The Psychological Assessment of Political Leadersothers' initiatives. Similarly, in a terrorist hostage arid barricade cri-
sis, rapid changes in a leader's profile could signal a sharp increase in
the hazard to the hostages' lives, suggesting a shift from hostage
negotiations to a SWAT team intervention. Real-time measures
could also identify crucial moments in international negotiations,
predicting the adversary's readiness to compromise.
Finally, leaders themselves often see people as the essence of poli-
tics and are strongly interested in what makes their adversaries and
allies tick. A more informed leadership will better negotiate the
treacherous shoals of national and international waters, and sound
methods of psychologically evaluating political leaders can assist in
that important task. Such knowledge can inform and guide the pol-
icy process without replacing the political skills necessary to exercise
effective leadership. As George (1993, 23) points out, even the best-
informed leader still needs to be able to make judgments about the
trade-offs among (i) searching for high-quality decisions, (2) bar-
gaining for support of the decision, and (3) expending time and
other resources on searching and bargaining. Applied to the analysis
of a policy problem, knowledge of who the players are can at least
help prevent the selection of a policy option so compromised by deci-
sion-making trade-offs as to be ineffective in dealing with the people
targeted in the political process (George 1993, 25).