The image counts enormously in politics, even more in our hypermediatized societies obsessed with the look. The “Images and Leaders” series examines how party leaders in the election campaign use their representations to seduce the electorate.
Power and the representation of power have always advanced as a rope. This is the lesson from far, far away, which still persists in our constitutional monarchy and our tired democracies. The candidates running in the current Quebec election campaign are no exception.
Let us reread Voltaire on the graces and physical assets of his king: “His size, already majestic, he wrote in The century of Louis XIV (1751), the nobility of his features, the masterful tone and air of which he spoke imposed more than the authority of his rank, which until then had been little respected. »
All the arts, from architecture to music and dance were then mobilized to affirm a policy of the spectacular made of glory and brilliance, despite the physical reality of the bald and wigged man measuring barely 1.60 m. The countless portraits of coins, tokens, medals, monuments or canvases have contributed to the myth of a supereminent majesty linking beauty and panache. As if the monarchy were concentrated in a game of perfect images.
The same observation can be repeated about Elizabeth II, Queen of Canada, an icon of ceremonial visibility, grace and magnificence. His Majesty has just left this world after having been painted or photographed in all his grandeur (1.60 m too…) more than 200 times during his reign almost as long as that of the Sun King.
“The importance of appearance is consubstantial with politics”, summarizes French professor François Hourmant in an interview. He just published power and beauty (PUF, 2021), which devotes pages to Louis XIV’s self-staging as well as Caesar’s symbolic manipulations of his senatorial toga, before finely analyzing in today’s world “the taboo of the physical in politics” (c is the subtitle of the book).
“Power is often staged in a majestic, spectacular, sumptuous mode. In Rome and Athens, the image of the speaker is fundamental in terms of authority, legitimacy, competence, to seduce or in any case circumvent listeners. »
The unique and pioneering essay dissects the phenomenon of appearances and the cult of the appearances of leaders. Few scholarly works, and even fewer in French, directly address the question of the container, reputed to be far removed from the more serious question of content (ideas, values, programs, promises, etc.).
“It seems to me there is an unthought, a blind spot that deserves to be explored, explains the professor of political science at the University of Angers. Especially since today more than yesterday, the image, in every sense of the word, plays an increased role in politics as in society with the Internet, social networks, the cameras of ubiquitous smart phones which also amplify necessary self-control. »
Beauty
The image, the appearances, the look and more, let’s be frank, the beauty and the ugliness, these “tyrannical and secret actors of an unknown story”, as the professor writes. These categories are obviously difficult to handle.
The survey recalls that certain universal criteria (symmetry for example) make it possible to recognize attractive features, even if the canons fluctuate over time. Individual perceptions also change while being conditioned by a “halo effect” linked to the function or social status of the people being evaluated.
A study found that virtually all US presidents were taller on average than the men of their time. Still other studies have shown the positive discrimination accorded in our societies to the beautiful men and women to whom we immediately attribute more kindness and competence.
In the Franco-French study, France, country of fashion and luxury, serves as a privileged observatory of the links between attraction and power, even if the general conclusions seem to be transposable almost everywhere from Limoilou to Moscow. Italy, always a political laboratory of the West, seems obsessed with the look of its politicians.
The cover of François Hourmant’s book also shows US President Kennedy and the first lady, Jackie, “objectively handsome and beautiful”, says the professor, adding that leaders can also beautify themselves by association. Nicolas Sarkozy and Donald Trump, for example, married ex-models.
At the same time, beautiful men and women should not show off too much. “Beauty is an asset, but it can become a trap, and even more so for women politicians,” observes François Hourmant.
They would face a paradoxical double injunction. “They are expected to embody a number of feminine stereotypes in terms of slenderness, elegance, etc. At the same time, they are always suspected of playing on their appearance, of playing to their strengths in order to succeed. This resource should therefore not be overemphasized: it is a perilous exercise to manipulate this card in politics. »
The weight of appearances also weighs on the male side with the same consequences. The leaders also go to the scalpel, Botox injections, hair transplants, submit to diets, play sports, hire stylists.
President Hollande, a little bald from the cap, had a hairdresser at his exclusive service paid 9895 euros per month. President Putin remains smooth as an egg. Do we really need to talk about President Trump’s hair?
Ugliness
What then remains for those who, according to the formula taken up by Kant, abuse the permission to be ugly or ugly? General de Gaulle and René Lévesque had many qualities, but beauty was not really one of them. These two leaders, like many others, were, and still are, highly adored.
“We cannot reduce de Gaulle or René Lévesque to their appearance because, behind, there is always a story, a trajectory, a political program, a legend too, explains the professor of political science. De Gaulle did not correspond to the conventional criteria of beauty, but he knew how to shape an image, a posture. The general knew how to play on his size to associate physical greatness with political greatness. He did with the resources he had. »
Mr. Hourmant adds that aesthetic capital mattered less in the era of these leaders, when ideologies and parties still weighed heavily on societies. “There has been a shift from the major issues to the political game and, with that, the logic of personalization that is associated with it,” says the specialist. This decades-long process has amplified the importance of the candidates’ appearances and image. »
The Kennedys or Pierre Elliott Trudeau were already announcing what grew with Justin Trudeau. The “son of” constantly arrives in the top ranks of the most beautiful leaders in the world.
It’s not just the media people who have a crush on her charms or those of the Prime Minister of Finland, Sanna Marin. The political parties themselves revamp their candidates, take care of their wardrobes, change their hairstyles. The studied, thought out, planned clothing choices of German Chancellor Angela Merkel, holder of a doctorate in quantum chemistry, have made history.
Finnish researchers quoted by Professor Hourmant have tried to quantify the appearance bonus, if it exists. They estimated it between 15 and 20%.
“It’s considerable, but it’s not the most decisive criterion in an election,” he said. In addition, contrary movements are asserting themselves everywhere to criticize the humiliations of the body (body shaming), fatphobia, obsession with youth and even the outfit of the supposedly perfect little politician. When the rebellious deputies sit in the hemicycle of France in sneakers and t-shirts, they get closer to the solidarity Catherine Dorion wearing the cotton cotton and the slogan t-shirt at the National Assembly of Quebec.
“There is a form of evolution in the relationship to the body, concludes Professor François Hourmant. We also see bodies that refuse norms or certain practices, such as hair removal, associated with a form of patriarchal domination. There is perhaps a return of the pendulum, an affirmation of difference after an excess of normalization of bodies. I don’t know if it will last. »