Gary’s Q&A

Listener question & Gary’s response · Transcript passage

Jesus Chan asks Hi Gary, greetings from South Texas. After hearing your recent episode on Francisco Macias Nguema, and based on current events, I am struck by how many times in history people have followed leaders who turned out to be disastrous dictators. Why do humans continue to follow such figures despite so many examples of the harm they cause? Is it human psychology, social pressures, or something else at play? I don’t want to believe that people are really that foolish, but it seems hard to explain.

Most people aren’t following dictators. They are stuck with dictators.

The path that dictators come to power can be different. Some are popularly elected and then become corrupt over time. Some come to power through a military coup. Some are revolutionary leaders who lose sight of what the original goals of the revolution were all about.

However, once they become dictators, most of them stay in power through similar means.

Staying does not require broad-based popular support. People aren’t stupid. Most of them hate the leaders of their countries.

Dictators stay in power by creating a small class of people who benefit from their rule. They are given positions of power and prestige. They often are corrupt, and a blind eye is turned towards their corruption. They are allowed to enrich themselves, although not as much as the leader.

After a while, the leader and his small group of supporters stay in power for survival. They know if they loosen their grip on power, everything could fall apart quickly. This is exactly what happened to Nicolae Ceau?escu in Romania, Muammar Gaddafi in Libya, and most recently, Bashar al-Assad in Syria.

One of the things that often brings down a regime is that the dictator threatens someone close to them in their inner circle. This is what happened in Equatorial Guinea.

When dictatorships fall, they often collapse quickly, either through a popular uprising or a coup. All it takes is a general who thinks that he is going to get put up against a firing squad and decides to take action first.