Like other forms of leadership, we know that charismatic leadership concerns leaders, followers, and situations. Charismatic leaders have specific traits and demonstrate certain behaviors that influence their followers. Some of these traits would include dominance, a strong desire to influence others, and self-confidence, while the behaviors would include such things as appearing competent to followers, communicating high expectations to followers, and articulating ideological goals that have moral overtones (PSU WC, 2015). Charisma is something we tend to look for in leaders, in fact, I’d imagine it’d be difficult for most people to name a few famous leaders who did not exude some level of charisma.
The problem with charismatic leadership comes when that leader has other traits or characteristics that can pair with their charisma to have a dark side. The goal of charismatic leadership is to have followers react in certain ways. With charismatic leadership it’s common to see followers trust the leader’s ideology, have similar beliefs as the leader, and have unquestioning acceptance of the leader (PSU WC, 2015). For every Martin Luther King Jr., who had good and noble intentions, you have a charismatic leader such as Jim Jones who fueled by his narcissistic personality, deceived and abused his trusting follower’s right up until their unfortunate mass suicide in the late 1970s.
Charismatic leaders who are well intentioned, ethical, and create a positive shared vision can basically be considered transformational leaders (PSU WC, 2015). Jones actually began his preaching career with some very noble intentions, for example, he promoted racial equality in his church at a time when that wasn’t widely common, and he had this vision of a peaceful utopia. When some negative traits begin to show however, you can see where this might begin to go in the wrong direction. As Jones’ narcissism began to prevail, it’s easy to how ones self-confidence can become overwhelming. The self-absorption and need for admiration can transform their previous good intentions into the concern for oneself as opposed to the group (changingminds.org). Such a high sense of self-belief can lead one to feel infallible, and in turn they can lead their followers down a dangerous road.
Consider the reactions I mentioned earlier that followers can have to charismatic leadership. They included things like trust in the leader’s ideology and unquestioning acceptance of the leader. Now think how horrifying those types of reactions can be when the leader doesn’t necessarily have great intentions. There became a point where Jones began to identify himself as God, and he would display the ability the resurrect people from the dead (The Peoples Temple…). Clearly, we don’t actually think Jones resurrected anyone from the dead. It’s more logical that a follower pretended to be dead, and came back to life once Jones “healed” them. This follower knows Jones isn’t actually reviving them, but they have an unquestionable trust of Jones and his ideology. So if they take part in this one minor deception, it will only strengthen the faith of the other followers. They truly think they’re taking part in deceit for the greater good of the group.
Now fast forward to the end, where Jones led a group of over 900 to drink the poison that led to their death. You can easily make the connection between Jones’ charismatic leadership style, and the decision of so many of his followers to commit suicide upon his order. They had complete faith in him, and for the most part, saw no reason to question his demands. The people of Jonestown aren’t alone in being the victims of a charismatic leader, but they’re an excellent reminder to be aware of the potential dangers that can come with charismatic leadership.
Here’s how… (n.d.). Retrieved November 13, 2015, from http://www.changingminds.org/
Kinsolving, L. (n.d.). The People’s Temple and Maxine Harpe. Retrieved November 14, 2015, from http://jonestown.sdsu.edu/?page_id=14086
Pennsylvania State University World Campus (2015). PSYCH 485 Lesson 10: Transformational Leadership. Retrieved from https://courses.worldcampus.psu.edu/fa15/psych485/001/toc.html
It is always important to remember that leadership has it’s dark sides. I would think that most of the dark intentions can be attributed to the emotions and psychological aspects of the leader. But I think that it is also important to remember the types of followers in the charismatic leadership group. These people are susceptible to the leaders ability to link the follower identity to the collective identity of the organization. (Penn State, 2015) These people follow with unquestioning trust for the leaders goals. (Penn State, 2015) When we are talking about the dark side of charismatic leadership, this type of follower can be dangerous to themselves or others. These followers fuel the negative personality traits of charismatic leaders and further perpetuate issues the group may encounter. This raises the question, is it all the dark-leader’s fault or do the followers also contribute to misfortune?
We can see this in a number of examples; Adolf Hitler, Che Guevara, and Julius Caesar all of which were highly successful through the manipulation of their followers. And in effect their dedicated followers influenced and further promoted the leaders negative qualities through the trust, unquestioning acceptance, expressions of warmth and similar beliefs. So while I agree with your Jonestown example, I wonder if all the people are victims? The leader and followers all contribute to the group and the leader is glorified by the followers. The negative attributes of a charismatic leader’s personality can surely become dangerous if the situation is generative.
I agree that to understand and be aware of the downfalls to charismatic leadership is important. I also think it is important to be able to identify when the group of followers are contributing and providing further power to the leader in certain situations. As you stated a charismatic leader can be a positive or negative leadership style and should be, in my opinion, proceeded with caution as a follower of such.
Works Cited
Penn State University Course Creator.(2015). Lesson 10:Transformational Leadership.
Retrieved from https://courses.worldcampus.psu.edu/fa15/psych485/001/content/10_lesson/07_page.html