Leadership

Update: This post is prompted by Arun Shourie's latest book : The Parliamentary System


Ten days ago (The incoherent soliloquy)

For some time I have been thinking about leadership, and I thought up of something.
However it is time to sleep, so may tomorrow, or may be not, anyway bonne nuit.

The present day (The post continues ... )

1. I play rather footloose with economics and genetics, if I am incorrect don't hurt me.

2. I believe that leadership can not be a profession. I also believe that there can not be a satisfactory monetary compensation for leadership (based on Adam Smith's 4 criteria for compensation for work).

First some background is in order.The success of a polity and by extension society is dependant on nature of its leadership.Now even a fleeting pursual of Indian story should convince that India has been hampered by a want of effective leadership. Here I should clarify that by effective leadership I just do not mean the control it wields on polity, but also its direction.

From above importance of leadership is obvious, which raises the question whether there are ways to ensure a competent Indian leadership.


Most of the proposals have monetary incentive as the solution. I don't find it persuasive, for the reasons stated here and here, however I do think that compensation (or to be precise lack of it) may act as disincentive.

Which is the reason I thought that perhaps an understanding of evolution of leadership as a social trait may help us gain insight into the problem.

Now almost all animal societies are organized hierarchy with the individual at top having the control over the group, the nature of control and hierarchy ultimately decided by how various instincts,broadly categorized as selfish or altruist for social animals, are resolved. Here it must be kept into mind that ultimately these instincts are controlled by genetic makeup. The key point here is almost all societies involves some or other form of reciprocal altruism or co-operation.

Seen from point of view described above, authority or leadership has a social utility. Authority has two aspects. First is by exerting control, stability and order is maintained in a hierarchical society. This can be more or less observed in all societies. Here it should be kept in mind that authority may depend on various criteria, for example while in Elephant society it is the experience which counts, for Lion it is the strength.

Of more interest to us, is the second aspect of the leadership, usually observed in pack hunters , directing the actions of group to achieve a particular objective. In other words, leader is the motive force behind the group.Since human has evolved as a pack hunter, therefore we can evaluate the leadership in human society in terms of pack behaviour.
Now here it is crucial to understand while authority has a social utility, it also benefits the individual and this is the initiative for leadership for animal hierarchy.

However taken with premises of the earlier posts , it turns out there is no individual incentive in a democratic system for leadership, what is worse there is a strong incentive for misuse of authority and subversion of system for own profit. In effect leadership becomes act of altruism.
That there is no incentive for leadership, is a rather depressing conclusion.

This is not to say that voluntary altruism is absent, far from it. However altruism is a potent force only in emergency situations. Which is why India was enslaved, we witnessed supreme sacrifice of Mahatama Gandhi, Bhagat Singh and Subhash Chandra Bose. However we can not depend on extraordinary altruism in ordinary day to day life, and therefore can not expect robust political or social institutions on altruism.

Neither is discarding democracy any solution. It is true that a hierarchical polity may be a more natural state of things, it is certainly not a desirable one. First, such polities with the power struggle among different groups will be inherently weaker and anarchic than democratic ones.

Second, an asymmetry of power means abuse and exploitation of weaker groups both in the sense of economic as well as social, in fact it will be worse than the asymmetry in animal societies because our social institutions vest the authority with monopoly of power, which is not the case in animal societies.

Here it should also be understood that it is instinctive for humans to respond to leadership and authority. While it is desirable that individuals are informed to participate in social arbitration, the incentives for such a behavior are weaker, a case of rational ignorance. In contrast, humans response to leadership is much stronger. In other words, there are stars and there are groupies and both need each other.

The unpalatable conclusion that I can draw is the problem of leadership doesn't have any perfect solution. However we can take measures which do affect the leadership in long term.

One is to establish concept of civic virtue as a cornerstone of society, related also promote ownership of society through concept of citizen, and hook up allegiance to community with individual identity.
Second is to ensure that magnitude of altruism that is required remains minimal, which implies that power must be as decentralized as particular circumstances permit.

Most important is to recognize that leaders are highly ambitious and motivated individuals, therefore the best way to improve the quality of leadership is to create a culture of excellence, re-orient the world view of society and its polity such that success is valued, and where ambition is a virtue not a vice. Where strength and drive is something which is cherished and not shirked.

We have, through a combination of lacunae and erroneous beliefs lead us into a state where the hallmark of prevalent culture is mediocrity and unabashed imitation, and a society which has morbid reverence bordering on cult-worship for emasculated.

This also means we have to put an end to the "politicians are our servants" tripe. No they are not. They are leaders, they wield the authority because of their ambition and drive. I find such delusion most annoying.

As this country, which is a political union of eternal conscious, strives towards a better the only entity which can stop her is her people. We can not fail our quest for which divine has appointed us.