Blackwell Reference Online

Extract

This commonplace term can be defined quite simply as the quality permitting one person to command others. This implies that leadership is, above all, a mutual relationship between leader and led, individual and group. The term also suggests action: the leader and the group do something together. Finally, leadership is clearly a relation based on consent, not coercion – the robber holding a gun at one's back is not one's leader. It follows, then, that an investigation of leadership requires the insights of social and psychological theory, and is a prerequisite for a full appreciation of the ways in which power is held, legitimized and wielded. However, despite (or perhaps because of) the apparent simplicity and fertility of the basic definitional framework, the study of leadership, though voluminous, has been marked by great controversy and little agreement – so much so that one well-known commentator concluded despairingly that ‘the concept of leadership, like that of general intelligence, has largely lost its value for the social sciences’ (Gibb, 1968, p. 91). Nonetheless, the topic continues to fascinate social thinkers, and has stimulated two rival modes of approach. The classic studies of leadership focused primarily on the personalities of great men, portraying them as unique and heroic figures capable of transforming their disciples through sheer force of will. Examples ... log in or subscribe to read full text