The Qualities of Leadership: Direction,

Revised for the American Political Science Review. September 2007. Abstract. Party activists wish to (i) advocate the best policy while (ii) unifying behind a party line. Activists learn about policy and the party line by listening to leaders. A leader’s influence increases with her judgement on policy (sense of direction) and her ability to convey ideas (clarity of communication). A leader with perfect clarity enjoys greater influence than one with a perfect sense of direction. When activists choose how much attention to pay to leaders they listen only to the most coherent communicators. However, attention-seeking leaders sometimes obfuscate their messages, but less so when activists emphasize party unity. Political scientists and commentators agree that good leadership is important, indeed fun-damental, to the successful performance of organizations. We have learned how leaders manipulate the agenda (Riker, 1996), serve as agents of their parties (Fiorina and Shepsle, 1989), and choose policies that enhance their survival (Bueno de Mesquita, Smith, Siver-son, and Morrow, 2003), but do not yet have answers to fundamental questions. What is leadership? When is leadership good and when is is it successful? Which qualitie