. The psychology of the crowd, the human mass, to which, like a sugar bone, the leaders throw utopian slogans about universal equality and, most importantly, equal prosperity for everyone, inevitably and very quickly becomes a terrible destructive force, overthrowing not only gods and temples, but also destroying the inner moral foundations of the human personality. The creation of a new idol, the militant desire to unify and make a person happy by giving him a new deity to replace the lost God in himself, the universal mechanism of power and subordination are equally characteristic of both dictatorial regimes and many parties and religious sects.

Power and submission, domination and obedience are in a dialectical unity, which Karen Horney talks about so convincingly in her works on neurotic love. But if the psychological mechanisms of domination have much in common, then the mechanisms of subordination can differ significantly. We know many people who retained the freedom of the spirit when the freedom of the body was taken away. That is why the work of the psychologist B. Bettelheim is included in the anthology. This is an amazing human experience, the experience of constructive submission, the survival of the soul in the inhuman conditions of a German concentration camp.

Can we be absolutely sure that freedom is given by God in some metaphysical sense as a true characteristic of the human person? Is not freedom our illusion or delusion? We will never know for sure; however, even if belief in human freedom is only an illusion, it is still the most useful of all illusions. No matter how bad things get, as long as there is hope for change based on being able to take action instead of waiting for help from someone else. With such a belief system, there is much less chance of feeling powerless.

A. Chernyavskaya

PART 1. MECHANISMS OF DOMINATION AND SUBMISSION IN SOCIETY

ERICH FROMM THE PROBLEM OF FREEDOM AND SUBMISSION

The new history of Europe and America has been shaped by efforts to win freedom from the political, economic, and spiritual fetters that bind man. The oppressed, who dreamed of new rights, fought for freedom against those who fought for their privileges. But when a certain class sought its own emancipation, it believed that it was fighting for freedom in general, and thus could idealize its goals, could attract to its own side of all the oppressed, in each of whom lived the dream of liberation. However, in the course of a long, essentially uninterrupted struggle for freedom, those classes that at first fought against oppression united with the enemies of freedom, as soon as victory was won and new privileges appeared that had to be protected.

Despite numerous defeats, freedom as a whole won out. In the name of its victory, many fighters died, convinced that it was better to die for freedom than to live without it. Such a death was the highest exaltation of their personality. It seemed that history had already confirmed that a person is capable of managing himself, making decisions for himself, thinking and feeling this way. as he thinks is correct. The full development of human abilities seemed to be the goal towards which the process of social development was rapidly approaching. The desire for freedom was expressed in the principles of economic liberalism, political democracy, separation of church and state and individualism in personal life. The implementation of these principles seemed to bring humanity closer to the realization of this aspiration.

The chains fell off one by one. Man threw off the yoke of nature and himself became its master; he overthrew the domination of the church and the absolutist state. The elimination of external coercion seemed not only a necessary, but also a sufficient condition for achieving the desired goal - the freedom of every person.

The First World War was seen by many as the last battle, and its end as the final victory of freedom: the existing democracies seemed to be strengthened, and new democracies appeared to replace the old monarchies. But not even a few years had passed before new systems arose that crossed out everything that had been won by centuries of struggle, it seemed, forever. For the essence of these new systems, which almost completely determine both the public and private life of a person, is the subordination of all to the completely uncontrolled power of a small handful of people.

At first, many comforted themselves with the thought that the victories of authoritarian systems were due to the madness of a few individuals, and that it was precisely this madness that would eventually lead to the fall of their regimes. Others complacently believed that the Italian and German peoples had lived under democratic conditions for too short a time and therefore they should simply wait until they reached political maturity. Another common illusion - perhaps the most dangerous of all - was the belief that people like Hitler allegedly seized power over the state apparatus only through treachery and fraud, that they and their henchmen rule by relying on sheer brutal force, and all the people are helpless victims of betrayal and terror.

In the years that have passed since the victory of the fascist regimes, the fallacy of these points of view has become obvious. We had to admit that in Germany millions of people gave up their freedom with the same ardor with which their fathers fought for it; that they did not strive for freedom, but were looking for a way to get rid of it; that other millions were indifferent and did not consider that freedom was worth fighting and dying for. At the same time, we realized that the crisis of democracy is not a purely Italian or German problem, that it threatens every modern state. At the same time, it is completely unimportant under what banner the enemies of human freedom act. If freedom is attacked in the name of anti-fascism, then the threat is no less than when attacked in the name of fascism itself. This idea is so well expressed by John Dewey that I will quote his words here: “The serious danger to our democracy does not lie in the existence of other, totalitarian states. The danger is that in our own personal attitudes, in our own social institutions, the same prerequisites exist that in other states led to the victory of external power, discipline, uniformity and dependence on leaders. Accordingly, the battlefield is here, in ourselves, and in our public institutions.

If we want to fight fascism, then we must understand it. Speculation will not help us, and the repetition of optimistic formulas is as inadequate and useless as a ritual Indian dance to make rain.

In addition to the problem of the economic and social conditions that contributed to the emergence of fascism, there is also the problem of man as such, which also needs to be understood. The purpose of this book is precisely to analyze those dynamic factors in the psyche of modern man that impel him to voluntarily give up freedom in fascist states and which are so widespread among the millions of our own people.

When we consider the human aspect of freedom, when we talk about the desire for submission or power, first of all questions arise:

What is freedom in the sense of human experience? Is it true that the desire for freedom is organically inherent in human nature? Does it depend on the conditions in which a person lives, on the degree of development of the individual, achieved in a certain society on the basis of a certain level of culture? Is freedom defined by the mere absence of external coercion, or does it also include the presence of something, and if so, of what? What social and economic factors in society contribute to the development of the desire for freedom? Can freedom become a burden that a person cannot bear, something that he tries to get rid of? Why is freedom a cherished goal for some, and a threat for others?

Is there not - besides the innate desire for freedom - and an instinctive craving for submission? If not, how can one explain the attraction that today for many, submission to the leader? Does obedience always arise in relation to explicit external authority, or is it possible to obey internalized authorities, such as duty and conscience, or anonymous authorities, such as public opinion? Is not submission a source of some hidden satisfaction; and if so, what is its essence?

What awakens in people an insatiable thirst for power? The strength of their vital energy or, conversely, their weakness and inability to live independently of others? What psychological conditions contribute to the strengthening of these aspirations? What social conditions, in turn, are the basis for the emergence of these psychological conditions?

An analysis of the human aspects of freedom and authoritarianism forces us to consider the role that psychological factors play as active forces in the process of social development, and this leads to the problem of the interaction of psychological, economic and ideological factors. Any attempt to understand the attraction that fascism has for entire nations forces us to recognize the role of psychological factors. Here we are dealing with a political system, which, in essence, is not based on the rational forces of human self-interest. It awakens in a person such diabolical forces, in the existence of which we did not believe at all or considered them to have disappeared long ago.

During the last centuries, the generally accepted opinion about man was that man is a rational being, whose activity is determined by his interests and the ability to act in accordance with them. Even writers like Hobbes, who considered lust for power and hostility to be the driving forces of human behavior, explained these forces as the logical result of self-interest. Since people are equal and equally striving for happiness, they said, and social wealth is not enough to satisfy everyone equally, then a struggle is inevitable; people strive for power in order to secure for themselves and for the future all that they have today. But Hobbes' scheme is outdated. The middle class achieved more and more success in the struggle against the power of the former political and religious rulers, humanity more and more succeeded in mastering nature. The economic position of millions of people became ever stronger, and at the same time, faith in the rationality of the world and in the rational essence of man was becoming stronger and stronger. Dark and diabolical forces in human nature were sent back to the Middle Ages or to even more distant times and were explained by the lack of knowledge in those days or the insidious intrigues of priests and kings.

They looked back at those periods of history as if they were looking at an extinct volcano, which has long been harmless. Everyone was sure that those sinister forces were completely destroyed by the achievements of modern democracy; the world seemed bright and safe, like the light-filled streets of modern cities. Wars seemed to be the last relics of ancient times; all that was missing was one more, the very last, to end them forever. Economic crises were considered accidents, although these accidents were repeated regularly.

When fascism came to power, most people were not ready for it. Neither theoretically nor practically. They were unable to believe that a person could exhibit such a predisposition to evil, such a lust for power, such a disregard for the rights of the weak - and such a desire for submission. (Fromm E. Escape from freedom. - M, 1995, pp. 13-17.)

AUTHORITY-VIOLENCEBORIS BAZHANOVESSENCE

When you get to know the personality of Lenin or Stalin well, you are struck by the amazing, seemingly manic desire for power to which everything is subordinated in the lives of these two people. In fact, there is nothing particularly surprising in this thirst for power. Both Lenin and Stalin are people of their doctrine, the Marxist doctrine, their system of thought, which determines their whole life. What does the doctrine require? A revolution in the entire life of society, which can and must be brought about only through violence. Violence that will be committed against society by some active, organized minority, but under one indispensable, mandatory condition - having previously taken state power into their own hands. This is the alpha and omega: nothing can be done, says the doctrine, without taking power. You will do everything, you will change everything, taking power into your own hands. Their whole life is built on this basis.

Power comes into the hands of Lenin, and then Stalin, not only because they maniacally, boundlessly strive for it, but also because they are in the party the most complete, most vivid embodiment of this basic action of the party doctrine. Power is everything, beginning and end. Lenin and Stalin live by this all their lives. Everyone else is forced to follow them.

But power is taken by an active minority with the help of violence and is retained by the same active minority with the help of violence against the vast majority of the population. The minority (party) recognizes only force. The population can have any bad attitude towards the social system established by the party, the government will be afraid of this negative attitude and maneuver (Lenin - NEP), only as long as it considers that its police system of covering the country is not strong enough and that there is a risk of losing power. When the system of police terror grips the whole country, one can use violence without hesitation (Stalin - collectivization, terror of the 30s), and force the country to live according to the orders of the party, even if it costs millions of victims.

The essence of power is violence. Over whom? According to the doctrine, above all, over some kind of class enemy. Above the bourgeois, capitalist, landowner, nobleman, former officer, engineer, priest, prosperous peasant (kulak), dissident and not adapting to the new social order (counter-revolutionary, White Guard, saboteur, wrecker, social traitor, hanger-on of the class enemy, ally of imperialism and reactions, etc. etc.); and after the liquidation and exhaustion of all these categories, more and more new ones can be created: the middle peasant can become a sub-kulakist, the poor peasant in the countryside can become an enemy of the collective farms, and therefore a frustrater and saboteur of socialist construction, a worker without socialist enthusiasm can become an agent of the class enemy. And in the party? Deviators, deviationists, factionalists, corrupt Trotskyists, right-wing oppositionists, left-wing oppositionists, traitors, foreign spies, lustful bastards - all the time you need to destroy someone, shoot, rot in prisons, in concentration camps - this is the essence and pathos of communism.

But at the beginning of the revolution, hundreds of thousands of people joined the party not for this, but believing that some better society would be built. Gradually (but not very soon) it turns out that the basis of everything is deception. But believers go on believing; if the devil knows what is going on around, it is probably the fault of wild and ignorant performers, but the idea is good, the leaders want the best, and we must fight to correct the shortcomings. How? Protesting, joining the opposition, fighting within the party. But the path of oppositions in the party is a disastrous path. And now all these believers are gradually becoming people of those categories that the authorities declare enemies (or agents of class enemies); and all these believers are also doomed - their way into a common giant meat grinder, which Comrade Stalin will expertly manage.

Gradually, the party (and especially its leading cadres) is divided into two categories: those who will destroy, and those who will be destroyed. Of course, everyone who cares most about their own skin and their own well-being will try to join the first category (not everyone will succeed: the meat grinder will grab right and left, who gets under the arm); those who believed in something and wanted something better for the people will sooner or later fall into the second category.

This, of course, does not mean that all selfish and scoundrels will safely survive; suffice it to say that most of the KGB execution cases of masters will also fall into the meat grinder (but they are because they are too close to it). But all more or less decent people with remnants of conscience and human feelings will surely perish.

A terrible thing is the wolf doctrine and belief in it. Only when you understand all this well and know all these people well, do you see what the doctrine that preaches violence, revolution and the destruction of "class" enemies inevitably turns people into.

(Bazhanov B. Memoirs of the former secretary of Stalin. - M., 1990, pp. 225-228.)

PSYCHOLOGY OF POWER A. YA. GOZMAN, E. B. SHESTOPAA

Some form of authority is necessary in any society, and societies without authority are as unknown to ethnographers as societies without family or property.

Power is the ability to force or persuade other people to act in a certain way or according to certain rules. The President or the monarch has power in relation to the citizens of the country, the sergeant in relation to the soldier, the parents in relation to the child, the kindergarten teacher in relation to pupils, in love with each other.

Most often, power is exercised within the framework of certain institutions - the army, family, state - but it can also exist within informal communities. Almost every person has power in relation to a certain number of other people and, at the same time, for each of us there is a mass of people who can force or convince us to do certain things, i.e. have power over us. At the same time, the power of, say, the president or the prime minister for an ordinary person appears to be very indirect and may not be noticed at all, while the power of the immediate boss at work or the dictatorship of a repeat hooligan in the school class is certainly recognized and is a factor that determines everyday life. human life. However, no one's power is absolute, it is always limited either by laws and traditions, or by the objective parameters of the situation. A tyrant can send any of his subjects to execution, but cannot, for example, prohibit religious rites. Or he is capable of doing any kind of arbitrariness in his capital, but a person who has traveled two days from it may already be out of his reach simply due to the lack of effective communications.

Of course, the power coming from above extends to a greater number of people than the power of those who are below, but the very relationship between the holder of power and those who obey him does not directly depend on the place of these two subjects on the social ladder. Thus, it would be wrong to believe that power is concentrated at the highest levels of society or the state. It is distributed across all levels of the social hierarchy. The same psychological patterns can be found both in big politics and in the relationships of ordinary citizens. At the same time, “condensations” of power are found somewhere - in some structures someone has very great power in relation to other people, and somewhere - a kind of “rarefaction” - power, as if it does not exist at all, no one obeys no one, at least the holders of power and the management methods used by them are not visible either to an outside observer, or, sometimes, even to the participants in the interaction themselves. Examples of the first type of situation would be a tyrant's court or a teenage gang, an example of a situation of the second type would be a hippie community.

The phenomenon of power, like any phenomenon of real life, is not the subject of a monopoly analysis of any one science. The problem of power is considered in political science, in jurisprudence, in history and, of course, in psychology. The subject of psychological analysis is not power relations, as such, but rather their subjective aspects - the perception of power institutions, attitudes towards power figures, the adequacy of awareness of the degree of dependence on power holders, etc. But perhaps the most interesting question is the problem of the psychological mechanisms of power: why are people ready to accept one power, to obey one people or rules, but resolutely, sometimes sacrificing their lives, reject another? What gives some people power over others?

PSYCHOLOGY OF POLITICAL LEADERSHIP

Who and why is striving for power?

The personality of a political leader is the most complex multidimensional formation and consists of many different interrelated structural elements. Not all of them are equally "responsible" for political behavior, they are manifested in it. However, after numerous studies conducted in American political psychology, it was possible to identify the most influential personal characteristics, which for convenience we group into six blocks: * the political leader's ideas about himself; * needs and motives that influence political behavior; * the system of the most important political beliefs; * style of political decision-making; * style of interpersonal relationships; * resistance to stress.

I am political leader concept

The problem of compensation for real or imaginary personality defects was posed by Z. Freud's "companion" A. Adler. This idea received its fuller development in the works of G. Lasswell. According to his concept, a person, in order to compensate for low self-esteem, seeks power as a means of such compensation. Thus, self-esteem, being inadequate, can stimulate a person's behavior in relation to politically relevant goals - power, achievement, control, and others.

G. Lasswell's attention was riveted to the development of a person's ideas about himself, the degree of development and quality of self-esteem and their embodiment in political behavior. His hypothesis was that some people have an unusually strong need for power or other personal values, such as affection, respect, as a means of compensating for injured or inadequate self-esteem. Personal "values" or needs of this kind can be considered as ego-motives, since they are part of the personality's ego-system.

A. George in one of his works continued the line of G. Lasswell's reasoning about the desire for power as a compensation for low self-esteem. He examined in detail the possible structure of low self-esteem and believes that five subjective negative feelings about oneself in various combinations can make up low self-esteem:

1) feeling of own unimportance, insignificance;

2) a sense of moral inferiority;

3) feeling of weakness;

4) feeling of mediocrity;

5) a sense of intellectual inadequacy.

After G. Lasswell drew the attention of political scientists and political psychologists to the role of self-esteem in the political behavior of a leader, a number of studies appeared devoted to the idea of ​​a politician about himself.

A political leader in any situation, with rare exceptions, behaves in accordance with his own self-concept. His behavior depends on who and how he perceives himself, how he compares himself with those with whom he interacts.

The self-concept, that is, a person's awareness of who he is, has several aspects. The most significant of them is the image of "I", self-esteem and social orientation of the political leader. W. Stone cites the argument of the classic of psychology, W. James, that our self-esteem can be expressed as the ratio of our achievements to our claims.

Although W. Stone himself believes that self-esteem is a positive feeling about oneself, understanding it as self-respect.

Social orientation refers to a sense of autonomy as opposed to a sense of dependence on other people for self-determination. According to the psychologist E. T. Sokolova, “autonomization of self-esteem is finally formed in adolescence, and the predominant orientation towards the evaluation of significant others or one’s own self-esteem becomes an indicator of persistent individual differences that characterizes a holistic personality style.”

American researchers D. Offer and C. Strozaer consider the image of the I of a politician, which corresponds to "the total amount of perception, thoughts and feelings of a person in relation to himself" ... "These perceptions, thoughts and feelings can be more or less clearly pronounced in the image of I, in in which the Self is divided into six different parts, closely interacting. These six I are the following: physical I, sexual I, family I, social I, psychological I, overcoming conflicts I. As E. T. Sokolova notes, “the value and subjective significance of qualities and their reflection in the image of I and self-esteem can be masked by defense mechanisms." the physical self represents, from the point of view of these scholars, the ideas of a political leader about his state of health and physical strength or weakness. A political leader must be healthy enough so that this does not interfere with his activities. The political science and psychological literature has described the suffering caused to US Presidents Roosevelt, Wilson, and Kennedy by their poor health. The experiences of Hitler and Stalin in connection with their physical disabilities are also well known.

Regarding the sexual self, that is, the politician's ideas about his claims and opportunities in this area, scientists note the lack of statistical data on how sexual preferences or sexual behavior is related to leadership abilities. We doubt that a homosexual or an exhibitionist can become the president of a modern developed state. First of all, such inclinations would close his way to big politics, regardless of his leadership qualities. In history, well-known tyrants were distinguished by the pathology of the sexual sphere and often suffered from various perversions.

The family self is a very important element of a politician's personality. It is well known, and above all from psychoanalysis, what a huge influence relations in the parental family have on the behavior of an adult. Some political leaders overcome early traumas and conflicts, others do not, and as they become leaders, they carry the frustrations of their childhood on to their environment in the country and in the world.

It is very important for people in the highest state position to have the ability to work together with others. The politician's concept of this quality is reflected in the social self. The political leader must learn how to negotiate and how to encourage his colleagues to show their best qualities. He must be able to use interpersonal skills to work effectively with different, sometimes hostile groups of people, with leaders of other countries.

The psychological self is made up of ideas about one's inner world, fantasies, dreams, desires, illusions, fears, conflicts - the most important aspect of the life of a political leader. Z. Freud said that psychopathology is the fate of everyday life. Like ordinary people, leaders are not innately immune from neurotic conflicts, psychological problems, and sometimes more serious forms of psychopathology such as psychosis. Whether a politician suffers from the realization of his own fears or takes it calmly, or even with humor, is manifested in his behavior, especially during periods of weakening self-control.

Overcoming conflicts Self - ideas of a political leader about his ability to creatively overcome conflicts and find new solutions to old problems. The leader must have sufficient knowledge and intelligence to perceive the problem. He must be confident enough in making political decisions to be able to convey that confidence to others. Another aspect of the self overcoming conflicts is the leader's awareness of his ability to overcome the stresses associated with his role and activities in the post, for example, head of state. Stress can lead to severe symptoms that severely limit the intellectual and behavioral capabilities of a political leader. It can increase the rigidity of cognitive and thought processes in historically difficult moments, lead to a decrease in flexibility and self-control, especially when they are needed.

The complexity of the self-concept R. Ziller and his colleagues understand as the number of aspects of the self perceived by a political leader, or as the degree of differentiation of the self-concept. In the early stages of self-consciousness, a person separates himself from others. Further, I in his mind is divided into an unlimited number of parts. Subsequently, a person tends to evaluate himself in comparison with other people. This process received a detailed analysis in the theory of social comparison by L. Festinger. The main provision of this theory is the assertion that at the heart of a person's desire to correctly assess his opinion and abilities in comparison with other people is the need to have a clear and definite self-concept. Through the process of social comparison, a person establishes the framework for social consideration of the Self as a reference point. R. Ziller, in another study conducted in 1973, found that people with a high complexity of the self-concept tend to seek more information before making a decision than those with a low complexity of the self-concept. Because self-concept complexity is related to perceived similarities with other people, politicians with high self-concept complexity are more likely to accept information from others. Political leaders with high self-concept complexity tend to more easily assimilate both positive and negative information and thus respond to situations based on feedback than do leaders with low self-concept complexity.

At the same time, the higher the self-esteem of politicians, the worse they react to the situation, the lower their reactivity. Leaders with high self-esteem are less dependent on external circumstances, they have more stable internal standards on which they base their self-esteem.

Politicians with low self-esteem appear to be more dependent on other people and thus more reactive. They are more sensitive to feedback and change their self-esteem depending on the approval or disapproval of others.

R. Ziller and his colleagues developed a typology of the personality of political leaders based on the study of self-esteem and the complexity of the self-concept. The first type is made up of leaders with a contradictory, at first glance, name "apolitical" politicians. They are individuals with high self-esteem and high self-concept complexity who assimilate new information about them without jeopardizing their self-concept, but there are severe limitations to their reactivity. They feel disconnected from others and therefore have difficulty responding to the behavior of their followers or the population of the state as a whole.

Another type, the most successful in politics, are the "pragmatists". These are political leaders with low self-esteem and high self-concept complexity, responding to a wide range of social stimuli. They listen to other people's opinions and modify their political behavior based on feedback.

The third type consists of political leaders with high self-esteem and low self-concept complexity, who do not react to the opinions of others. Their cognitive processes and behavior are very rigid, and their self-esteem is extremely stable. These are the "ideologists" so familiar to us from the Politburo of the CPSU.

And, finally, the fourth type is people with low self-esteem and low complexity of the self-concept, who react intensively to a narrow circle of social stimuli. They were called "non-deterministic". In American history, neither this type of president nor major party leaders are known.

The self-appraisal of a political leader leaves a very important imprint on the domestic and foreign policy of his country. If he developed low self-esteem during his life, then his constant dissatisfaction with himself could be the very driving force that pushed him to take more and more new barriers in the sphere of domestic or foreign policy. That was President Nixon, that was President Reagan. With each of their victories, they constantly proved to themselves that they were worth something. But the taken barriers no longer pleased them. And they strove for new ones in order to once again ascertain their own significance. Low self-esteem pushes the political leader to "great" steps in the international arena: large-scale military or, conversely, peacekeeping actions, extravagant turns in foreign policy unexpected for the environment, and much more.

For a number of politicians, it is international relations that are becoming such an area in which they, as leaders of the state, can assert themselves and compensate for low self-esteem. Both Nixon and Reagan were not products of the American establishment, and they clearly felt that he did not accept them. In the international arena, no one could look down on them. On the contrary, among other heads of state, they were the leaders of the most powerful military and economic power. Respect for them, fear of them, dependence on them from the heads of other states, people who stood above their own establishment, made it possible for these presidents to forget the humiliation and contempt that they had previously experienced. In Russian history, Stalin and Khrushchev had a very low self-esteem.

Leaders of states with overestimated self-esteem, overestimating their own qualities as a politician and commander-in-chief, often do not notice the general, both external and internal reaction to their course in the international arena. They revel in their own success (even if it is mythical) and classify criticism as malicious envious. Here we can talk about the violation of the feedback between the consequences of political action and the subject. Almost no consequences can make such a leader frightened or shudder at the thought of what his actions might lead to.

Another type of leaders with inflated self-esteem, faced with underestimation of their policies both at home and abroad, suffers greatly from the affect of inadequacy. When their policies were built, from their own point of view, on the principles of high morality, or seemed to them thoughtful and productive, but perceived as immoral or senseless, such political leaders took the most unexpected steps. And the more they were offended and worried, the more often they repeated similar political actions, causing even more disapproval. American President Johnson was very worried that his Vietnam War began to cause a negative attitude both in the United States and in the world. His close advisers noted that very often, having received a report of a sharp negative reaction in other countries and in various sections of American society, complaining that he was not appreciated, not loved and not understood, he ordered another bombing of Vietnam. The circle is thus closed.

Leaders with adequate self-esteem represent the best model of partners in the political arena. Their foreign and domestic policy is not motivated by the desire for self-affirmation, the feedback between the consequences of actions and themselves works rigorously. A leader who adequately evaluates his political abilities, as a rule, respectfully and highly evaluates other leaders. Without being afraid that he will be humiliated, offended, bypassed, firmly knowing his own high price, considering himself no worse than those with whom he has to interact, such a leader will pursue a policy that would allow him to achieve his goals and would give mutual benefit. The absence of a neurotic component in self-esteem leads, as a rule, to its absence in political behavior.

3. Needs and motives of leaders influencing political behavior Leader's political behavior is purposeful and motivated. There are many different personal needs that are somehow connected with his political activities. However, in numerous studies conducted by scientists from different schools, several basic needs have been identified that motivate the political behavior of leaders: * the need for power; * closely related to the need for power, the need for control over events and people; * the need for achievement; * the need for affiliation, that is, to belong to a group and receive approval.

The need for the power of a political leader has a long history of research. To date, there are various concepts of the need for power, one of the oldest is the concept of G. Lasswell and A. George, who understand the need for power as compensatory.

In his work “Psychopathology and Politics”, G. Lasswell developed a hypothesis according to which certain people have an unusually strong need for power and / or other personal values, such as love, respect, moral purity, as a means of compensating for injured or inadequate self-esteem. These personal values ​​or needs can be seen as an essential part of a political leader's motivational structure.

A. George, with the aim of his work "Power as a compensatory value", puts forward the expansion of the theoretical framework of the general hypothesis of G. Lasswell for its use in the study of specific political leaders by the method of psychobiography. From the point of view of A. George, all political leaders are "striving for power." Having received it, they often try to remake political institutions, reinterpret and expand the functions of political roles, or create new ones that would satisfy their needs.

In the concept of G. Lasswell, "power" is a certain value. A person feels the need to possess it or experience sanctions or influence in relation to other people. A. George defines the "need for power" as the desire to achieve power, this highest value.

The last point is especially important for understanding the motivation of a political leader. First, the politician's need for power and achievement are in fact closely linked. Secondly, the need for power suggests that it can be not only and not so much compensatory, but rather instrumental, that is, power can be desired to satisfy other personal needs, such as the need for achievement, respect, approval, security.

Sometimes the goal of no one dominating a politician can be an end in itself and more highly valued than others. The need for power, which has arisen as a compensatory mechanism, manifests itself in a politician in different ways depending on the conditions. This need can be reinforced by other needs or, on the contrary, come into conflict with them - with the need for love, affiliation, achievement, which the leader also seeks to satisfy on the political stage.

In compensation, the political leader tries to find a field of activity in which he can demonstrate his competence and dignity. The importance of such processes for individuals suffering from low self-esteem is obvious. Achieving compensation in this field of activity, in some cases, however, narrow and specialized, creates a “field” for the individual in which the political leader functions quite productively and autonomously (this “field” is free from the interference of others), perhaps aggressively and presumptuously, for achieving personal balance.

The process of creating a sphere of competence is characterized by a tendency to shift from one pole of subjective feelings to another - that is, from lack of self-confidence to high self-esteem and self-confidence in one's actions. Another view of the need for power, which is far from understanding it as a compensation for low self-esteem, is the concept of D. Winter, developed by him in a number of theoretical works, among which we note "The Need for Power". D. Winter believes that the need for power is a social motive and therefore is closely related to presidential behavior. Presidents with a high need for power will be active, lively and happy in a world of conflict and intense political bargaining. If necessary, to stay at the top, they will exploit allies, attack enemies. They usually have no tendency to consult with experts and change their behavior, so they may face unforeseen harmful consequences of the actions they have taken to maintain their prestige. In the situation that has arisen, they may see a threat to their power, experience stress and "retreat into an unreal subjective world of risk, prestige and concern for their inner sense of potency." In extreme cases, they can react to defeat by taking their world - their friends, enemies, civilization - with them, as Hitler did at the end of World War II.

An indicator of the need for power for the behavior of a political leader is the occupation of a position that gives formal social power. He shows concern for prestige and prestigious things, often consumes alcoholic beverages, shows a tendency to relatively high risk in gambling situations and hostility towards other persons of high status. He surrounds himself with few prestigious friends, is active and influential in small groups, and usually matures sexually early.

For many political leaders, the need for power is well developed. However, it can be moderate or hypertrophied. In many ways, the very post of head of state, with its inherent attributes of power, should already satisfy this need for a leader. But, since the leader acts on behalf of the state in the international arena, he, firstly, interacts with other leaders, thus not being the only top of the pyramid of power, which he has become in his own country, and there is a field for rivalry and competition . Secondly, acting on behalf of his own state, he seeks to assert his authority over other states.

The need for power in a political leader is a complex psychological characteristic for analysis, since it can manifest itself in his foreign policy activities in different ways, depending on the dominant image of power, on the presence of various kinds of “pain points”, an inferiority complex, life path, and much more. However, no matter how difficult it is, without studying this psychological characteristic, it is almost impossible to realistically assess many of the foreign policy steps of the leader of the state.

Closely related to the need for power are such traits as dominance in interpersonal relationships, Machiavellianism (the desire to manipulate people), persuasiveness, the need for achievement, each of which is accompanied by its own set of behavioral correlations.

The need of a political leader for personal control over events and people. This need is a manifestation in political activity of the basic human need to control the external forces and events that affect our lives. When these forces and events belong to the realm of politics, a connection is formed between personal control and political life.

Naturally, political leaders have significant individual differences in their need for personal control. Obviously, political leaders with low need will be satisfied with less, leaders with a high level of need will require a great deal of control over events and people in order to satisfy themselves.

The sphere of control is the breadth of the area of ​​living space and activities that a political leader seeks to influence. The scope can vary from very limited, including only one specific area, to broad, including many policy areas. The wider the scope of personal control desired, the lesser the degree of personal control, as a political leader has limited abilities and skills, and each "sector" of the sphere of control requires the use of certain skills and capabilities.

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