HIGH-CONFLICT POLITICIANS

I wrote this book to tell you about the personality patterns of high-conflict people (HCPs) when they become high-conflict politicians. Warning people about HCPs and how to deal with them has become my life’s work. In this book, I want to tell you about how extremely dangerous they can be, how extremely deceitful (lying and conning) they can be, and how compulsively divisive they always are. Yet their personality patterns can be spotted early on, so you can avoid electing them in any setting and giving them power over your life.

Please note that this is not a book about politics. High-conflict politicians can be Republicans or Democrats or Libertarians, independents, liberals, or conservatives. They are mayors and governors and senators and heads of countries around the world. They are even elected to city councils, school boards, and homeowners’ association boards.

They have high-conflict personalities because they have a pattern of increasing and prolonging conflicts, rather than managing or resolving them. They polarize communities, ruin the lives of thousands of people (sometimes millions), lay waste to shared resources, and go to war against their perceived enemies—verbally, legally, and sometimes violently.

A Worldwide Trend

This is also not a book that focuses on one particular politician, such as Donald Trump, even though he is a classic example of a high-conflict politician and he is included as one of the examples in this book. It’s bigger than him. He’s at the tip of the iceberg of a growing worldwide election trend that has picked up speed over the past thirty years and will continue to get worse until enough voters learn the warning signs of high-conflict politicians and how to stop them.

The Power of Personality

How serious a problem could one personality be? Let’s look at what historians say:

These three men were Adolf Hitler, Josef Stalin, and Mao Zedong. Hitler was responsible for at least fifty-five million deaths (by causing World War II as well as the holocaust), Stalin for twenty million, and Mao for at least forty million.² Were their wars, famines, and genocides inevitable, regardless of each leader’s personality? Here’s what other historians have said:

Other historians concur:

Similar conclusions were made about Stalin and the genocide he caused in Russia and Ukraine through the forced collectivization of farms, which artificially created famines that lead to the deaths of over four million Ukrainians and more in Russia.⁵ Even Stalin’s wife committed suicide because she was apparently so distraught over her husband’s ruthless policy.⁶

Likewise, Mao imposed a similar collectivization effort within China, which he called the Great Leap Forward.

This and the Cultural Revolution had one source:

The Causes of Political Conflict

You may wonder, as I did, aren’t political problems mostly caused by simmering historical disputes? Or racial and ethnic hatreds? Or economic troubles? The answer to each of these questions? Much less than you would expect.

For example, in Africa, from 1960 to 1979, when so many former colonies gained their independence from their European conquerors, at least 160 ethnic groups were living side by side with the potential for violence between them: riots, civil wars, genocide. Yet violence broke out in less than 1 percent of them.

After the Soviet Union broke up at the end of the 1980s, 45 ethnic groups had the potential to break out into armed conflicts. Yet historians found that only 4.4 percent of these potential ethnic hatreds burst into warfare.¹⁰

The Yugoslav Wars of the 1990s, when Yugoslavia broke up into smaller countries with the collapse of the Soviet Union, were unusual for one reason: they involved the apparent high-conflict personalities of a few key leaders, who escalated prior co-existence into genocidal violence and who were later tried for war crimes by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia.¹¹ Without these likely HCP leaders, would these wars have occurred at all?

Perhaps you wonder if these were unusual circumstances in which an HCP politician was like a match on gasoline that was already poured—that these countries were already highly dysfunctional. For example, weren’t the economic problems of Germany after World War I and the global stock market crash the driving forces in the rise of Hitler? Not exactly. Here’s how an American reporter stationed in Germany described the typical Nazi in 1932 when Hitler was gaining power:

So poverty itself doesn’t necessarily drive political conflict, either. Apparently, Hitler didn’t get his followers from the poorest people—or the most prejudiced. Even though anti-Semitism existed for centuries throughout Europe, Hitler taught the German people to hate Jews at a level they never had before. As the cultural leader of the nation, he was able to directly condition the German people to his way of thinking, primarily through his radio speeches, which reached into many Germans’ homes, and movies of his rallies, which dominated the theaters—“playing on their fears, resentments and prejudices more masterfully than anyone else.”¹³

Three Key Questions

As I researched political conflicts—large and small—for this book, three key questions about the power of personality emerged that are relevant to today’s events:

1. Can one high-conflict politician turn a well-functioning community—or nation—into one that is extremely polarized? If so, how does this occur?

2. In a time of peace, can one high-conflict politician lead a nation into war, famine, and genocide? If so, how does this occur?

3. Can we stop high-conflict politicians before they get this far?

In researching and writing this book, I have attempted to answer these questions. To understand the answers, we first need to look more closely at the personality patterns of HCPs, narcissists, and sociopaths and how they think differently about conflict from everyone else—and what happens when these three personalities combine in one person.

What Is a High-Conflict Personality?

Our individual personality is how we regularly think, feel, and act. When most of us find ourselves in a dispute, our natural inclination is to attempt to resolve it. But for someone with a high-conflict personality, as I have repeatedly observed in hundreds of disputes, the opposite is true. They think all relationships are inherently adversarial; they constantly feel threatened as an adversary (even when they’re not); and they often react in an extremely adversarial manner.

As a result, in almost any situation, they tend to create one unnecessary conflict after another because they think conflicts already exist all around them. They feel at war with the world and project this feeling onto others.

Worse, they have no interest in resolving conflicts. Instead, they usually make them worse—no matter how many other people get hurt and no matter how much their actions end up hurting themselves.

People with high-conflict personalities are intensely driven (although usually unconsciously) to control, remove, or destroy their perceived enemies. They ultimately sabotage themselves, but they can’t see it coming.

Although each high-conflict person is unique, all HCPs share a narrow pattern of behavior that includes four key characteristics:

THE HIGH-CONFLICT PERSONALITY PATTERN

1. A preoccupation with blaming others: their Targets of Blame

2. All-or-nothing thinking and solutions

3. Unmanaged or intense emotions

4. Extreme negative behaviors that 90 percent of people would never do

HCPs also have traits of one or more personality disorders. Personality disorders have been a hidden mental illness that most people have not heard about until recent years, because people afflicted with them can appear to function well some of the time. But they are: 1) impaired in their relationships, 2) don’t reflect on their own behavior, and 3) don’t change. These three characteristics can make people with personality disorders very difficult to be around, sooner or later.

Although research has suggested that those with personality disorders are about 15 percent of the adult population,¹⁴ I believe that HCPs are only about 10 percent of the adult population. Not all people with personality disorders are preoccupied with Targets of Blame, and not all HCPs have personality disorders—but they all have some traits of personality disorders such as narcissistic or sociopathic.

HCPs compulsively act in self-defeating ways over and over again. That’s why they stay in conflict, because they don’t try to change or improve anything about themselves even when they are the conflict’s primary or only cause.

They lack insight into their own high-conflict behavior, so when things go badly, they get more and more defensive and attack those around them: their Targets of Blame.

For this reason, they often have no real friends and develop a bad reputation in their communities. They are your lousy neighbors who may physically threaten you or make your life stressful with their endless complaints. They are your most difficult co-workers, bosses, and business owners. And, of course, they can also be family members.

HCPs are everywhere, but most people just think they’re jerks—isolated, angry, poorly adjusted individuals. They don’t see the pattern. They don’t realize that HCPs are at the center of so many of today’s problems and that there are so many of them.

They have a presence in every country and in every culture. HCPs are not an American problem, or a Western problem: they are a human problem—one that appears to be increasing, year by year. Unless you live alone in the wilderness, you cannot avoid them.

Extreme Charm and Persuasion

Another surprising and notable aspect of HCPs enables them to often get what they want. They can be extremely charming, persuasive, and charismatic. At least, that’s how they show themselves to others at first. Then, when they get close to people or conflicts arise, their façade crumbles and they start to show their true colors. If you want to see how predictable HCPs are, refer to Appendix A: 40 Predictable Behaviors of HCPs.

Let me emphasize that HCPs do not choose to be difficult. All personalities are the result of three basic factors, none of which we have control over while growing up. It’s hard to know which played a bigger part in any one person’s development, but it’s usually a combination:

This means that we should have compassion for HCPs, but at the same time we need to set firm limits to protect ourselves from their behavior.

The key is to adapt your own behavior rather than to try to change theirs. Avoid trying to give them insight into themselves or endlessly discussing the past. Just focus on what to do now, such as focusing on your own choices going forward. And don’t choose them to be your partner, your team leader, your boss, or your local (or national) leader.

Why Are There So Many HCPs in Politics Today?

I can think of at least two reasons for this:

1. HCPs can be mayors, governors, or even presidents. But some high-conflict people really want to be kings (or, sometimes, queens). HCPs are profoundly attracted to the glory and attention, vindication and validation of being elected—and to gaining, having, and exercising absolute power. In particular, they relish having the power to publicly blame, punish, or destroy anyone they view as their enemy. They love the fight—the adversarial process. But, above all, they want to win and they want to dominate—and they want everyone to know that they won, and to see them as the absolute top of the heap.

They want to be the strongman. The person no one challenges. The person everybody loves—or at least obeys or bows down to. The person with the power and the glory. And they are driven to do everything they can to make this happen, regardless of the consequences to others or even to themselves. They have unrestrained aggressive behavior. They are fundamentally authoritarian, because it’s all about them and their unlimited power over everyone else.

2. They are particularly drawn to the fantasy world of today’s high-emotion media. In their various forms (network and cable TV, Facebook, YouTube, etc.), these platforms do not require politicians to have any leadership experience or political skill in order to provide them with lots of attention. In fact, acting badly gets them more attention than leadership skills do. Those HCPs who lack empathy and remorse are good at creating fantasy images of themselves with no regard for the truth—the charming storytellers who emotionally grab the voters who are already primed for tales of crises, heroes, and villains.

Plus, high-emotion media craves high-conflict personalities. They have the most exciting, dramatic, and expressive faces and voices that work particularly well on screens and speakers, large and small—and they sell the most advertising. With their emotional intensity, all-or-nothing thinking, and seemingly unpredictable extreme behavior, they are natural performers. High-emotion media attracts HCPs like basketball attracts tall players. They are the best in the game.

But which HCPs are attracted to politics? There are five types of HCPs: narcissistic, antisocial, borderline, paranoid, and histrionic. (See my book 5 Types of People Who Can Ruin Your Life for more on all five.) But most aren’t interested in being in charge of a community or nation. The two most charming, deceptive, and dangerous leaders are the HCPs with traits of narcissistic and sociopathic personality disorders. Occasionally we see traits of the others as well, but mostly these are the two personalities that seek to be leaders.

Personality Disorders

I’m sure you have met some narcissists and sociopaths. They are everywhere. In their extreme form, these are two of the ten personality disorders in the diagnostic manual of the American Psychiatric Association, known as the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition (DSM-5).¹⁶ But I will not be determining whether the HCPs we discuss have these disorders. Instead, my goal is to describe the conflict behavior patterns of these personalities so that you can spot them when you are getting ready to make voting decisions. The issue of whether HCPs simply have some traits of these personalities or full-blown personality disorders is less important—either case is a problem when we are choosing leaders.

Generally people with narcissistic personalities are self-absorbed, feel entitled to special treatment, have grandiose ideas, have fantasies of unlimited success and power, lack empathy, and are driven to show that they are superior to others. People with sociopathic personalities (also known as antisocial personalities) frequently violate rules and laws, are routinely deceptive (lying and conning), are highly aggressive, lack remorse, and are driven to dominate others.

However, not all people with one of these personalities are HCPs, because some don’t focus on Targets of Blame. And many of them have no interest in politics. But the ones who are interested in politics and know how to focus their attention (and the attention of others) on their Targets of Blame are the most dangerous. They are the ones who want to get elected and are driven to be in charge to dominate their targets. Let’s look at each of these types of personality, separately at first, and then let’s see what happens when they are combined into one person.

Narcissistic Personality Traits

Narcissists are preoccupied with looking and being superior to others. Narcissistic HCPs make demeaning statements—often in public—against their Targets of Blame, including their spouses, their children, co-workers, neighbors, bosses, or heads of organizations. In order to appear superior, they must put other people down. They do this a lot.

This characteristic makes politics appealing to them: political races provide them with opportunities to show that they are better than everyone else. They can win. And in the process, they can get revenge on anyone who tries to expose that they are not superior to everyone else.

Yet HCPs generally don’t have the flexible political skills they need for the jobs they are running for, so instead they divert attention and keep the focus on their Targets of Blame. They persuade everyone else that they are better than that terrible candidate. But they also have grandiose ideas. They often convince others that these ideas can come true, but only if they are made leader.

The most narcissistic HCPs are attracted to the highest offices, because that proves that they are the most superior. Winning such an office also gives them the power to really demean everyone else, especially their targets.

Diagnosing any personality disorder is generally very subjective and based on the information available. Even experienced mental health professionals often disagree. This is fine for our purposes, because we’re not trying to reach a diagnosis here. We’re just trying to recognize high-conflict behavior patterns that may cause a person to be dangerous and deceptive and therefore not someone who should be elected.

Narcissistic personality disorder (NPD) is an extreme form of narcissism. According to the DSM-5, someone with NPD has internal distress and/or social impairment,¹⁷ and exhibits at least five out of nine specific characteristics.¹⁸ For the purposes of this book (since we’re not diagnosing disorders but understanding high-conflict behavior patterns), the key narcissistic traits to look for are these:

KEY HIGH-CONFLICT BEHAVIORS OF NARCISSISTS

1. Drive to be superior

2. Grandiose ideas

3. Fantasies of unlimited power

4. Lack of empathy

These four characteristics help narcissists get elected because they help the candidates convince people that they are really superior and that their grandiose ideas are really achievable. Since narcissists truly believe in themselves and their ideas, they can appear very charming, authentic, and persuasive. But they tend to deceive everyone, including themselves. Although they aren’t necessarily lying, they are usually unaware of how exaggerated and unrealistic they are about their own abilities and ideas.

For example, studies have shown that when narcissists are CEOs of companies, their preoccupation with themselves and their overestimation of their own skills creates more volatility for the company’s performance. They are not popular bosses, are seen as below average in leadership skills, and take credit for other’s work. They are usually not very successful when compared to CEO’s who put the organization first.¹⁹

A large study determined that about 6.2 percent of the United States population has NPD. That’s about twenty million people. This study found that just over 60 percent of the people with this disorder are male and just under 40 percent are female.²⁰

Sociopathic (Antisocial) Personality Disorder

The DSM-5 lists several characteristics for antisocial personality disorder (antisocial is an equivalent term for sociopath), or ASPD.²¹ For the purposes of spotting sociopathic high-conflict behavior patterns, look out for the following four traits:

KEY HIGH-CONFLICT BEHAVIORS OF SOCIOPATHS

1. Drive to dominate

2. Deceitful (lying and conning)

3. Highly aggressive

4. Lack of remorse

Research indicates that nearly 4 percent of the population has ASPD. That’s over twelve million people in the United States alone. About 75 percent of them are male and about 25 percent are female.²²

Sociopathic HCPs naturally gravitate toward positions in which they can dominate and humiliate others—such as politics, business, organizational leadership, and/or criminality. They may become CEOs of large corporations, politicians, and highly paid consultants; or gang leaders, heads of drug cartels, and leaders of terrorist groups.²³ A sociopathic HCP can also be a common criminal; a smiling, friendly, drug-dealing neighbor; or a heartless co-worker. You don’t want to become their target by getting too close to them, joining in any of their schemes, or directly confronting them by yourself.

Some sociopathic HCPs are attracted to politics because they can steal from the public coffers for themselves and/or engage in large-scale schemes of swindling others. They enjoy that kind of dominance and high risk taking. They can also use their political power to boss around large groups of people by fooling them, controlling them, removing them, or destroying them.

They use Targets of Blame as a distraction while they are doing their dirty work. By getting you to look over there at another politician, they are able to take power and whatever else they want without being stopped. It’s just like pickpockets who distract you by bumping into you and pointing somewhere else: “Look up at that over there!” they shout, grabbing your wallet while you’re looking up.

You might wonder what the difference is between narcissistic and sociopathic personalities. Here’s what the DSM-5 says: “[N]arcissistic personality disorder does not include characteristics of impulsivity, aggression, and deceit.”²⁴ So if a politician seems narcissistic, but also lies a lot and is highly impulsive and aggressive, that probably means that he (or she) has traits of both disorders.

Malignant Narcissism

Now it gets really frightening. If someone has both of these personality disorders, they are considered to be a malignant narcissist, which is a disorder that experts say has “no treatment and no cure.”²⁵

The malignant narcissist can be particularly powerful, persuasive, confident, and aggressive. They can look very attractive and charismatic while promoting extremely grandiose plans (their narcissistic side). They are ruthless, heartless, and lack a conscience (their antisocial side). They are also paranoid and sadistic,²⁶ say the experts, so they are more driven than most narcissists or sociopaths to destroy their Targets of Blame—including almost everything and everyone in their path—and, ultimately, themselves.

This diagnosis was identified by German-born psychiatrist Erich Fromm who left Nazi Germany in the 1930s and came to the United States where he had a significant influence on the development of psychological theory and practice. Here’s how Fromm explained this particular disorder:

Fromm says that this narcissism is malignant because it is not restrained in its growth, like a malignant cancer.²⁸

The major study of personality disorders mentioned previously indicated that approximately 0.7 percent of the United States population has both of these disorders.²⁹ Although that sounds small, it’s about two million people. They can be in any walk of life, at any level of society.

For example, Brian David Mitchell, the kidnapper of fourteen-year-old Elizabeth Smart from her home in Utah in 2002, was identified as having both narcissistic and antisocial personality disorders during his criminal trial. He apparently wanted to rule a family with many wives and had plans to kidnap more teenage girls because he believed they would be easier to mold to his wishes. He couldn’t stop himself. Fortunately he was captured, and Elizabeth Smart is doing well and is educating the public about how such dangerous personalities can exist anywhere.³⁰

Conclusion

In short, narcissists, sociopaths, or both, when combined with high-conflict personalities, are driven to be the kings (or, to a much lesser extent, queens), the dictators, the supreme ruler over all. I think of them as HCP Wannabe Kings. And these aren’t the friendly Camelot or Disney type of kings. These are the grandiose and ruthless Wannabe Kings who will do anything and destroy anyone to gain power to become the absolute ruler.

Now you have the fundamentals for identifying the patterns of high-conflict politicians, including the narcissists, the sociopaths (antisocial), and the combination (malignant narcissists). Figure 1 is a simple way to summarize their characteristics.

Throughout the rest of this book, I refer to this personality pattern as HCP Wannabe Kings, HCP politicians, or simply HCPs or Wannabe Kings. Consider these terms as equivalent in describing this set of characteristics.

This pattern awareness gives you the ability to predict much of an HCP’s future behavior early on, unlike most people who simply look at each of their actions in isolation and constantly express surprise. With practice, you will find that these patterns get easier and easier to spot. Since HCPs don’t change their behavior, they are, in fact, more predictable than the average person.

FIGURE 1. High-Conflict Politicians. Copyright © 2019 Bill Eddy, All Rights Reserved, Why We Elect Narcissists and Sociopaths—And How We Can Stop, Berrrett-Koehler Publishers

Remember, you are not diagnosing anyone; rather, you are watching out for those you do not want to assume positions of power over you—whether this is in relationships, at work, or as your political leaders.