Quotes from Bruce Bueno de Mesquita

There is an interesting interplay between power corrupting and corruption empowering. The causality does not go one way.

There are lots of people shaping decisions, and so if we want to predict correctly, we have to pay attention to everybody who is trying to shape the outcome, not just the people at the pinnacle of the decision-making pyramid.

I'm not engaged in predicting random number generators. I actually get phone calls from people who want to know what lottery numbers are going to win. I don't have a clue.

I think almost all strategic problems could at least be improved upon if people would do more careful game-theoretic analysis. The reason game theory works in predicting is because people intuit how to behave game-theoretically.

We probably could more successfully resolve the North Korean nuclear threat through game-theoretic reasoning. We could successfully resolve what American leaders seem to perceive as an Iranian nuclear threat through game-theoretic reasoning.

Pretty much, you point to a problem and good reasoning about why people are doing what they are doing and what constraints they face in terms of how others will behave, and you're looking at a problem that could be improved upon by game-theoretic reasoning.

If you're running a dictatorship, you don't really have to worry about the welfare or the property rights of the ordinary citizen. Only the people who keep you in power, a very small group, matter.

In order to predict effectively, we need to use science. And the reason that we need to use science is because then we can reproduce what we're doing; it's not just wisdom or guesswork. And if we can predict, then we can engineer the future.

I'm not an Iran expert.

Leaders never hesitate to miscount or destroy ballots. Coming to office and staying in office are the most important things in politics. And candidates who aren't willing to cheat are typically beaten by those who are. Since

Paying supporters, not good governance or representing the general will, is the essence of ruling. Buying loyalty is particularly difficult

There is never a point in showing your hand before you have to; that is just a way to ensure giving the game away.

The world of politics is dictated by rules.

Every type of politics could be addressed from the point of view of leaders trying to survive.

It's always better for a ruler to determine who eats than it is to have a larger pie from which the people can feed themselves.

Democracies are not lucky. They do not attract civic-minded leaders by chance. Rather, they attract survival-oriented leaders who understand that, given their dependence on many essentials, they can only come to and stay in power if they figure out the right basket of public goods to provide.

This is the essential lesson of politics: in the end ruling is the objective, not ruling well.

The three most important characteristics of a coalition are: (1) Loyalty; (2) Loyalty; (3) Loyalty.

For autocrats, money spent on people—like infants and little children—who are years away from contributing to the economy is money wasted. Resources should instead be focused on those who help the ruler stay in power now, not those who might be valuable in the distant future.

There's nothing better than a rigged election, so long as you're the one rigging it.

After all, our experience tends to confirm that on one end of the political spectrum we have autocrats and tyrants—horrible, selfish thugs who occasionally stray into psychopathology. On the other end, we have democrats—elected representatives, presidents, and prime ministers who are the benevolent guardians of freedom. Leaders from these two worlds, we assure ourselves, must be worlds apart! It's a convenient fiction, but a fiction nonetheless.

Companies maintain lively web sites to put their view across but entrepreneur-owners have not stepped forward to do the same to help organize the mass of little owners and to provide a way for them to share views. Sure, there are bloggers writing about anything and everything, but there don't seem to be shareholder-controlled sites to exchange thoughts and ideas about a company that participants own in common.

The difference between doing a good job and doing a lousy job is driven by how many people a leader has to keep happy.

Borrowing is a wonderful thing for leaders. They get to spend the money to make their supporters happy today, and, if they are sensible, set some aside for themselves. Unless they are fortunate enough to survive in office for a really long time, repaying today's loan will be another leader's problem. Autocratic leaders borrow as much as they can, and democratic leaders are enthusiastic borrowers as well.