Leader. It’s hard to get away from the word. There are leadership groups in schools, a new national college of leadership, a leadership programme for heads and leadership qualities drawn up in models of excellence laid down by government.
The Greeks believed in leaders. All that nonsense about the place being the cradle of democracy ignores the fact that women and slaves were excluded from the process, even in city states that decided matters by vote - and most did not. The Greeks coined the word aristocracy - rule by the best - to describe the way they usually ran things. And a system based on birth and privilege ran happily for the next 2,000 years.
The year 1789 jolted the European aristocracy out of its reverie, but the idea of leadership by right persisted well into the 20th century.
Leaders had special qualities - they were lions or foxes compared with society’s sheep. First Mussolini then Hitler adopted the idea with enthusiasm. Fuehrer means leader. Both dictators could command loyalty and respect. They had charisma. The German sociologist Max Weber said that charismatic leaders could control followers by direct appeal to the emotions. Not all charismatic leadership is evil. Jesus had charisma, as did Alexander the Great, Nelson and Churchill.
Weber argued that exceptional people in modest positions could exert charisma; he specifically cited teachers.
But academics have argued that charismatic leadership has no real place in modern organisations. It’s too individual, too disruptive. When the leader dies or moves on, the organisation concerned is literally left bereft.
Some argue that the current leadership vogue is simply a desire to dress managerialism in acceptable clothes. Others say that society looks at exceptional leaders and fondly imagines that these personal qualities can be bottled and marketed. Either way, leadership is fashionable again.
I’m assured that it doesn’t have to involve invading Poland.
