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Why, after all the revelations of torture, lies and incompetence which have been documented in the last several months, are forty-eight per cent of the American voting public still in favour of George W. Bush and his policies? Why, after the resounding loss of more than half its voter support for his Austrian Freedom Party (FPO) in the 2002 national elections (from a high of 26.9% in 1999 down to 12.7% in 2002), did nearly forty-three per cent of voters in Carinthia (Kaernten) yet again choose to elect the right-wing millionaire playboy-cum-proletarian, Joerg Haider, to the governorship of that southern Austrian province for the third time? Indeed, why do so many people continue to be attracted by the black-and-white, one-sided, populist and skewed versions of reality that political leaders such as Bush and Haider preach? And what might one conceive to be a feasible, healthier alternative to this kind of split and splitting leadership?
In this paper, I shall suggest some psychodynamic reasons for the success of such politicians and their politics, as well as indicating the direction in which, to my mind, the correction of this situation must lie. As my theoretical tools I shall call to mind important elements of Bion's container-contained model, as well as relevant aspects of his theories on group dynamics, especially those dealing with leadership and followership. I shall then illustrate their concrete application by analysing these two current examples in the USA and Austria - George W. Bush and Joerg Haider - as basic assumption as opposed to what I have called ‘containment’ leaders.