Leadership and Followership: Evolutionary and Relational Perspectives
This paper examines leadership and followership from evolutionary, anthropological, and relational perspectives. Drawing on psychological and evolutionary literature, it defines leadership as a social influence process aimed at achieving common goals, and traces its origins across human hunter-gatherer societies and nonhuman primates. The paper outlines two major evolutionary theories — leadership as a byproduct of dominance and leadership as an adaptive trait — before examining relationship-based approaches that highlight the follower's often-overlooked role. It concludes by arguing that effective followership is a prerequisite for strong leadership and that future organizational success depends on developing capable followers alongside capable leaders.
- Introduction to Leadership and Followership: Universal nature and origins of leadership behavior
- Definitions, Assumptions, and Framework: Psychological and social definitions of leadership and followership
- Anthropological and Nonhuman Evidence: Cross-species and historical evidence for leader-follower dynamics
- Evolutionary Theories of Leadership: Dominance byproduct and trait-based evolutionary theories
- Leader and Follower: A Relationship-Based Approach: Leader-member exchange and mutual relational value
- Followership as a Prerequisite to Leadership: Recruiting and developing effective organizational followers
- The Importance of Effective Followers: Follower quality as key to future organizational success
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What makes this paper effective
- It synthesizes multiple theoretical traditions — evolutionary biology, social psychology, and organizational behavior — into a coherent argument about the origins and nature of leadership.
- The paper uses concrete cross-species examples (baboons, chimpanzees, migratory birds) to ground abstract evolutionary claims, making the argument more accessible and persuasive.
- By closing with a discussion of followership as a prerequisite to leadership, the paper inverts conventional leadership-centric thinking and offers a fresh organizational insight.
Key academic technique demonstrated
The paper demonstrates the technique of comparative analysis across disciplines — drawing on zoology, evolutionary theory, psychology, and management studies to build a multi-layered definition of leadership. Rather than accepting a single framework, it evaluates competing theories (byproduct dominance vs. adaptive leadership) and highlights the limitations of each, showing critical engagement with the literature.
Structure breakdown
The paper opens with a broad, cross-disciplinary introduction to leadership before narrowing into definitions and theoretical assumptions. It then marshals anthropological and animal behavior evidence to support evolutionary claims, surveys two competing evolutionary theories, pivots to a relational leader-follower model, and ends with a practical argument for investing in follower development. This funnel structure moves from universal patterns to organizational application.
Introduction to Leadership and Followership
In his award-winning and influential book, James McGregor Burns wrote that "leadership is one of the least understood and most observed phenomena." According to a social and psychosocial study, a leader-follower framework establishes spontaneously even when groups are supposed to be leaderless (Edge, 2020). Whenever there is a group of people, a leader-follower relationship develops naturally. As a result, multiple experts have concluded that leadership is universal human behavior (Van Vugt, 2006). Evolutionary scientists have also had a standing interest in leadership (Winston & Patterson, 2006). To zoologists, leadership is the simple act of leading other group members while moving from one point to another (Northouse, 2021). Several evolutionary researchers consider group movement — for instance, toward new feeding grounds or waterholes — a classic leadership challenge. Within society, leadership is usually considered an inherent individual phenomenon (Bennis, 2001).
Definitions, Assumptions, and Framework
Various psychological bodies of literature have defined leadership in several significant ways. Broadly, leadership can be defined as the influence processes directed toward achieving a mutual target (Van Vugt, 2006). Leadership can also be considered a social process in which interacting persons coordinate their activities to attain common goals (Edge, 2020). According to this perspective, leadership cannot be studied without evaluating the desires and needs of followers (Northouse, 2021). Within psychological literature, questions concerning the origins of followership are not commonly asked (Winston & Patterson, 2006). However, they are vital in evolutionary analysis. Even though psychological literature usually assumes that followers' and leaders' goals are identical, an evolutionary perspective argues this is an unwarranted assumption (Van Vugt, 2006). For instance, even humans — members of highly social species — repeatedly experience conflicts of interest as they pursue individual aims.
Leadership can also be described as a quantitative trait. Everyone can lead to some degree, but personal differences exist in the propensity to lead (Van Vugt, 2006). Some research studies have also claimed that leadership is a function of the situation, suggesting that anyone could potentially be a leader (Winston & Patterson, 2006). When leadership is viewed as a social influence strategy, an evolutionary analysis is compatible with both state and trait explanations of leadership.
A leader must recognize the importance and impact of audiences outside the organization and present the organization to those external audiences so they have a precise image of its goals and purpose (Winston & Patterson, 2006). Through every leader-follower-audience interaction, a leader demonstrates commitment to values such as concern for others, controlled discipline, humility, mercy, pursuit of the organization's best interests, and the maintenance of internal peace (Winston & Patterson, 2006).
A leader is also one or more people who influence, select, train, and equip followers with dynamic skills, abilities, and gifts (Winston & Patterson, 2006). A leader shifts followers' focus toward the organization's objectives and mission, motivating followers to willingly and enthusiastically expend emotional, physical, and spiritual energy in a combined effort to achieve those goals (Van Vugt, 2006). Such influence can be attained through effective and humble communication — conveying a prophetic vision of the future in terms that resonate with followers' values and beliefs in a manner that allows followers to internalize and translate that vision into present-day action.
During this process, a leader communicates a vision that differs from the organization's current state, drawing on intuition, insight, critical thinking, persuasive rhetoric, and interpersonal communication (Winston & Patterson, 2006). A leader pursues this through ethical means and strives for the greater good of followers, such that followers are better off as a result of their interaction with the leader (Van Vugt, 2006). Moreover, a leader can simultaneously pursue personal renewal, growth, mental stamina, spiritual regeneration, and emotional and physical well-being through follower-leader interactions.
Anthropological and Nonhuman Evidence
The evolutionary claim is grounded in the assumption that followership and leadership co-evolved in humans and other social species, since assuming such roles under appropriate circumstances would have been adaptive (Edge, 2020). As a result, examples of leadership would be found across cultures and throughout human history (Van Vugt, 2006). Throughout evolutionary history, humans were organized into small hunter-gatherer communities (Northouse, 2021). Research findings indicate that even though hunter-gatherer societies lacked elected officials or institutional rulers, certain individuals were more likely to play a crucial role in the group's direction and decision-making (Winston & Patterson, 2006). Several such societies had an informal leader — a "Big Man" — a physically strong, warrior-like figure who enjoyed greater influence over the group's course of action.
Primates are also known to engage in leader-follower relationships similar to those of humans (Edge, 2020). For example, when baboons travel, an older male takes the lead by moving a few meters ahead of the group toward his preferred destination; others then follow in the same direction as another portion of the troop falls in line (Van Vugt, 2006). Migratory social species have also exhibited this pattern, including migrating birds, buffalo, and deer (Winston & Patterson, 2006).
Leadership has also been observed in response to aggression within groups. In De Waal's 1996 study, chimpanzee behavior was observed, and on one occasion the animals displayed clear leadership-followership dynamics while defending their territory (Van Vugt, 2006). Because these patterns closely resemble the leader-follower relationship in humans, a similar underlying principle is presumed to be at work.
References
Bennis, W. (2001). The end of leadership: Exemplary leadership is impossible without full inclusion, initiatives, and cooperation of followers. In W. E. Rosenbach & R. L. Taylor, Contemporary Issues in Leadership (pp. 247–260).
Edge, L. Historical reflections on the value of followership.
Northouse, P. G. (2021). Leadership: Theory and practice. Sage Publications.
Van Vugt, M. (2006). Evolutionary origins of leadership and followership. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 10(4), 354–371.
Winston, B. E., & Patterson, K. (2006). An integrative definition of leadership. International Journal of Leadership Studies, 1(2), 6–66.
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