Having taught and conducted research on psychopathology for over 25 years, and nearly as many providing clinical supervision, it’s pretty clear to me that there is no 'wisdom' (nor adaptive, successful aspects) in pathology, including psychopathy. And personality pathology fundamentally involves disturbance in self (identity &/or direction) and interpersonal (empathy, intimacy) functioning, and thus it is difficult to imagine how a psychopathic person within most institutions can go on for very long before his/her dysfunction ‘infects’ the social climate. The nature of social systems within institutions are key as to how we deal with the psychopath. Transparency and accountability within the institutional system can shed light on and potentially put a halt to the psychopathic person, and without these, the psychopath can potentially survive, especially in ‘cut throat’ business climates. But will the psychopath thrive? I don’t think so… in a 2010 study we did of over 200 upper corporate personnel, among those scoring higher on the Psychopathy Checklist, not one was a president or CEO, and when we looked at their performance ratings, higher psychopathic traits were associated with worse overall performance and poor managerial effectiveness. Only a performance variable reflecting charisma was related to higher psychopathic traits. A recent study on hedge fund managers found psychopathic traits are associated with worse real-world outcomes in investment performance. So, persons with psychopathic traits don’t seem to ‘deliver the goods’ so to speak and thus we have to ask why they are allowed to persist in various institutions, maybe in some cases adored? I have to conclude that such institutions must be dysfunctional themselves.
Babiak, P., Neumann, C. S., & Hare, R. D. (2010). Corporate psychopathy: Talking the walk. Behavioral sciences & the law, 28(2), 174-193.
ten Brinke, L., Kish, A., & Keltner, D. (2018). Hedge fund managers with psychopathic tendencies make for worse investors. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 44(2), 214-223.
Babiak, P., Neumann, C. S., & Hare, R. D. (2010). Corporate psychopathy: Talking the walk. Behavioral sciences & the law, 28(2), 174-193.
ten Brinke, L., Kish, A., & Keltner, D. (2018). Hedge fund managers with psychopathic tendencies make for worse investors. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 44(2), 214-223.