25 Concept of Power, Authority and Leadership

Indelha Khan

Table of content

 

  1. Learning outcome
  2. Introduction
  3. Authority and power
  4. Leadership
  5. Authority, power and leadership
  6. Summary

 

Learning Outcome

  •   Concept of Authority and its development over age
  •   Concept of Power and its development over age
  •   Concept of Leadership and its development over age
  •   Relation between Power, Authority and Leadership

 

Introduction

 

A society as defined in oxford dictionary is the community of people living in a particular country or region and having shared customs, laws, and organizations. This framework of society is shaped in a pyramidal system where in a particular person or faction takes care the regulatory affairs of the society. On a broader scale a country run by president or prime minster is aggregate of different societies. So for the organization of society there is should be people with authority, power and leadership. Sociologically authority and power are loosely differentiated and have been found to be overlapping mostly. By definition, power can be understood as the capability of a person to do certain thing whereas authority is power or right of a person to make decisions for an organization. However, a leader can have authority to exercise his powers or powers to demonstrate his authority.

 

AUTHORITY AND POWER

 

Max Weber, one of the eminent sociologists, defined power as the “probability that one actor within a social relationship will be in a position to carry out his own will despite resistance, regardless of the basis on which this probability rests.” Weber conferred, in his works, the concept of power is sociologically amorphous brought into act by an individual under demanding circumstances. On the other hand, Max Weber defined authority as the “probability that a command with a given content will be obeyed by a given group of persons.” Power and authority can be differentiated on the basis of stature of individual i.e. association of power is related to personal features of individual whereas association of authority is to social status of the individual. Power and authority can be exercised by an individual either in a positive or negative way. Adolf Hitler (1889-1945) can be looked upon as a tyrant ruler who implemented authority and power negatively whereas Akbar the Great (1542-1605) executed his power and authority positively.

 

Authority and power both are variable with milieu of the individual. A major has power and authority to command over a team of soldiers however not over entire battalion. A colonel has authority and power to question a major but later hasn’t. An individual can utilize his power and authority to manipulate people under his command to believe in his ideology. In a work group it’s the power of a manager to motivate his employee into doing some extra work but it’s his authority to suspend any one. Max Weber further terms authority as legitimate power. The fundamental characteristic of authority is domination and imposition of will by the man in power. The authority can only be exercised by an individual if he succeeds in motivating his people for submission to his commands. From here we can estimate the complexity in the concept of power and authority. These intricate overlapping domains of the concepts of power and authority have rendered sociologists in debate over years. From the works of Dhal, Weber and Dahrendorf power can be categorized as a subset of authority. For example as Dahl says that power is what A has on B if A has authority over B to persuade B in doing what otherwise B won’t do on his own. Stephen Lukes has beautifully debated through different views on power and tries to bring forth the concept of power as a phenomenon depending on the thinking of man in power. J. A coleman derives from Lukes’s understanding of power and quotes “power is one of those concepts which inevitably involve endless disputes about their proper uses on the part of users.” Coleman further takes reference from Edward Shils’s Tradition “wherever there is organization, there will be authority and authority will become enmeshed in traditions”. Michels proposed that authority can be defined as the ability, inborn or attained, for exercising dominance over a set of people. As repeatedly mentioned in this article, authority, Roberto Michels also holds that, is a manifestation of power and is dependent on the obedience of the followers. Coleman presents in his article the argument Robert Bierstedt who refers to authority as “sanctioned power, institutional power” and further argues against Michels’s view and claims that that “authority is not a capacity or innate. It is relational and exists even when it is not being explicitly exercised”. Power and authority can be distinguished as per Coleman on the basis of moral of individual in command. He exemplifies a manager who would try to control people by interfering in the private lives of his subordinates; hence questioning boundaries of that define authority and power. Albeit, the manager has authority over the defined assignments of his subordinates however when he trespasses into their lives he delegitimizes the authority into power.

 

So strolling through the concept of authority and power we will provide a sequential view on both. As per Dahl the concept of power and authority is not naïve but has been discussed since the time of Pluto and Aristotle. He further argues that since authority and power have synonyms in every language so it can be said that the concept of both exist in every community. It was however only after Weber’s works that a pattern or a systematic understanding of both concepts starts to begin. Weber (1947) categorized authority into three broad classes:

 

  1. Legal authority: The legitimacy of this type of authority is dependent on the set of laws and rules written in a state and applied administratively and judicially. The examples of it can be seen in the administrative offices. The persons who behold and regulate such authority are elected through legal procedures. The authority is restricted to the stature of person and implementation of authority is dependent on the hierarchal superiors. Government offices can be sought as the best example for the rational legal authority.
  2. Traditional authority: As the word tradition speaks for itself; this type of authority is legitimized by its ever existence in the society. It can be exemplified by the monarchy system. People belonging to this type of authority enjoy their position as they have inherited by birth. Nepotism usually gives rise to such authority i.e. a person favored by a king or ruler can pass on the attributes to his kith and kin.
  3. Charismatic authority: This is class of authority where in a leader has intrinsic quality of cowing people into following him. Historically two perspectives can be seen in this category one is religious and other is political. Jesus Christ, Moses, Mouindeen Chisti, Gautama Buddha and Rama displayed miracles which made people to believe in them. Politically, Adolf Hitler, M.K. Gandhi and Martin Luthar King by virtue of their personal oration skills made people to follow them. In either case the followers submit themselves to their will.

Fig No.1: Classification of Authority and their fundamental characteristics given by Max Weber.

Power according to Max Weber, is the ability to of an individual or an organization to accomplish objectives with or without the help of subordinates on the objectives. As Max Weber said in his book Society and Economy “By power is meant every opportunity/possibility existing within a social relationship, which permits one to carry out one’s own will, even against resistance, and regardless of the basis on which the opportunity rests.” To dictate and emphasize on power and its source three theories have been proposed, the pluralist theory, the power-elite theory and the Marxist theory. Briefly, pluralism dictates the distribution of power whereas elitist and Marxist theory emphasis on concentration/ centralization of power. Power has been categorized by John French and Bertram Raven as follows:

  1. Legitimate Power. This type of power is related to stature of an individual. People believe in him and think of him as an ultimate authority to make any decision. For example sergeant in field, prime minister, chief executive officer of a firm etc.
  2. Reward Power. It can be somewhat sociologically related analogously to behavioral training. Here an individual has power to reward the work Rewards can be financial, acknowledging and recognition of subordinates.
  3. Expert Power. It is type of submission to the skills of superior. This class of power is attained by individual on the basis or his expertise in the field. For example. A new research scholar bestows a scientist with such power, because he submits to the experience and expertise of the scientist in the field. Likewise, in a hospital young doctors submit to the decision of senior specialist. . The project leader may able to exercise expert power either as a subject matter expert in the content of the project (technical knowhow) or as an expert in the context of the project: the tools practices, disciplines and rigor of effective project management.
  4. Referent Power: Unlike others this type of power is more or less dependent on positive favoritism. Positive favoritism can be understood as the person is capable of influencing his friends, relatives, neighbors and other members of society and earn their loyalty. These motivations can be achieved by showing affection, admiration, people friendly behavior and discussing ideology rather than imposing it. Referent power can be rooted from one person liking, respecting and/or seeking approval from another and connecting with that people. An example can be Celebrities; who have referent power by which they influence and have earned respect cum loyalty from people.
  5. Coercive Power. As is suggested by the term coercive this type of power is achieved by force. Generally it has been reported in history as negative in nature. A leader or king forces people into submitting to his will and thinking. The person in power can punish or penalize the follower for not admitting his ideology or not fulfilling assignments assigned to him. Adolf Hitler, Napoleon are the best example of this type. However it is not always negative in nature, in case of national emergency a leader can utilize force to deal with the situation. Similarly in a corporate office a manager might pressurize subordinates to achieve company goals.

French and Raven (1959) by their classification revolutionized the concept of power and structured the organizational studies. In other terms we can say that the pluralistic view of Max Weber has dominated the concept of authority by his tripartite classification; French and Raven formulized the concept of power. An argument raised by Eduardo Zambrano and Stephen Lukes on concept of authority furthers the theory of Max Weber view on authority. They add that authority is dependent on the relation between superiors and the superior and further define that a multiple perspective aspects need to be considered for better understanding the concept of authority. Richard Friedman identified a zone of comfort between ruler and follower i.e. he states that a better impact of authority is achieved when follower and ruler have common interests.

Ophelia Eglene et al recollect the four factor theory of Peabody (1962) “(1) legitimacy, arising from a legally established order of rights and duties; (b) position, linked to the office a person occupies with its associated powers; (c) competence, resting on an individual’s experience, skills, and knowledge of a domain; and (d) person, based on individual philosophy and style of working”. They suggest that the latter is correlated to leadership. Another key factor that has been linked to the effective leadership is decision making. Decision making is the intrinsic attribute of the individual which depends on skills, knowledge and expertise of the individual. Decision making and implementation are constrained by the power of a person and his authority.

 

LEADERSHIP

 

In layman’s terms leadership can be defined as the ability of a person to lead a faction of people or an organization or a country. Leadership is a process by the man in power influences people subjected to him and ordains them to accomplish objectives cohesively. Effective leadership is proportional to the expertise, skills and decision making traits of a leader. Bass, Avolio, Ekvall and Conger have debated on the paradigm of leadership. They propose that an effective leadership should be more of participative and democratic. Anderson and King (1993) support this view and put forth a very crucial skill for effective leadership i.e. clarity in the mission and objectives. An effective leadership can be best achieved by participating in discussion about any mission with the followers. Leadership was the form of social behavior known to human for ages; however, the literature regarding same is very recent. The growing literature in leadership has collected research studies from versatile domains to give a leader arsenal of factors to study for an effective leadership. As goes the famous saying leaders aren’t born but it’s a process of self-studying, analysis of surroundings, education, will power and desire that makes a leader. One of the critical traits of a leader is capability of making decisions. Decision making is outcome of the ethical and moral training of the leader. Rest, Thoma, and Narvaez (1999e) discussed development of moral in relation to the cognitive training strategy. The decision making dependence on cognitive training can be emphasized as follows. A person who has read history should always remember the consequence of a particular strategy or what he himself suffered upon making a plan. This experienced eduvction is a triat of effective leadership as is brought into account by Barlett (1932). Salter, Green, Ree, Carmody-Bubb, & Duncan, (2009) very finely describe that the moral grounds of a person and decision making capability can be considered as a factor in looking at a leader as effective or ineffective. However, there has been lack of consensus among sociologists regarding how to define an effective leadership. Some authors suggest that leadership articles, since contain a vast domains of traits to be an effective leader, should be studied in parts (B. Winston and K. Patterson). While others suggest that the leadership should is virtue developed by analytically practicing the traits individually. Filip Lievens, Pascal Van Geit, and Pol Coetsier have brought forth that an effective leadership brings transformation into an organization.

 

Burns (1978) categorized leadership into transactional and transformational leadership. Conger and Kanungo (1998) and Kuhnert and Lewis (1987) furthered the idea of burns and stressed on the outcome of leadership is dependent of the ruler-follower bond. . A leader to bring a transformation in the organization has to identify the goals of the organization and the mentality of his followers. . Filip Lievens, Pascal Van Geit, and Pol Coetsier have based their article on the works of Bass who has himself stressed on the bond between the leader and the follower. Bass (1985) modified and propagated the ideology of Burns on leadership. Bass believed that transformational and transactional leadership are different concepts. Bass further briefed the qualities and behaviors that result into transformational or transactional leadership. Transactional leadership is based on leader-follower relationships which in-turn is directly related to the ways of trading the support and effort. Transactional leadership can be looked upon as a contractual form of leadership where in the main motives or goals are taken into consideration that would promise a healthy relation with the follower for a particular duration of time. Bass acknowledged that transactional leadership can be categorized into contingent reward (CR) leadership and management-by exception. Contingent reward leadership is the type of leadership in which leader-follower relation is rooted by the fear and reward strategy. A leader can give promotions to the followers or punish them or reward them. Another class of transactional leadership involves transaction between leader and follower in terms of intervention when there is lack of trust between the two; this type is called management by-exception. Bass and Avoilio in later years further categorized management by-exception on the basis of timing of intervention by the leader i.e. active and passive management by-exception. Bass, Avolio and Haters defined active management by exception the leader foresees the mistakes or anticipates them before they could lead make the relation vulnerable. However in passive, management by-exception a leader intervenes when a standards are not addressed as per the demands. Final type of leadership is laissez-faire leadership which is inactive leadership. In such type of leadership there is the avoidance or absence of leadership. In such scenarios leaders avoid making decisions, falter in taking action, and generally are not present when required.

 

The second category of leadership classified by Burns is transformational leadership; wherein, the leaders take steps beyond expectations and enable the followers to perform better. Bass acknowledged four traits of the transformational leadership i.e. charisma, individual consideration, inspiration motivation and intellectual stimulation. Charismatic factor of a leader makes people believe in him and its capability of a leader to whatever level he can take the followers. Individual consideration is the extent to which a leader is capable of addressing the grievances of people individually or a group of people and guides them till the problem is resolved. Inspirational motivation can be described as the skills of the leader to inspire and motivate people to achieve goals e.g. by giving motivational speeches. Intellectual simulation is character of a leader to stimulate people into better thinking and to create better ways/ideas of facing issues.

Fig No. 3:  Diagrammatic sketch of types of Leadership as classified Burns and modified cum furthered by Bass

LEADERSHIP, POWER AND AUTHORITY

 

After addressing the concepts of authority, power and authority next important thing is to understand the relation between the three and how the three are intertwined. As is depicted in below gear diagram that the three make each other spin. A leader who has capability of making decision would be effective if he has authority to implement it and power to motivate people into following it. Even though as we said previously that the leadership can be good or bad either way the principle domains remain same. For example, one of the world’s most prominent and successful leader, Nelson Mandela who was elected as first president of Republic of South Africa led Anti-Apartheid movement. By his clarity of mission, self-motivation, persistence, individual consideration, inspirational motivation, decision making skills, emotional integrity and other traits was able to lead entire country to an equal and independent nation. He built trust in people by his moral values and inspired people by his speeches motivated them to stick together follow his command and addressed grievances of people until he was able to create a nation. The primary goal behind effective leadership is the progression of organization a whole. Mintzberg (2001) divided the organizational development motives into three sects of leadership focus: information, people, and action. Examples of each can be seen in every form of leadership. In corporate world where leadership is segregated at different levels e.g. team leader, project manager, CEO, etc., the variance in leadership is also visualized. To understand above three focuses we take into consideration a corporate sector. A leader may be interested in the information generally focuses on the communication and spend most of his time in gathering information about the other participants, stakeholders. In second category where people are the main focus of the leader, a leader tries to form better links with the employee and connects with them in all possible ways. Finally, leaders who focus on action fundamentally believe in action i.e. they resolve crisis, supervise actions and device strategies vibrantly. In religious perspective, a typical example of charismatic authority as a leadership trait, great figures like Jesus Christ or Moiundeen Chisti displayed miracles or sermons that would render people’s mind and heart into believing the leader and submitting to every commandment given. They had eloquence in speech that would drive people to stick to their authority and power and motivate the followers to stick to a particular path. In such leaders we can find transformational type of leadership accompanied by a healthy leader-follower bond. V.Kessler in article Leadership and power suggests that the leadership cannot be implemented by an individual without power. Ophelia Eglene, Sharon S. Dawes and Carrie A. Schneider have presented the role of authority in public sectors that leads to effective leadership. Gabriel Robin has debated religiously the role of power in leadership mostly stressing on the charismatic authority built power for effective leadership. Kanter (1977) proposed that powerful leaders depend on personal power than on job title, or credentials, instill confidence among subordinates. Kanter presents a dialogue on the inspirational motivational leadership and the ability of leader to harness power out of his followers. Block (1987) said has furthered the concept by adding the fact that for effective leadership, a leader has to increase his power by nurturing the power of subordinates. The most effective leaders found in history had one common characteristic i.e. they would chose a few followers and bestow them with a part of his power and authority. As a result those people were accountable for their authority and power given to the leader. Harold E. Fuqua, Jr. et al stresses that for effective leadership relies on the leader to increase to increase their personal power, persuasiveness, and expertise. Further they suggest the effectiveness of leadership is directly proportional to the communicating with followers and understanding their needs. They suggest using reward, expert and referent power to earn trust and faith of the followers. Stewart (1997) advised leaders for maximum effectiveness learn to use power effectively, be accessible to followers, enhance networking, listen to people, and appreciate public skills. Harold E. Fuqua, Jr. et al have further pointed at the development of personal power and authority power for the effective leadership. It can be also noted that the triangle of power, authority and leadership give rise to another factor what has been termed as influence. Influence of a leader by virtue of power and authority can be positive or negative. Effectiveness of leadership can be related to the influence that a leader is able to create on the basis of his leadership skills, utilization of power and authority. Margaret Ann Faeth and Albert Wiswell debate the dependence of leadership on power and authority; as they suggest “the body of research on the influence processes of leadership has focused on organizations with clear hierarchical lines of power and authority between boss, subordinate and peer.” To conclude the relation between power, authority and leadership, below we have presented the table from the article by R. Dennis Green “Leadership as a Function of Power.”

Fig No. 5: Gear representation of the interdependence of authority, leadership and power.

 

Summary

 

From all the presented review of literature and research articles it can be concluded that the concept of power authority and leadership has been practiced in every society, community and organization. However, the research on the concept of all three is very recent. Max weber is considered to lay roots on the concept of authority and leadership. Whereas John French and Bertram Raven have laid the foundations on understanding the source of power for leadership. It can be concluded that power, authority and leadership are intertwined to each other. A leader can be an influence on the followers only if he has an authority and power.