The 2016 Election through a Leadership Theory Lens

Donna Ladkin, an American citizen, currently teaches at the Graduate School of Management at Plymouth University in Plymouth, United Kingdom. I find her leadership theory, perhaps best described as a framework for analyzing leadership, very useful. She is one of my favorite leadership scholars because of the way her “leadership moment” sees leadership. This post focuses on a recently published article entitled “How did that happen? Making sense of the 2016 US presidential election through the lens of the ‘leadership moment.'”

The leadership moment framework

Ladkin sees leadership as a dynamic and lived experience, not a set of traits or behavior. Leadership is a collectively produced phenomenon. She believes leadership occurs when (1) context, (2) purpose, (3) followers, and (4) individuals who want to take a leader role align in a particular way. How followers perceive whether these factors align becomes critical in determining the person they see as a leader. In Ladkin’s view, context and the followers’ perception of context play crucial roles. Thus, we need to understand why followers attach themselves to a leader they want to follow. We also need to understand the larger contextual dynamics that affect the leadership moment.

Any person, says Ladkin, can become a leader if followers perceive that person demonstrates those characteristics judged to be significant in a particular context or circumstance. She recognizes that perception can change in an instant. Consequently, the followers’ perception of context and circumstance becomes more important, more meaningful, than the objective facts of a context or circumstance. As applied to the 2016 election, Ladkin suggests that appeals to emotion and personal beliefs often meant more than objective facts.

Context and the 2016 election

Ladkins identifies three arenas in which perception played an important role in the 2016 election.

Unemployment

The unemployment rate in the United States fell from 8% in 2008, the year of Obama’s election, to 4.7%, at the end of his final term of office. However, Ladkin argues that many Americans thought that the unemployment rate was much higher, a view that Trump forcefully made during his campaign for the presidency. The labor participation rate helped generate this disconnect. The participation rate (the number of people considered to be available for employment) dropped from 67.3% in 2008 to 62.6% in 2016, a 38-year low. This suggests the unemployment rate was low because the number of participants in the workforce was low. Many long-term unemployed (those out of work for more than 27 weeks, for example), are not defined as unemployed. Additionally, people who are employed include those who earn low wages or are working in no-contract lowly paid jobs.

Trump declared that people should not be taken in by phony government unemployment rates, that the real unemployment rate was much higher, perhaps even at 40% or more. While this was not factually accurate, it may have felt like the truth to many people. This may have been especially true of people who were employed in insecure low-paid jobs. In other words, for many people the 4.7% rate did not seem true; they perceived the unemployment rate was actually much higher. They were primed to accept Trump’s view of unemployment as being more accurate than the government’s statistic.

Immigration

Immigration provides another example in the 2016 election of the divide between fact and perception. Factually, illegal immigration from Mexico declined since 2009 while the majority of illegal immigrants came from East Asia, South America, and sub-Saharan Africa. Various academic studies tended to show that illegal immigrants do not significantly compete with vulnerable American workers. Some studies indicate that within a generation illegal immigrants contribute perhaps as much as $30 billion in taxes. Yet the perceptions of illegal immigration differed from the facts for many 2016 voters.

Ladkin suggests that the long history of Mexican immigration may help explain the disconnect between fact and perception. Throughout much of our history, whenever there has been a shortfall of labor resources within the United States Mexican immigrants were welcomed as guests. A relaxation of border controls accompanied this need influx of labor. When this labor was no longer needed, undocumented Mexicans were sent back to Mexico. There has always been a history of targeting undocumented Mexicans for removal from the United States.

But Ladkin makes another point that may be important in understanding the role Mexican immigration played in the election. Over the past decades, citizens of Latin American descent have developed, or have been perceived to develop a common identity. Non-Latinos, therefore, may see Latinos as an increasingly empowered population. At the same time, many whites may see their own power declining.

This growing Latino identity coupled with whites finding it difficult to find employment may lead to a perception that Latinos are becoming culturally more important as well as taking jobs away from Americans. In other words, Trump’s rhetoric, while not factually correct and even misleading, aligned with how many people felt about Mexican immigrants and jobs.

Rustbelt states

A geographical voting divide clearly marked the 2016 election. Rural whites largely voted for Trump while urban residents more consistently voted for Clinton. Rustbelt states became the poster child for this divide. Since the late 1970s, manufacturing employment as a percentage of all employment declined precipitously. The manufacturing-based states of Ohio, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin best illustrated the decline of manufacturing. And these were the states that gave Trump his electoral victory.

Many voters in these and in other states saw Bill Clinton’s signing of the North American Free Trade Agreement as significantly contributing if not causing this decline in manufacturing. The increasing speed of globalization after NAFTA enlarged the number of people who saw international trade as contrary to their economic interests. These voters perceived themselves as being damaged by free trade. They also witnessed financial interests and bankers, who were seen as large contributors if not the primary cause of the 2007-2008 financial crisis, being bailed out by taxpayer funds. Ladkin argues that these circumstances made many voters anti-establishment. They saw Hillary Clinton as aligned with the Washington establishment and the political elite.

Trump continually pictured himself as being anti-establishment. His outlandish lies, his public rhetoric, and his outlandish personal behavior fueled the belief and he was not part of the political or economic elite as understood by the anti-establishment voters.

The candidates and their purposes

Given the outlines of the election context as described above, the leadership moment framework focuses on the candidates and their purposes. Which candidates did voters see as demonstrating the characteristics as most attractive to this given situation?

Hillary Clinton

Clinton has always been subject to mixed judgments during her career. She has always provoked conflicting and often strong reactions from both women and men. Her commitment to what many perceived as left-wing causes and her commitment to make a difference generated support and antipathy among voters. She has always had a “likability” problem, an inability to connect with common people (as demonstrated, for example, by her reluctance to shake hands while campaigning). Ladkins suggests that this is not uncommon for many strong women in public roles.

Clinton also had a trust problem, which many polls indicated. Part of her trust issue dealt with her connections with Wall Street and financiers who funded her campaign. Ladkin also points out that ambitious women generated a distrust that ambitious men did not generate. Many also perceived women as being unsuitable for the presidency.

Relative to purpose, Ladkin remarks that although she voted for Clinton she could not recall Clinton’s campaign slogan. In writing her article Ladkin notes that she had to look it up (“Stronger Together”). Yet this slogan communicated little about Clinton’s purpose. Digging deeper, Ladkin determined that in her campaign Clinton stressed her commitment to “the family,” “equal rights,” “diversity,” and “kindness.” All these concerns sounded good, but were they important to key constituent groups, to the voters?

Donald Trump

As with many others, Ladkin remarks that Trump was an unsuccessful businessman. His public businesses ended in disaster, all of them going into bankruptcy within several years of starting. His private business, the Trump Organization, was always shrouded in secrecy, was never transparent, and did not have to obey the legal requirements of public companies. His claim to fame was his goldplated ostentatiousness and his branding. Outside of New York, he rose to fame through his television and talk radio appearances and his successful television show, The Apprentice. The Apprentice, a reality television show ran from 2004 to 2015. Not only did the show give Trump national exposure, but it also presented him as a wise and successful businessman, of which he was neither. Throughout his life, his continued assertions of success and wealth were at best constantly inflated and often contrary to the truth.

Trump demonstrated throughout his campaign many of these behaviors, such as repeatedly labeling truthful things as lies, his constant self-aggrandizement, the alluding to his superior knowledge of how the system worked against ordinary people. Yet, many voters were attracted not offended by his talk and behavior. To many, Trump was entertaining (something that could not be said about Clinton). His behavioral candor and the simplicity, albeit often being false, of his statements, gave Trump “an aura of ‘unpolished immediacy,’ something that is interpreted as ‘authentic,’ rather than political.” Here, Ladkin is quoting an article in the English newspaper, The Observer, by Gwenda Blair.

Trump had a memorable campaign slogan, “Make America Great Again.” He promised to accomplish this by putting America first. This slogan spoke to many in rust belt states. But it “also to white middle-class men who perhaps had felt their own status fade in the wake of an African American president and a sense that their powerbase – once so solid – was slipping away.”

Followers

Ladkin focuses on three specific follower groupings: (1) white middle-aged men (who virtually voted as a block for Trump, (2) white women, and (3) Latino voters. Significant numbers of the last two mentioned voted for Trump.

White middle-class men

Among non-college educated white men, about 70% voted for Trump. But the voting of college educated-white men nearly matched this statistic, 60%. Contrary to the popular belief that only rural poor whites voted for Trump, the median income of his voters was $72,000 a year, compared to the national average of $56,000. What explains why wealthier white men voted for Trump?

Ladkin argues that wealthier white men voted for Trump because of a battle for identity. These voters benefitted from the traditional order of things. Trump’s MAGA slogan spoke to a longing for an earlier era. Trump voters anxiously viewed the future as changing the face of power. More specifically many white men grew up with a sense of white, masculine privilege and image of power. In 2016, many such men viewed such power and status as precarious and in need of protection if not a restoration.

In summary, white men voted for Trump because of their desire for the bygone days of uncontested economic security and because of a disregard for political correctness, and perhaps looked back on a time when black people, and perhaps women, knew their place. Trump was the protector and restorer they thought was needed.

White women

Given how Trump treated women, why did so many white women vote for him? About 60% of white non-college educated women voted for Trump. Clinton won only about 50% of college-educated white women.

Apparently, some college-educated women voted for Trump because they thought they would have more economic opportunities if a successful businessman was president. Many women (and men) expressed the view that a woman was not capable of being president, not strong enough to stand up to foreign leaders and the military. Many women and men went to sleep election night assuming America was going to elect its first female president. But many others were hoping Clinton would lose.

Ladkin believes those who assumed women would automatically vote for Clinton were wrong to make such an assumption. Such an assumption ignored “a deep-seated, gender prejudice and the way in which patriarchy infests both men and women. Gender identification did not necessarily encourage women to vote for Clinton. Ladkin points out that white women are not a homogenous group, and many would have voted for Trump for ideological, economic, or identity-based reasons.

Latinos

Trump always campaigned strongly against Mexican immigration. His most popular and specific policy proposal was building a wall between America and Mexico. Nonetheless, about 30% of Latinos voted for Trump, a percentage that is a bit higher than those who voted for Romney.

Ladkin suggests that many variables induced Latinos to vote for Trump. For example, some Latinos held religious views that made them oppose Clinton’s pro-gay and pro-abortion policies. Latinos who were owners of small businesses may have voted for Trump because he was a businessman and would do more to ensure their business success than Clinton. Some Latinos expressed the view that some legal Latinos were jealous of those who were successful, but in the country illegally.

Conclusion

Ladkin is fully aware that no one factor made Trump victorious, and that Trump became president because he won the electoral college while losing the popular vote by a significant margin. Just as with leadership in general, Ladkin believes electing a president cannot be determined by the traits of an individual or even by the extent to which a leader connects with followers. Her theory of leadership leads her to conclude that leadership as well as the election of a president “is fluid, contingent, and dependent on the ‘around space’ in which leader-follower relations are embedded, as well as by what transpires between them.

She notes that the ‘around space’ is difficult to access and measure. Followers’ perceptions of this ‘around space’ are based on both objective facts as well as on subjective and sometimes irrational feelings and judgments. It is difficult if at all possible, to determine how such facts as the economic decline of the rust belt interweave with ingrained prejudices and issues of identity.

Social identity theories of leadership suggest that to be accepted as a leader by others one must be prototypical of the group being led and respect key aspects of the group’s values. Ladkin indicates that Trump’s supporters understood that a similarity existed between the identities of those who voted for Trump and Trump himself. But other factors also played a role. Identity, says Ladkin is fickle, remarking on voters who voted for Obama in 2012 and then voted in 2016 for Trump.

Followers often make their choices through an interweaving of conscious and unconscious and rational and irrational perspectives. Their own emotional experiences color their perceptions. What is important to them is often not developed through a rational process. Voters used their own lived experiences about employment and Mexicans taking jobs, experiences which they thought were more accurate than the facts presented by others. She believes that identity struggles, economic hardships, and misogyny will not disappear. Many voters will need to alter their perceptions and emotional experiences if the political landscape will

She ends her article on two thoughts. First, she remarks on how the media landscape shapes followers’ perceptions. She suggests the popular press has a better understanding of how perceptions mold public opinion about potential leaders than do leadership theorists.

Second, because others halted many of Trump’s early initiatives, she raises the possibility that Trump may learn that “leading is not accomplished through his individual exertions alone, but through their alignment with others, their perceptions, and the context within which all are situated.” Otherwise, she predicts his aspirations as a leader will not be achieved.

Comment

Ladkin bases her theory of leadership phenomenology. For example, the term “moment” refers to things that exist only through the combination of other things. Moments in phenomenology cannot exist by themselves, cannot exist independently of other phenomena. Thus, leadership is collectively produced. Leadership is generated by the confluence of context (the space around leaders and followers), by followers, by individuals who willingly take on a leadership role, and the purpose brought to the context and followers by such leaders. Only when those factors align does leadership occur.

This theory of leadership makes leadership more fluid and dynamic than most other theories of leadership. More so than other theories of leadership, it makes the space around leaders and followers significant, an aspect of leadership that many theories ignore. Finally, more so than most other theories of leadership, her framework identifies the significant role played by perceptions, feelings, and emotions.

Reading Ladkin’s article made me think about three things. First, it struck me how Clinton seemed unable to understand the election context and well explain her purpose in running for president. She did obtain most of the votes, but she probably would have won the electoral college if she dealt more effectively with context and purpose. My sense is that she never integrated into her campaign the perceptions, emotions, and feelings that swirled in and around the context of the election and many voters. She was never able to align the four elements of Ladkin’s theory.

On the other hand, Trump played the perceptions, emotions, and feelings of many voters to his advantage. He facilitated, fueled, reinforced, and perhaps even created, many of those perceptions and feelings. He waded right into them and used them well. His purpose was clear on two significant issues, immigration and employment/international trade. It seemed to me that Trump intuitively worked during his entire campaign to align the four elements of Ladkin’s framework.

Second, once elected, Trump’s leadership moment froze. Perhaps another way of saying this is that Trump stayed in campaign mode. He led effectively enough to be elected, but once elected the space around him changed. He was in a different context. Also, he did not realize that he had a much broader set of followers, which required some alteration of purpose. As president, his situation changed, and this altered the perceptions, feelings, and emotions he faced. He did not realize (or perhaps he did realize but was constitutionally unable to adapt) that “leading is not accomplished through his individual exertions alone.”

Finally, perceptions, feelings, and emotions can be fleeting. They can change rapidly and with a bit of time change significantly and systematically. I think the 2018 mid-term elections demonstrated this. Notwithstanding the mid-term elections, Trump seems unable to recognize these changes. One wonders whether he can recreate the perceptions, feelings, and emotions that helped him win the election to the point where they get him re-elected.