It is a characteristic of every group whether small or big to have a leader. The phenomenon of leadership is evidenced in the play of children, in the games of adults, in trade unions in an industry and in several other situations. The moral is that groups need leaders if they are to pull together as a team.
How leadership evolves has been a controversial problem and students of human affairs inspite of their efforts to evaluate the role of leaders in group behaviour, have not come to any final agreement.
Leaders are either necessary or history is made by them or leaders are merely the expression of popular needs. The first view is called the “leader principle” or the “great-man theory” of history. It holds that people drift along in aimless confusion until a gifted leader assumes command and tells them what to do. He may accomplish social change for good or bad, but the truth is that he appears to accomplish much more than he actually does.
For example, Hitler is said to have killed millions of people, but literally speaking, he himself did not kill them and yet he is credited with such events as killing and conquering. The second view is the sociological view.
It says that history makes or selects the man, and not vice versa. Social and cultural developments are thought to follow their own laws, and the presence of a particular person as leader is purely coincidental.
For example, if a society is at war, a peaceful leader will not be tolerated; in other words, every leader has to follow the needs of the group. In brief, sometimes the leader acquires the leadership influence as a result of his assigned role in an already structured group according to the needs of the group. Sometimes, the group has no predetermined structure and the leader emerges from the group.
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