Q&A: Sociologist Julia Sonnevend on How Political Leaders Try to 'Charm' Us
Q&A: Sociologist Julia Sonnevend on How Political Leaders Try to 'Charm' Us
An author explains why world leaders have taken to Instagram to allure us
Julia Sonnevend is Associate Professor of Sociology and Communications at The New School for Social Research in New York. She is a sociologist of global culture, focusing on the events, icons, symbols and charismatic personalities of public life. She is the author of a new book, Charm: How Magnetic Personalities Shape Global Politics. In the book, she explains how world leaders use charm -- a difficult-to-define concept where audiences are swept in by personal magnetism -- to achieve their political goals. Some of the leaders whose charm (or lack thereof) she focuses on include German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, and North Korean dictator Kim Jong-Un. We spoke last week over Zoom about her book, and whether Donald Trump and Kamala Harris have charm. Our conversation follows, condensed and edited for clarity.
Luke Johnson: What do you think of as charm?
Julia Sonnevend: My argument is that there is a distinct form of personal magnetism at this moment in contemporary politics, different from traditional understandings of charisma. Charisma was based on distance from the audience. What we see now is a new form built on proximity. Politicians have to appear as one of us, like the person you want to have a beer with. It's built on proximity with political tribes. What is unique about that contemporary political movement is that we can feel that politicians are part of our everyday lives.
LJ: What are the elements of charm?
JS: I focus on five elements. The first one is performing authenticity. The absurd situation is that we look for authenticity in a manufactured environment. Why would a politician who is on the campaign trail -- barely having time to go to the bathroom -- behave like a next-door neighbor? That's not why we select that person, but that's what we are looking for.
The next element is demasking. Every politician has a formal role with a mask, be it president or chancellor. But there are moments in which they appear as regular human beings; when they say something that wasn't scripted. These moments make politicians relatable. For example, President Biden visited Warsaw and said Vladimir Putin "cannot remain in power." It was a massive PR crisis for the White House, but it was a moment in which audiences felt like he was real.
Restaging is about shifting away from traditional sites of politics. Instead of press conferences and meeting rooms, you suddenly have a politician sitting in the back seat of the car or at home. For Example, New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinta Ardern was diapering her baby and speaking about the law that she was introducing.
One more is equalizing. If you're a politician, you have a very diverse audience. Yet, politicians want to present that audience as a community -- really as a tribe. There are tricks with which politicians suggest that we are members of this community, such as asking us to comment or participate in some kind of performance.
Breaking from routine is when you signal to the audience that there is suddenly an event happening. One of these manufactured events for the media is when Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu hung out on the beach with Prime Minister Narendra Modi of India. There is nothing like friendship there or spontaneity, but it's presented as a moment of eventfulness. There are cases when charm is manufactured directly for media and public consumption.
LJ: How did you come to think of charm as something important in politics?
JS: I started out by thinking of charm in everyday life. I'm a social scientist, but I focus on topics that are hard to define and difficult to quantify. Social scientists hate that! My first book is about events; the second is about charm. There are other hard-to-define qualities like luck and love, yet they define our lives.
Particularly in higher education where I work, I realized more and more that people are suspicious of charm. In faculty meetings and hiring decisions, people think we have to be very careful with charming people: they can seduce and deceive us. I thought, how interesting that there is this powerful quality of social life, yet there is this deep-rooted suspicion towards it. We all know charming people, be it boyfriends or friends. I thought, let's take a look at this unique feature of social life.
LJ: You are from Hungary, and you write that Prime Minister Viktor Orban has charm. I think most English-language readers would be surprised by that. Explain why you think so.
JS: It's absolutely the case. I felt, yes, you can describe him as illiberal and a mini-Mussolini. I don't dispute that. However, if you use those terms repeatedly, you will not get any closer to understanding why he has been reelected four consecutive times in Hungary. (It is the case that Orban is in control of elections, but still.)
It was important to show that he presents a relatable, consistent image to Hungarian voters. He uses some of these contemporary tools of personal magnetism, even as an illiberal leader. It's not enough for an illiberal leader to control the media. He also presents a seductive message, and together those have to be understood to explain his power.
LJ: What's the seductive part of his message?
JS: One thing that he regularly does is visit food carts, taste Hungarian pastries, and have meals that I consider quintessentially Hungarian. He is appearing as one of us. He frequently shows images of his family, particularly his grandkids. It's sometimes awkward, and people comment on that, but there is a persistent effort to show a more personable side. He comments on his favorite soccer players and activists who passed away. But mostly it's not about high culture. It's about being part of the community. What he is indirectly communicating there is that he is the symbolic condensation of Hungarianness -- here is how it should be done. He shows a heterosexual couple with many children living in Hungary, dedicated to a Hungary against immigration. When he is tasting pastries before Christmas, there is a message about Christianity. He doesn't say that directly, but you get the message.
LJ: Is part of charm using social media to do very ordinary things? For instance, your aunt or uncle might post on Facebook about tasting pastries before Christmas, and here is Viktor Orban doing the same thing.
JS: Absolutely. They want to appear as one of us, one of the tribe, not an exceptional, faraway politician like Churchill giving bombastic speeches. Orban does that too. But he also wants to appear as an everyday Hungarian. For instance, going to the countryside and participating in a pig slaughter. It's not elite restaurants or the Budapest orchestra that he's showing on Facebook.
LJ: Who's an example of a leader who is not charming?
JS: I close with a chapter on Angela Merkel, because I wanted to have a case where my book does not apply. I wanted to see if you construct political authenticity and power in contemporary media environments without using these strategies. I analyzed Angela Merkel's Instagram. You see Angela Merkel in a persistent representation; the color of the jacket changes, but not much else. At the beginning, her team experimented with making her more Instagram-like and then they just ended up presenting Angela Merkel in her typical appearance. And it worked. But again, Germany may be a unique historical case with an exceptionally negative experience with charisma.
I'm not making the argument that every single politician in every single context can use every tool that I described in this book. What I'm saying is that there is a strong global trend towards charm. At the same time, we have counterexamples when people are fed up with the seductive powers of charm and want a more plain leader; you observe this in the shift from Trump to Biden in 2020.
LJ: Do you think Donald Trump or Kamala Harris have charm?
JS: I think they both have it. In the case of Harris, there was a more restrained image during her time as vice president, partly not to overshadow the sitting president. But as soon as she became the candidate, I was surprised by how swiftly we were flooded with videos. She's commenting on spices. She's playfully mocking her mother-in-law. She's dancing. These are all relatable moments. I just watched a video of her trying different spices and laughing about them. What does that have to do with her role as future president? But that's what we look for.
With Trump, we see a mix of charisma in bombastic speeches and charm. In social media representations, many of them produced by his fans, you very much see elements of charm. As a multimillionaire, he needs the red baseball hat to appear as a more everyday person.
LJ: You mentioned that people are on guard about people who are charming. Should we be on guard for politicians who are charming as well?
JS: Yes, I think it's fair to be careful. I also find it ridiculous that our only approach is to focus on the scary elements, which ignores the fact that personal magnetism and charm are important in everyday life. We do get seduced by charming people. Charm is a spectrum. You have seduction on one end and deception on the other. It oscillates between the two. Depending on your political preferences, you will judge each time, and you may move, as if you are in a relationship -- you fall in love and then get disenchanted. The same kind of negotiation goes on in politics: each time you ask, is it authentic? Or, as my students would say, is it cringe?
LJ: Cringe is too much charm?
JS: Yeah, it becomes too much or it falls apart. Every charming moment is a performance, and if it comes together, you fuse with the person. If it somehow becomes too cringe, then it falls apart as a performance. You feel, this is not me -- this is fake. There is a fine line between the two. Even very successful politicians create cringe videos as well. Yes, we have to be careful. But I think we should also watch for charm and try to understand its power.