The Perils of Leadership Based on Charisma Instead of Strategy

Pity Matt Hancock. Until this summer, Britain’s health minister was best known for creating a smartphone app for his constituents—and naming it after himself.

Now he is the most obvious instance of a growing political trend: the self-abasing outrider. No U-turn has been too big to stay in favor with Boris Johnson, the man who will likely be Britain’s next prime minister. This type of abasement is inevitable under a leadership based on charisma rather than strategy: You can see it in Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour Party here in Britain, as well as Donald Trump’s Republicans. Self-abasing outriders are a symptom of a party with an identity crisis. And yet we might still regret their disappearance.

Let’s spend a little time with Matt Hancock, though,. In the hope of getting a promotion, Hancock volunteered to be Johnson’s human shield: the all-but-guaranteed prime minister did not himself give a televised interview until after the ambassador had resigned.