Having failed to convince the US of the need to prepare for war with Adolf Hitler’s Germany, Franklin Roosevelt quipped: “It is a terrible thing to look over your shoulder when you are trying to lead – and to find no one there.”

The US presidency sounds far more powerful than it usually is. Scholars, journalists and presidents routinely exaggerate its potency. In spite of his many wiles, FDR failed to cure America of its isolationism. It was Imperial Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941 that eventually snapped it out of its reverie.

Joseph Nye’s slim volume on presidential leadership offers an elegant antidote to many of the myths. The Harvard scholar – and frequent White House adviser – set out to rank which US presidents had the biggest impact on the country’s rise.