The Dictator's Handbook: Why Bad Behavior Is Almost Always Good Politics
  • The Dictator's Handbook: Why Bad Behavior Is Almost Always Good Politics
  • The Dictator's Handbook: Why Bad Behavior Is Almost Always Good Politics
  • The Dictator's Handbook: Why Bad Behavior Is Almost Always Good Politics
  • The Dictator's Handbook: Why Bad Behavior Is Almost Always Good Politics
  • The Dictator's Handbook: Why Bad Behavior Is Almost Always Good Politics
ISBN: 1610391845
EAN13: 9781610391849
Language: English
Release Date: Jul 31, 2012
Pages: 352
Dimensions: 1" H x 8.1" L x 5.5" W
Weight: 0.8 lbs.
Format: Paperback
Publisher:
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Book Overview

For eighteen years, Bruce Bueno de Mesquita and Alastair Smith have been part of a team revolutionizing the study of politics by turning conventional wisdom on its head. They start from a single assertion: Leaders do whatever keeps them in power. They don't care about the national interest--or even their subjects--unless they have to.

This clever and accessible book shows that the difference between tyrants and democrats is just a convenient fiction. Governments do not differ in kind but only in the number of essential supporters, or backs that need scratching. The size of this group determines almost everything about politics: what leaders can get away with, and the quality of life or misery under them. The picture the authors paint is not pretty. But it just may be the truth, which is a good starting point for anyone seeking to improve human governance.

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Book Reviews (10)

5
  |   10  reviews
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5
   The Rules of Politics
The central idea of this book is the offering of an analytical tool to explain political behavior and predict it. This is an important resource for anyone interested in politics, history or leadership. The world is not what it should be. In the future, I believe that this book will become a standard curriculum for advanced political science courses.
 
Recommended to buy: Yes
4
   but it is essential reading for anyone who wants to make the world a better place. It will equip the reader with tools ...
This is a fresh and insightful view of power and why leaders behave the way they do, especially political leaders. It is not an essential book, but it is a positive reading for anyone who wants to make the world a better place. It will equip the reader with tools and understanding to control leaders and guide them toward making decisions that will benefit all that they sway.
 
Recommended to buy: Yes
5
   Educational and enlightening
After the United States was so close to a dictatorship under the last presidency, I was just dumbfounded. I needed to understand how it is possible that a country like that can switch gears so easily. I needed to understand how politicians can band together to hold power. This book is a great resource, so well written and put together. The only thing is that it is not too easy to follow for a regular reader. If you are a major politics figure, it will be more engaging.
 
Recommended to buy: Yes
5
   Great Book
This is easily one of the best reads I have had in a while. I see business now, investing, politics... pretty much everything... differently. I am glad that I have invested the time reading this and would give it more stars if it was possible.
 
Recommended to buy: Yes
5
   The truth behind the gears of power
The authors successfully explain why autocrats can stay free in power for such long time, even committing the worst atrocities against their subjugated populations. They laid the ground to explain power relationships and dinamics to seek political power and stay in power and burn any hope that any politician is there for the good of the people. It is a really good book that explains what is behind the curtain and why politicians and autocrats behave as they often do and in this way it is for us, the common, to understand what is really important from a machiavelian practical point of view and what is not.
 
Recommended to buy: Yes
5
   Eye Opening
The Handbook of Dictators is an eye-opening book. Most notably, politics is primarily about money and power to the right. There are other casual explanations for why politics work the way they do, but as I see it, these are the most compelling. I recommend '' to anyone who has an interest in the mechanics of political survival.
 
Recommended to buy: Yes
5
   Well argued and convincing
The authors include many examples of how political structures make for political dynamics. The policy proposals were convincing overall. The description of foreign aid was insidious, but dead. The arguments for democracy were empirically based and cogent. The biggest belly falls were misinformation of the arguments for the electoral college, the untrusted call for increased immigration and the oversimplification of how England moved to a constitutional monarchy.
 
Recommended to buy: Yes
3
   Decent thesis, but the book could have been half as long
The core idea is pretty good, but it gets into a lot of details, supported by rhetoric, rather than facts and examples.
 
Recommended to buy: No
5
   Can't put down kind of book
Simply put, could not be put down.
 
Recommended to buy: Yes
5
   AMAZING! So Bruce Bueno de Mesquita teaches at NYU ...
Bruce Bueno de Mesquita teaches at NYU and this book is required reading for several politics courses there, and the reason why is that it is a fantastic book written by such a brilliant professor. While reading the book, you begin to see game theory differently and understand topics like rationality. This book is interesting for politics as well as general life.
 
Recommended to buy: Yes
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