Governing under pressure : the mental well-being of politicians

Flinders, M; Weinberg, A; Weinberg, J.; Geddes, M; Kwiatkowski, R

Abstract

Despite the singular importance of the work of national politicians in creating legislation, representing constituents and holding government to account, relatively little work has been done concerning their wellbeing and psychological health. There are unique, as well as universal, stressors that impact upon politicians; a neglect of these issues has profound consequences for those individuals and wider democracy. We propose a ‘taxonomy of stressors’ as a starting point for further inter-disciplinary and comparative research, and argue that it offers analytical leverage vis-à-vis a far broader set of debates concerning the future of representative democracy.

Citation

Flinders, M., Weinberg, A., Weinberg, J., Geddes, M., & Kwiatkowski, R. (2020). Governing under pressure : the mental well-being of politicians. Parliamentary Affairs, 73(2), 253-273. https://doi.org/10.1093/pa/gsy046

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Nov 14, 2018
• Online Publication Date: Dec 26, 2018
• Publication Date: Apr 1, 2020
• Deposit Date: Mar 25, 2019
• Publicly Available Date: Dec 26, 2020
• Journal: Parliamentary Affairs
• Print ISSN: 0031-2290
• Electronic ISSN: 1460-2482
• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Volume: 73
• Issue: 2
• Pages: 253-273
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/pa/gsy046
• Publisher URL: https://doi.org/10.1093/pa/gsy046
• Related Public URLs: https://academic.oup.com/pa
• Additional Information: Additional Information : This is a collaboration between the fields of psychology and political science in an under-researched area; Access Information : This is a pre-copyedited, author-produced version of an article accepted for publication in Parliamentary Affairs following peer review. The version of record Matthew Flinders, Ashley Weinberg, James Weinberg, Marc Geddes, Richard Kwiatkowski, Governing under Pressure? The Mental Wellbeing of Politicians, Parliamentary Affairs, Volume 73, Issue 2, April 2020, Pages 253–273 is available online at: https://doi.org/10.1093/pa/gsy046