Sir Keir Starmer: Character, leadership and the politics of perception
By Anthony Kila
As we have often observed on these pages, most political careers end in tears.
Some end in scandal. Some in humiliation. Some in irrelevance. A fortunate few end in applause and gratitude. Yet even among the latter, there is usually a final reckoning, the moment when the applause fades, the crowds disperse, and a leader realises that power is ultimately rented, not owned.
It is hardly surprising, therefore, that Sir Keir Starmer’s premiership should end with a speech in which he struggled to hold back tears as he paid tribute to his family during a dramatic political moment. Politics, after all, is one of the few professions in which a person can spend years climbing a mountain only to discover that the summit is merely the beginning of another ascent.
For readers offshore, the key lesson isn’t that Sir Keir Starmer fell; leaders fall regularly. The crucial point is how he fell, and perhaps more significantly, the story constructed around him.
Leadership rarely collapses because of a single event; more often, it is undermined by a narrative. Sometimes that narrative is justified, sometimes exaggerated, and occasionally it only loosely reflects reality.
Once a story about you gains traction, it creates a political reality of its own. The perception others have of you can become more powerful than your actions. Similarly, the story surrounding your leadership can overshadow the leadership itself. This, perhaps, is the most important takeaway from Sir Keir Starmer’s rise and fall.
The first thing to note is that nothing about his departure was particularly mysterious. Nothing happened that could not have been anticipated. Nothing occurred that lay beyond the imagination of informed observers. If anything, the remarkable thing is how predictable the entire process was. This predictability is one of the great strengths of mature democratic systems.
In functioning democracies, leaders rarely vanish overnight. Their decline is usually evident long before their departure. Poll numbers begin to soften. Party members grow restless. Journalists become less deferential. Supporters lose enthusiasm. Allies begin to position themselves for a future beyond the current leadership.
Criticism begins privately, and then it turns public. Soon, everyone acts as if they predicted the outcome from the start. Although this process can be uncomfortable, it is often transparent, and transparency promotes accountability.
This lesson is particularly valuable for readers outside the Westminster-style of government. Consider comparing the process that led to Sir Keir Starmer’s downfall with how leaders rise, last, or leave in your own country.
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How readily can people assess their leaders’ performance? How openly can party members challenge those in power? How predictable are leadership changes? How much do institutions influence these transitions compared with individual personalities?
These questions reveal more about a political system’s health than many constitutional frameworks.
Accountability alone, however, does not tell the full story of Starmer’s fall; ambition is a valuable complement. Human ambition is one of the most powerful forces in politics, capable of being both constructive and destructive. Let’s face it, without ambition, there would be no reformers, innovators, great public servants, or political renewal, and society would stagnate.
Ambition, however, can also cause political tragedies. Politics often resembles Shakespeare’s plays more than economics. Leaders are not always defeated by opponents; more often, they are undermined by allies, weakened by colleagues, or challenged by those who believe they can do better. Westminster has long been a breeding ground for such ambitions.
The British Parliament is filled with talented individuals, many of whom believe they should become Prime Minister. Sometimes they are right; most times they are wrong. Politics rarely offers a way to test these claims before the race begins.
Some of the people who have been considered to succeed Starmer may have more charisma, others may connect better with party activists, and some may have stronger support among parliamentarians. However, it’s natural to wonder how much stronger Labour and the country could have been if more energy had been devoted to collective success rather than personal ambition.
Ultimately, Westminster has never mistaken itself for a monastery. Ambition exists there as naturally as pigeons in Trafalgar Square. However, ambition alone doesn’t explain why Sir Keir Starmer’s story became so damaging. The key lies in an often-overlooked distinction in modern politics: the difference between character, competence, charisma, and reputation. These qualities are not identical.
A leader might have competence without charisma, or charisma without competence. Similarly, someone can have strong character but poor communication skills, or weak character but excellent public relations. The public often conflates these qualities because they see them through the same screen, headline, or speech. Yet, history shows they are fundamentally different.
A notable aspect of modern politics is that leaders are often judged more by the narratives surrounding them than by their achievements.
Sir Keir Starmer might have been an uninspiring Prime Minister, possibly struggling to build emotional connections with voters and lacking the natural political flair of some predecessors. He certainly made errors.
However, the gap between his performance and his public image warrants serious analysis. Critics sometimes suggest Britain faced two years of continuous disaster, but the reality is more nuanced. The economy remained stable, government functions continued, and reforms progressed. Successful efforts were made to improve NHS waiting times, labour conditions, rail policy, healthcare, and social welfare. Disagreeing with these policies is valid, some of us voters, yet such disagreement should not lead to blindness or forgetfulness.
Many of Starmer’s initiatives align with the programme that secured Labour’s electoral support. His record is also more favourable than that of some recent prime ministers, whose reputations haven’t faced as much criticism. This doesn’t imply Starmer was an outstanding Prime Minister; rather, it highlights that reality is often more complex than political narratives suggest.
Perhaps his greatest political mistake was allowing others to define and describe him.
Every leader has to deal with two simultaneous challenges. The first is managing governance, which involves dealing with reality. The second is shaping perception, which involves how others see it.
Many leaders focus solely on governance and overlook the importance of explaining what their actions mean. They believe results will speak for themselves, but achievements usually need advocates. Success is rooted in interpretation, narrative, and storytelling. A common tragedy among leaders isn’t failure itself, but the failure to define their identity before others do. They neglect to tell their story, allowing others to shape it for them.
In politics, the leader who effectively narrates their story often gains the upper hand.
Long before a leader falls, they often lose control over the narrative about their tenure. Once this happens, recovering credibility becomes extremely challenging.
A success that is poorly communicated disappears from public view, while a visible mistake risks becoming defining. Perception begins to overshadow reality, and the story gains strength beyond the facts. This highlights the importance of character, clarity, and sound judgment.
Leadership isn’t just about the decisions made; it also depends on how those decisions are perceived, communicated, and remembered. Leadership begins before decisions are taken and endures long after their implementation.
Successes and failures alike are often quietly established, with outcomes revealing underlying issues over time. The impact of decisions often outlasts their immediate moment, and leadership effects linger long after a leader departs. A bad decision may endure for decades, whereas a wise one can benefit many generations. Therefore, leadership requires more than intelligence; it demands judgement, discipline, self-awareness, and humility, recognising that public office is not only about effective governance but also about making governance visible, understandable, and memorable.
Perhaps that’s why one of the most lasting lines in political literature remains so impactful centuries after it was first made: “The evil that men do lives after them; the good is often interred with their bones.”
This quote endures because it exposes a harsh truth about public perception. Mistakes attract headlines. Successes are reduced to footnotes. Failures become part of folklore. Achievements are summarised in statistics. The negative is vividly remembered, while the positive often goes unnoticed in reports, policy papers, and forgotten speeches.
Sir Keir Starmer’s political journey might exemplify this pattern. His mistakes will be widely discussed, his successes more quietly acknowledged, and his failures may overshadow his accomplishments. Such is politics. Such is public memory.
Yet for students of leadership, governance, and public life, the deeper lesson lies elsewhere.
The ultimate lesson from Sir Keir Starmer’s rise and fall is not that leaders must avoid mistakes. That is impossible. It is that leaders must never surrender ownership of their story. Once others begin to define you, they begin to govern your reputation. And reputation, once lost, is often harder to recover than power itself.
In politics, reality matters, and perception matters too. But perception often arrives first and lingers longest. And when history finally renders its verdict, it is frequently the story others told about a leader, not the leader’s own story, that survives.
- Anthony Kila is the author of “Crucial Cs Around D: The Disciplines of Decision-Making and Leadership.” He is a Jean Monnet Professor of Strategy and Development at the Commonwealth Institute of Advanced and Professional Studies (CIAPS). He is also the Pro-Chancellor and Chairman of the Governing Council of The Michael and Cecilia Ibru University (MCIU). You can join him on X at @anthonykila to continue the conversation.
