Leaders, political behaviour and decision-making: the case of the former President of the Republic of Cyprus, George Vasiliou

The operational code is the most commonly used psychological/attitudinal approach applied by international relations scholars to the study of political leadership. Its basic assumption is that the belief system of a leader plays a decisive role in the way he/she understands a political event and the way he/she makes decisions. In this paper, I will first present the operational code of the former President of the Republic of Cyprus, George Vasiliou (1988–93), by using quantitative and qualitative analysis of primary and secondary sources. Then, three major policy decisions of Vasiliou over a period of time will be examined in order to determine if they have a direct linkage with his beliefs. If all three decisions have a consistency with his belief system, then we can conclude that his belief system played a decisive role.