Global Security and Intelligence Studies Volume 3, Number 1, Spring/Summer 2018 | Page 10

Global Security and Intelligence Studies • Volume 3, Number 1 • Spring / Summer 2018
A Psychological and Political Analysis of a
Twentieth Century “Doctator”: Dr. François
Duvalier, President-for-Life of Haiti
Nicole K. Drumhiller
American Military University
Casey Skvorc
National Institutes of Health
American Military University
Abstract
As one of the prominent “doctators” (physicians who become political
dictators) of the twentieth century, François Duvalier successfully
translated the trappings of beneficence associated with his status as a
medical doctor to the office of President-for-Life of Haiti. This psychological
and political analysis of Duvalier traces his early political
development, strongly influenced by the presence of the U.S. military
in Haiti, to his post-graduate medical education in Michigan,
culminating in his ultimate rise to power and reign of terror against
those who challenged his political authority. The psychological influences
of mental illness of Duvalier’s mother, and subsequent use
of Voodoo imagery and mounting levels of his grandiosity and paranoia,
are discussed in the context of his behavior as a political dictator.
The circumstances of Dr. François Duvalier’s remarkable rise to
political power and terror are of both historic and current interest as
unanticipated political leaders continue to emerge in international
political landscapes.
Keywords: François Duvalier, doctator, dictator, psychobiography,
decision-making, leadership, paranoia, narcissism
9
doi: 10.18278/gsis.3.1.2