Exogenous Dynamics and Leadership Traits: A Study of Change in the Personality Traits of Recep Tayyip Erdoğan

Do leadership attributes change/persist with experience in office, and after a dramatic event? Answers to this agent-structure question represent the main division line between situational and dispositional theorists. While the first posits that leader’s actions are a product of configuration imposed by experience, and traumatic events, the latter focuses on persistent set of beliefs in leaders. This paper aims at testing the role of these two variables, experience, and traumatic event, on the personality of political leaders with a special focus on Recep Tayyip Erdogan. To recover the personality attributes of Erdogan, and measure their resilience or weakness against experience and traumatic events, the paper uses Leadership Trait Analysis (LTA) developed by Margaret Hermann. LTA assumes that leaders’ choice of certain words in public speeches reflects their personality traits, through which they can be compared with other leaders, and even themselves in different roles and times.