image management

"A large part of the image management of Mr Modi is about making sure that he's never associated with a negative outcome that can be pinned on somebody else or some other factors," says Mr Sircar.

Trump's faith is not in God, but that bellicosity and image management can overcome anything: Democracy, his body odor, people noticing he can barely read.

Which is to say that even by the standards of modern image management, Melania Trump’s public persona is unusually untethered to any ideas or beliefs that are actually personal—although there may be some Freudian displacement at work in her advocacy for more dignified online behavior, and higher standards of evidence and sourcing in public discourse.

All of these exhibitions leave one feeling slightly guilty: The curators try to anatomize how power works, the strategies of mythmaking and image management, but the material on view is so seductive one forgets the larger intellectual construct.

The actor's appearance on "The Daily Show with Trevor Noah" is a masterstroke in image management, in which he asks the audience to empathize with him, and others, by reminding them that they have no idea what strangers are going through.