Leaders are accepted only when embodying features shared with followers

Evidence

What exactly is Freud telling us with this new account? Simply that whenever the need for a strong leader meets the individual only halfway, the leader will be accepted only if he presents, in a particularly marked fashion, features that he shares with those he is supposed to lead. In other words: the led are, to a considerable extent, in pari materia with the leader – that is to say, the latter becomes primus inter pares. — Ernesto Laclau, On Populist Reason, 153

Categorization

• DEEPTHINKING: The whole chapter takes a text usually read as legitimating the authoritarian chief and extracts from it a democratic, accountable, Gramscian-hegemonic model — reversing the received reading of Freud’s Group Psychology.
• XREF: connects to: Ideas spread only across terrain prepared by prior slow imitation — Ernesto Laclau, On Populist Reason, 117; Followers transform leader identity into commitment mainly through emotional attachment, not categorization — Roderick M. Kramer, Geoffrey J. Leonardelli, Robert W. Livingston, Social Cognition, Social Identity, and…, 1863; Leadership rests on reciprocal imitation, each following because others follow — Niklas Luhmann, Trust and Power, 738 (+10 more)

Broader Connections

• Followers are swayed most by leaders who embody the group’s valued traits. #corroborates (0.95) — Roderick M. Kramer, Geoffrey J. Leonardelli, Robert W. Livingston, Social Cognition, Social Identity, and…, 1762
• Leaders become authentically installed only through communion with the people #corroborates (0.80) — Paulo Freire, Pedagogy of the Oppressed, 422
• Leader appeal depends on leader-follower trait matching while performance reflects enduring traits. #expands (0.80) — John T. Jost and Jim Sidanius, Political Psychology, 1366
• Successful leaders rise when their own conflicts match their followers’ needs #exemplifies (0.78) — John T. Jost and Jim Sidanius, Political Psychology, 1288
• Followers transform leader identity into commitment mainly through emotional attachment, not categorization #qualifies (0.75) — Roderick M. Kramer, Geoffrey J. Leonardelli, Robert W. Livingston, Social Cognition, Social Identity, and…, 1863
• Leadership rests on reciprocal imitation, each following because others follow #expands (0.72) — Niklas Luhmann, Trust and Power, 738
• Authority, reputation, and leadership are generalized motives for accepting influence #qualifies (0.72)