Personality, Character, and Leadership in the White House - by Steven J Rubenzer & Thomas R Faschingbauer (Paperback)

About the Book

Analyzing the American presidents from George Washington to George W. Bush

Book Synopsis

Personality, Character, and Leadership in the White House is the first book-length work to present truly scientific personality evaluations of the American presidents. This benchmark work dramatically improves the state-of-the-art in classifying presidents and predicting performance in the White House. Dr. Steven Rubenzer and Dr. Thomas Faschingbauer asked 120 experts, including biographers, historians, presidential advisers, and other knowledge-able sources, to rate the presidents by filling out standardized personality tests. For each president that fell within their area of expertise, the evaluators completed a 592-item questionnaire regarding personality, intelligence, and behavior. From the results, the authors identify nine traits related to presidential success, examine how the presidents' personalities affected their job performance, and list their scores on the major dimensions of personality. Rubenzer and Faschingbauer provide revealing insights about every American president and profile twenty-one of them in detail, including all post-World War II presidents and all of the "great" presidents. In addition to revolutionizing the way we look at the presidency, the study offers entertaining and unexpected conclusions. For instance, which recent president's personality and character most closely resembles those of Thomas Jefferson and Abraham Lincoln? The answer may surprise you. Presidential scholars, students, and anyone who likes to be well informed when discussing their political preferences will find this enlightening book irresistible. Visit www.testingthepresidents.com and www.PersonalityinHistory.com for more information.

Review Quotes

"Although many books proclaim to be unique and groundbreaking, this one really is. Rubenzer and Faschingbauer s work should shift the prevailing paradigms of presidential and leadership study. Any scholar or any well-educated layperson should come away with a new understanding of the importance of the individual president/leader and the importance of their psychological attributes. All previous attempts to understand presidential psychology and its importance simply pale beside this work."

"Fascinating . . . Provides some very interesting reading. . . ."

"Personality, Character, and Leadership in the White House is by far the most comprehensive scientific study of presidential personality ever published. It must provide the starting point for all future debate about the intricate connection between a president's personality and his leadership."

"This book provides a unique objective assessment of the personality and character of each president since Washington in a crisp and highly readable format. There is something important here for all who have an interest in the personal qualities of political leaders that reaches beyond the scope of traditional biographies."