This article presents the Dynamic Model of Psychopathy (DMP) and its theoretical framework. The DMP portrays the process behind the "mask of sanity" that Cleckley (1941) described, by conceptualizing the way in which shame contributes to dynamic shifts in extreme and conflicting experiences, strategies, and behaviors (narcissistic compensation) associated with basic needs for community and agency in psychopathic individuals. If the narcissistic compensation is sufficiently strong, the shame of the psychopathic individual is unconscious (demarcation for severe psychopathy characterized by grandiosity). As such, the DMP specifies the agreed-upon and loosely defined affective and interpersonal core of psychopathy, providing a framework for explaining, assessing, and treating this dynamic interplay of affective-interpersonal, conscious and unconscious states. The DMP further offers a causal perspective (lack of community and agency; attachment needs) for the development of psychopathy, and reveals the close bond between the vulnerability and the destructiveness of psychopathic individuals. Clinical observations and empirical studies support the DMP and its theoretical framework, constituting an integrated construct of psychopathy. Further validation of the DMP is, however, needed.