What is the relationship between a personalistic style of government and presidential approval? And, to what extent the relationships between evaluations of the economy, partisanship and presidential approval are conditioned by a personalistic government style? We answer these questions using survey data and contextual information on government style. Data on government style comes from an original measure designed to capture this variable. Results suggest: Although all personalistic leaders establish an emotional link with people, some of them complement this link with authoritarian practices. There is a positive link between personalistic government style and presidential approval. Personalistic government style plays a conditional role as it boosts the effect of sociotropic evaluations on presidential approval.