Why Won’t Dictators Let Go?

Scornful Assad strikes defiant note: Syria’s leader adopted a defiant stance yesterday, blaming ‘conspiracies’ for two weeks of anti-regime protests and stopping well short of offering a widely anticipated reform package… President Assad made accusations but did little to address the demands of pro-democracy supporters, scores of whom have been shot by his security forces.  Just hours before his speech, a boy of 14 was shot in the head in the southern town of Deraa while carrying an olive branch on a peaceful march… after the speech, which echoed those of other flailing dictators across the region who have blamed foreign provocateurs and the media for fomenting unrest, hundreds of people took to the streets of the northern port of Latakia, chanting “freedom.”

The Times, Thursday 31 March 2011

Many people watching the revolutions sweeping across North Africa and the Middle East may be asking themselves, “Why do dictators cling on to power when it’s clear most of their people no longer want them as their leader?  Why don’t they face reality and step down?  Why make things worse for themselves and their country by killing their fellow citizens?”

These questions touch on a psychological issue that affects most leaders – although not normally with such lethal results for themselves and those they lead.  It’s an issue that, if understood, can help leaders grow towards self-mastery – to the benefit of those they lead.  It can also help those who work with leaders, like executive coaches, offer better support.

So bear with me for a few paragraphs as I lay the psychological foundations for this article before returning to the question about dictators.

Self and Identity

In my book, The Three Levels of Leadership, I’ve outlined a new model of the psyche that draws together the latest thinking and research from psychology and neuroscience.  I explain that each of us is a Self – a centre of self-awareness, will and imagination.  A centre of potential, but not of psychological content.

However, we all need a sense of identity (in other words, a set of beliefs forming a self-image) through which to express ourselves, connect with others, grow and gain experience in the world.  This we create in our psyche.  We also form a worldview – again built from our beliefs – that makes sense of what the world is like, how it works and how other people treat us.  So our psyche acts as a container for the psychological contents we use to live in the physical world.  These include not only our beliefs, but also our knowledge, feelings, memories and habits.

But the key point to bear in mind is that you, the Self, are distinct from the contents of your psyche.  In other words, you have beliefs, thoughts, feelings and habits but you are not those beliefs, thoughts, feelings and habits – you are more than them.

Limiting Beliefs and the False Self

Many of the beliefs we hold are true and helpful.  But many of them false (although we don’t realise it) and they limit our freedom of thought and action.  For example, if we believe ourselves to be inadequate, that would be a limiting belief.  And it can lead to a powerful fear of failure or humiliation.

The sum total of our limiting beliefs is what I call the False Self.  And the core emotion of the False Self is fear.  Like the fear of feeling insignificant, feeling we don’t matter, that nobody would notice if we weren’t around, that nobody would listen if we expressed our views.  Or the fear of not being good enough, of failing, and the humiliation or the powerlessness we might experience.  Or perhaps the fear that we’re unattractive or unworthy of another person’s affection and are permanently at risk of rejection.

The Self’s Greatest Problem

The great problem for the Self is that with its powers of imagination, will and self-awareness it can imagine being something negative, choose to accept that limited view of itself and then experience the results in its self-awareness.  What might it imagine itself to be?  It can imagine itself to be the False Self – the scaffolding of subtle, negative limiting beliefs I just described.  In other words, each of us can identify with the limiting beliefs of our False Self so strongly that we believe we are the False Self and its fears.

Most people on this planet have limiting beliefs in their psyche – many of which they are unaware of.  But life doesn’t stop.  We have to make decisions, earn a living, win friends, influence people and cope with change.  And because of that, we’re always at risk of experiencing our False Self fears.

For example, let’s say you believe you are unattractive, yet you dare to ask someone out on a date, but he or she turns you down so you feel rejected and experience what you’d always feared (that you’re unattractive) is indeed true.  This is why – without realising it – we develop ways to protect ourselves from these fears.  You see, the False Self craves a sense of security and it strives to achieve this through what psychologists call defence mechanisms.  It uses these to defend its self-image and view of the world through defensive behaviours.

The False Self’s Defensive Behaviours

Some of us take the passive road.  We assume because we’re insignificant or unimportant that if we try to be more visible people will ignore us (which will hurt) and therefore it’s better to stay low-profile if we want to avoid that experience.  Or perhaps, if we believe we’re useless, we’ll decide that we’re always likely to fail or be criticised by others if we try anything ambitious.  So it’s better to let others tell us what to do – for after all, if we screw up we can tell ourselves it was “their” fault, not ours.  And if we fear rejection because we believe others will push us away, we can get into the habit of staying at arms length from everyone – even when, deep down, we crave intimacy and affection.

Others take the active approach.  And these are often the people we regard as successful.  People who end up as chief executives, prime ministers, presidents or wealthy, self-made men and women.  Their defence against the fears I talked about is to make themselves so visible, so important, so powerful or so good at what they do that no one will ever ignore or humiliate them.  And in this way, many of them hope others will love them.  Now I’m not suggesting that every famous or successful person has achieved all they have because of a drive to defend themselves against uncomfortable subconscious beliefs, but it does happen.

Psychology of Dictators

What’s this got to do with dictators?  Well, if he (and it usually is a he) accepts that his people don’t want him any more – and that he can’t do anything about it – he is accepting rejection, powerlessness and loss of his significance (or so he thinks) – and that may be too much for his False Self.  For it will mean that everything he has believed about himself and his relationship with “his people” must have been a lie.  In other words, the active defence against his deepest fears is being exposed.  And make no mistake, an extreme False Self will do anything to prevent exposure of the lies it’s built on – including killing other people.

This is why a dictator facing a revolt often creates an imaginary enemy and distorts or suppresses the truth.  That way, he doesn’t have to look at himself and his inner issues.  For example, look at how Colonel Gaddafi recently declared that the Libyan people loved and supported him while all those who opposed him were members of Al Qaeda.  He had to cling to both beliefs to retain a sense of psychological security.

For if he’s to accept that his people no longer want him, that he is no longer the great leader, the hero of the Libyan revolution, then who is he now?  For decades, he has been identified with his self-image as a great and popular leader.  So when that self-image is under threat, he feels under threat, even though as a Self he is not that self-image.  But most of us don’t realise we are more than our beliefs – that we’re more than our self-image and the fears stemming from it.

Thus, the dictator in a corner fights.  And he directs the people who have tied their careers to him to attack those who threaten his psychological security.  Yes, he argues that this is all for his nation’s benefit, but in fact it’s about his psychological well-being.

Now of course, I’m generalising.  President Mubarek of Egypt was one dictator who did give up his position.  But then what happened afterwards?  There were reports in the media of him suffering from depression.  Why?  My guess is that his self-image had been punctured, with painful consequences.

But he was unusual.  He let go, but most dictators don’t.  Why not?  You could argue that they’re afraid of being punished by a vengeful population.  But I think it’s also because it’s too psychologically painful for them to let go.  You see, if a dictator is to step down of his own will, he has to be ready to let his old self-image die.  Now, in fact, this is often healthy, but when a human being is strongly identified with an old self-image, it can be difficult to give up.  Thus, he fights while the world looks on and wonders why.

What This Means For Us

But in case those of us who look on from the outside are tempted to say, “Oh, but that’s his mistake, I would never make the same error,” we should show some humility.  For nearly every one of us has the same kind of negative beliefs that control many dictators – although, fortunately, not to the same unpleasant degree.

So we may criticise dictators – and certainly their actions in killing others are inexcusable.  But we should bear in mind that positions of leadership often expose and magnify the fears stemming from our false, but hidden beliefs.  And so before we pass judgement, we might like to consider whether our own limiting beliefs are also distorting the quality of our leadership in whatever sphere we work in and whatever role we play – whether that be statesman, organisation leader, teacher or parent.  And if so, whether it’s time for us to work on self-mastery.