Ben Ghiat Analysis

Authors Ruth Ben-Ghiat and Maria Konnikova both wrote articles discussing the theory of personalities affecting people politically. In August 2016, Maria Konnikova wrote an article called “Politics and Personality: Most of what you Read is Malarkey”. In this, Konnikova argues that there is no causality in peoples personalities and their political tendencies. Later in January of 2017, Ruth Ben-Ghiat came out with an article called, “Donald Trump’s Cult of Personality”. In this, Ben-Ghiat uses Donald Trump as an example to show that people’s personality affect their politics. He goes on to argue that people’s personalities can be a tool in the political world. Though these two articles approach the same topic differently, they both try to answer
Although she makes a convincing argument about Donald Trump having a cult personality, and what that could mean, she doesn’t really provide any statistics or facts that support her claim. She shows similarities between Trump and other cult personality leaders, but offers no statistics to backup her claim. When doing research on Ruth Ben-Ghiat, it came to light that she taught classes on Italian Studies and History, which shows her plethora of knowledge on Silvio Berlusconi, an italian politician. She doesn’t really have a whole lot of experience in the political sphere which might make readers question her authenticity on the
Overall, the two authors are writing about the same central issue: Does personality affect politics? To sum it up, Ruth Ben-Ghiat argues that politicians, like Donald Trump, can use their personality as a tool. Maria Konnikova argues that having a certain personality doesn’t necessarily affect your political tendencies. When you put the two articles side by side, readers can see a stark difference in writing styles, approach, and tactics used to overall strengthen their claim. Ben-Ghiat seems to use a much more emotional approach to convince readers of her argument. As mentioned above, she doesn’t use statistics or studies in her article. Instead, she points out ways that Trump resembles people like Putin and Berlusconi. By using a tone of urgency, the reader is more inclined to believe her argument because it targets people’s emotions. When readers see the potential President of the United States being compared to people like Putin, Stalin, and Kim Jong-un, it’s understandable that readers are going to be concerned. Konnikova on the other hand provides two separate studies taken 10 years apart to support her claim. She uses a much more straightforward informational approach, and presents the readers with the facts. She acknowledges that her findings go against what people might originally assume, but continues on to present her