Try to Rule Fairly and You'll Be Overthrown

CGP Grey · 26M views · 2016-10-24 · 18:13

Open on YouTube ↗

If playback is restricted in your region, try opening the original video. Use Mark watched to add it to your marked videos.

Overview

CGP Grey's animated adaptation of The Dictator's Handbook, explaining how rulers stay in power by keeping a small group of key supporters happy rather than ruling fairly. It lays out selectorate theory and how resources shape regimes.

On Hacker News

HN treats it as the standard short summary of how power and political incentives work, applied to governments, companies and workplaces.

Recommended by 15 HN people across 15 months · HN mentions 2016–2025

Topics

Politics & history (other)World history Management, leadership & organizations

What people said

fredley · 2019-11 · Strong recommendation
An excellent primer on modes of Government, how they arise, and how this perpetuate is this CGP Grey video, Rules for Rulers : [VIDEO]
Read the original HN comment ↗

mtgx · 2018-09 · Strong recommendation
I feel like this comment thread needs a link to CGP Grey's excellent Rules for Rulers video, too: [VIDEO]
Read the original HN comment ↗

abandonliberty · 2018-07 · Strong recommendation
Negative? It's how the world works. Those in resource-driven countries enjoy very little comfort, because you don't need very comfortable/educated people to extract resources. Our economies are more based on knowledge, so we get better lives. CGPGrey's rules for rulers is a very good outline of this and other related topics: [VIDEO]
Read the original HN comment ↗

Sources

Video by CGP Grey, played through YouTube.

HN Library · Source license

Data and selection notes

HN summaries and labels may contain AI errors. HN dates refer to discussions, not video publication.

HN Library: HackerTube export (2026-10-31) and open-index/hacker-news. Upstream summaries and classifications may contain AI errors.

Views, duration and playback status refresh separately from the published catalog. When an update fails, existing data remains visible.

Selection checks

SaaS & AI candidates: Topic keywords do not match
Editor-approved picks: Editorial review is required

Rule matches identify candidates. They do not guarantee video quality or financial results.

About the library and its sources