Professional Pathways to the Presidency

During presidential elections a quadrennial debate emerges, wherein candidates lay claim to qualification for the presidency based on their prior professional experiences. Usually this entails invoking the legacy of one of the great presidents, who followed the same trajectory to the White House. Missing from this debate is a systematic analysis of how the different job experiences prepared the population of all presidents for service. For each of the greats who followed a particular pathway to the presidency there is at least one failure who shared the pathway. This book takes both a quantitative and descriptive approach to evaluate all the presidents systematically in order to discuss how prior professional experiences influence presidential performances.

Theresa Marchant-Shapiro is Assistant Professor of Political Science at Southern Connecticut State University, USA. She received her Ph.D. in political science from the University of Chicago, USA. She teaches courses in leadership, mass political behavior, and methods at Southern Connecticut State University, USA. She recently published Statistics for Political Analysis. Her current research addresses how the roles of leaders change in the context of overlapping organizations.

1. Political Pathways to the Presidency

2. Generally Popular: Military Experience

3. Heir Apparent: Vice Presidents

4. Washington Insiders: Members of Congress

5. From the Governor's Mansion to the White House: Governors

6. A Little Something Extra: National Appointees

7. The Business of the Presidency: Non-Political Experience

8. Modeling Greatness: Evaluating the Pathways to the Presidency