Many leaders - in politics, business, religion, community - are pathological or malignant narcissists. But, maybe surprisingly to some, not all of them. Consider politics. The preponderance of narcissistic traits and personalities in politics is much less than in show business, for instance. Moreover, while show business is concerned essentially (and almost exclusively) with the securing of narcissistic supply - politics is a much more complex and multi-faceted activity. Rather, narcissism in politics is a spectrum. At the one end, we find the 'actors' - politicians who regard politics as their venue and their conduit, an extended theatre with their constituency as an audience. At the other extreme, we find self-effacing and schizoid (crowd-hating) technocrats. Most politicians are in the middle: somewhat self-enamoured, opportunistic and seeking modest doses of narcissistic supply - but mostly concerned with perks, self-preservation and the exercise of power. Most narcissists are ruthless opportunists. But not all opportunistic and ruthless operators are narcissists. This book is a good introduction to narcissists in positions of leadership and to the pernicious effects of their disordered personalities. Yet, all such tomes suffer from a major - and, to my mind, iredeemable, drawback. I am strongly opposed to remote diagnosis. I think it is a bad habit, exercised by charlatans and dilettantes (even if their names are followed by a Psy.D.). Only a qualified mental health diagnostician can determine whether someone suffers from NPD and this, following lengthy tests and personal interviews. Moreover, often, politicians are nothing but a loyal reflection of their milieu, their culture, their society and their times (zeitgeist and leitkultur - the Germans have words for such things). This is the thesis of Daniel Goldhagen in 'Hitler's Willing Executioners'. Lasch, for instance characterized America as narcissistic (in, among others, 'The Culture of Narcissism'). Read cautiously. Sam Vaknin, author of 'Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited'.

Pathological narcissism is a stealthy, pernicious and all-pervasive form of semipternal and venomous abuse. The narcissist is not necessarily as 'evil' person. He (for 75% of all narcissists are men) is simply oblivious to the long-term outcomes of his actions and inaction. He uses and discards, idealizes and devalues, derives narcissistic supply and then moves on. To be the child of a narcissist is a harrowing, devastating, incomprehensible experience. Golomb does an unparalleled job of mapping the territory of pain and rage that her childhood was - and by implication the childhood of victims of narcissists is. One of 5 books that are a must to anyone who wants to come to grips and demystify this disorder - Sam Vaknin author of "Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited".

A defining dimension of pathological narcissism is the inability to foster and maintain intimacy. Intimacy is not only feared - it is despised because it is perceived as 'common' and 'degrading'. The narcissist idealizes his sources of narcissistic supply and then habitually discards and devalues them. This book is instrumental both as a somewhat iconoclastic introduction to narcissism and as an anatomy of the frustration that is life with a narcissist. Sam Vaknin, author of "Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited".

Alice Miller is by far the most prominent popularizer of the twin concepts - True Self and False Self. She regards the True Self as a prisoner within the walls of the False Self. The latter is an intricate and multi-faceted defence mechanism. Defence against what? Against one's emotions that were repressed during early childhood. The narcissist plays a role - that of the gifted, docile, accepting, tranquil, loving, peaceful and well-adjusted child. He becomes the extension of his parents: their unfulfilled dreams and sexret wishes. His identity is moulded to fit the idealized and ideal offspring. His negative feelings are buried deep inside his tormented psyche. These emotional skeletons later erupt and produce depression, suicidal ideation or narcissistic defences. Excellent, readable and - if one can use this word in this context - entertaining. Sam Vaknin, author of 'Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited'.

This book is a vivid delight: patients' case histories, patient drawings and the paraphrenalia of a therapist's existence. Underneath this colourful maelstrom lies an hypothesis: pathological narcissism is the direct outcome of early childhood abuse and trauma, mainly in the form of abandonment or neglect. Narcissism, in other words, is a defence against hurt and emotional injury. To eradicate it, one must revert to one's roots and deal with unrsolved pain and conflict with caregivers and significant others (in other words, one's mother). This is the orthodoxy and it is supported by a large body of therapeutical experience. Yet, the author neglects to review the entire spectrum of abuse - from physical to verbal, from smothering to ignoring, from doting to absence. A child treated as a parent's precious extension, the parent's only shot at wish fulfillment and a parent's favourite toy is no less abused than a child abandoned and beaten. this book, in other words, deals with a niche - with ONE of the possible dynamics that lead to narcissism. Otherwise, this is recommended reading....

There is no exile worse than the internal kind. There is no pain greater than the pain of alienation. There is no craving stronger than the desire to be seen. There is no urge more urgent than longing to belong. And there is no one who knows these truths more than Moshe Benarroche and who expresses them more faithfully. Whether in straightfoward and wistfull narrative, or in fantastic and naively colourful prose, Moshe is there and you are there, surrounded by generations past and engulfed by an all-pervasive yearning. His poetry is an hand extended, an ablution, the smells of childhood, the silent scream of the suppressed and the ignored and the mocked. Moshe knows that the meek shall inherit the earth - but the price is dear. The lost is never found. There is no resurrection in his poems, just a netherland of peripatetic people, looking to connect, looking to comprehend - ultimately, striving to be. A tour de force. But it - and learn Hebrew to read his other tomes. I can't remember the last time that an author's work kept me awake and talking to myself.

This book is a vivid delight: patients' case histories, patient drawings and the paraphrenalia of a therapist's existence. Underneath this colourful maelstrom lies an hypothesis: pathological narcissism is the direct outcome of early childhood abuse and trauma, mainly in the form of abandonment or neglect. Narcissism, in other words, is a defence against hurt and emotional injury. To eradicate it, one must revert to one's roots and deal with unrsolved pain and conflict with caregivers and significant others (in other words, one's mother). This is the orthodoxy and it is supported by a large body of therapeutical experience. Yet, the author neglects to review the entire spectrum of abuse - from physical to verbal, from smothering to ignoring, from doting to absence. A child treated as a parent's precious extension, the parent's only shot at wish fulfillment and a parent's favourite toy is no less abused than a child abandoned and beaten. this book, in other words, deals with a niche - with ONE of the possible dynamics that lead to narcissism. Otherwise, this is recommended reading. Sam Vaknin, author of 'Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited'

There is no exile worse than the internal kind. There is no pain greater than the pain of alienation. There is no craving stronger than the desire to be seen. There is no urge more urgent than longing to belong. And there is no one who knows these truths more than Moshe Benarroche and who expresses them more faithfully. Whether in straightfoward and wistfull narrative, or in fantastic and naively colourful prose, Moshe is there and you are there, surrounded by generations past and engulfed by an all-pervasive yearning. His poetry is an hand extended, an ablution, the smells of childhood, the silent scream of the suppressed and the ignored and the mocked. Moshe knows that the meek shall inherit the earth - but the price is dear. The lost is never found. There is no resurrection in his poems, just a netherland of peripatetic people, looking to connect, looking to comprehend - ultimately, striving to be. A tour de force. But it - and learn Hebrew to read his other tomes. I can't remember the last time that an author's work kept me awake and talking to myself. Sam Vaknin, author of 'Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited'.

The book deals effectively (though sometimes too expansively) with narcissistic and messianic leaders of churches and congregations. Priests, leaders of the congregation, preachers, evangelists, cultists, politicians, intellectuals - all derive authority from their allegedly privileged relationship with God.

Religious authority allows the narcissist to indulge his sadistic urges and to exercise his misogynism freely and openly. Such a narcissist is likely to taunt and torment his followers, hector and chastise them, humiliate and berate them, abuse them spiritually, or even sexually. The narcissist whose source of authority is religious is looking for obedient and unquestioning slaves upon whom to exercise his capricious and wicked mastery. The narcissist transforms even the most innocuous and pure religious sentiments into a cultish ritual and a virulent hierarchy. He preys on the gullible. His flock become his hostages.

Religious authority also secures the narcissist's Narcissistic Supply. His coreligionists, members of his congregation, his parish, his constituency, his audience - are transformed into loyal and stable Sources of Narcissistic Supply. They obey his commands, heed his admonitions, follow his creed, admire his personality, applaud his personal traits, satisfy his needs (sometimes even his carnal desires), revere and idolize him. Sam Vaknin, author of "Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited".

Descriptive criteria aside, what is the essence of mental disorders? Are they merely physiological disorders of the brain, or, more precisely of its chemistry? If so, can they be cured by restoring the balance of substances and secretions in that mysterious organ? And, once equilibrium is reinstated - is the illness "gone" or is it still lurking there, "under wraps", waiting to erupt? Are psychiatric problems inherited, rooted in faulty genes (though amplified by environmental factors) - or brought on by abusive or wrong nurturance?

These questions are the domain of the "medical" school of mental health.

Others cling to the spiritual view of the human psyche. They believe that mental ailments amount to the metaphysical discomposure of an unknown medium - the soul. Theirs is a holistic approach, taking in the patient in his or her entirety, as well as his milieu.

The members of the functional school regard mental health disorders as perturbations in the proper, statistically "normal", behaviours and manifestations of "healthy" individuals, or as dysfunctions. The "sick" individual - ill at ease with himself (ego-dystonic) or making others unhappy (deviant) - is "mended" when rendered functional again by the prevailing standards of his social and cultural frame of reference.

In a way, the three schools are akin to the trio of blind men who render disparate descriptions of the very same elephant. Still, they share not only their subject matter - but, to a counter intuitively large degree, a faulty methodology.

As the renowned anti-psychiatrist, Thomas Szasz, of the State University of New York, notes in his article "The Lying Truths of Psychiatry", mental health scholars, regardless of academic predilection, infer the etiology of mental disorders from the success or failure of treatment modalities.

This form of "reverse engineering" of scientific models is not unknown in other fields of science, nor is it unacceptable if the experiments meet the criteria of the scientific method. The theory must be all-inclusive (anamnetic), consistent, falsifiable, logically compatible, monovalent, and parsimonious. Psychological "theories" - even the "medical" ones (the role of serotonin and dopamine in mood disorders, for instance) - are usually none of these things.

The outcome is a bewildering array of ever-shifting mental health "diagnoses" expressly centred around Western civilisation and its standards (example: the ethical objection to suicide). Neurosis, a historically fundamental "condition" vanished after 1980. Homosexuality, according to the American Psychiatric Association, was a pathology prior to 1973. Seven years later, narcissism was declared a "personality disorder", almost seven decades after it was first described by Freud.

Szasz is the father of the "anti psychiatry" movement and this is his best book - a riveting, mind boggling,scholarly read. Sam Vaknin, author of "Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited".