The New Psychology of Leadership: Identity, Influence and Power

Citation

Haslam, S. A., Reicher, S. D., & Platow, M. J. (2011). The New Psychology of Leadership: Identity, Influence and Power. Psychology Press.

Chapter Summary

The book has eight chapters and about 270 pages. Its argument, in the publisher's words, is that leadership is never just about leaders: it is about leaders and followers joined together as members of a social group that gives them a shared social identity. The first two chapters review the older psychology of leadership, the third sets out the social identity foundations, and chapters 4 to 7 each describe a role that leaders play in relation to group identity. The final chapter extends the approach to prejudice, practice and politics. The publisher lists the issues covered as the nature of group identity, the basis of authority and legitimacy, the dynamics of justice and fairness, the determinants of followership and charisma, and the practice and politics of leadership.

Chapter 1: The Old Psychology of Leadership: Great Men and the Cult of Personality

The book opens with the traditional approach, in which leadership is explained by the personal qualities of exceptional individuals. This sets up the contrast with the approach the authors propose.

Chapter 2: The Current Psychology of Leadership: Issues of Context and Contingency, Transaction and Transformation

The second chapter reviews current theory: how leadership depends on context, contingency models, and the distinction between transactional and transformational leadership. A reviewer in Times Higher Education describes the chapter as beginning to weigh the importance of the follower in the leader-follower relationship.

Chapter 3: Foundations for the New Psychology of Leadership: Social Identity and Self-Categorization

This is the theoretical core. It introduces social identity and self-categorization theory and uses them to link an individual's social identity to the cohesion of a group or organization. The review notes that the chapter draws on well-known leaders and speeches as illustrations.

Chapter 4: Being One of Us: Leaders as In-Group Prototypes

The fourth chapter presents leaders as in-group prototypes: the leader's standing depends on being seen as one of the group.

Chapter 5: Doing It for Us: Leaders as In-Group Champions

The fifth chapter turns to leaders as in-group champions, those who are seen to act for the group.

Chapter 6: Crafting a Sense of Us: Leaders as Entrepreneurs of Identity

The sixth chapter treats leaders as entrepreneurs of identity, who help to craft a sense of "us" rather than only reflecting one that already exists.

Chapter 7: Making Us Matter: Leaders as Embedders of Identity

The seventh chapter treats leaders as embedders of identity, the role of making a shared identity matter in the life of the group.

Chapter 8: Identity Leadership at Large: Prejudice, Practice, and Politics

The last chapter extends the approach to wider questions, including prejudice, the practice of leadership and political leadership.

Key Concepts

Chapters 1–2

• Great-man and trait approaches: explanations of leadership based on individual personality.
• Contingency, transactional and transformational leadership: the main concepts of current mainstream theory.

Chapter 3

• Social identity: the part of a person's self-concept that comes from membership in a group.
• Self-categorization: the process by which people see themselves as members of a group rather than as separate individuals.

Chapters 4–8

• In-group prototype: a leader who represents what is typical of the group.
• In-group champion: a leader who advances the group's interests.
• Entrepreneurs of identity: leaders who craft and define a sense of "us".
• Embedders of identity: leaders who make identity real in group life.
• Identity leadership: the combined approach applied to prejudice, practice and politics.

Critical Analysis

Strengths

• A single, clearly stated thesis. The authors build the whole book on shared social identity, which gives the chapters a unified logic, and the four middle chapters have parallel titles that make the argument easy to follow.
• Follower-centered view. Cary Cooper, reviewing the book in Times Higher Education, highlights its focus on followers and on engaging them in the organization's goals, as opposed to lists of leader traits.
• Readable and illustrated. The same reviewer praises the way the science of leadership is mingled with historical and modern examples, and the publisher describes the style as accessible and engaging.
• Useful review of earlier work. Cooper calls the review of the older psychology of leadership in Chapter 1 an outstanding one that he would recommend to postgraduate students and managers.

Limitations

• One theoretical lens. The book argues for the social identity approach, so it gives less space to other approaches than a general leadership textbook; only Chapters 1 and 2 are devoted to them.
• Short. At about 270 pages and eight chapters the treatment of each leadership topic is concise, and readers who want practical techniques will need other sources.
• Edition. The version described here is the 2010-2011 first edition; a second edition appeared in 2020 and may differ in content.

Where It Fits in the Course

This book is best read as a focused extension of a general organizational psychology text. OpenStax's Organizational Behavior and Spector's Industrial and Organisational Psychology cover leadership as one topic among many, and the Chmiel, Fraccaroli and Sverke introduction frames chapters around practical questions. Haslam, Reicher and Platow then offer a deeper view of one question, what makes leadership possible.

Haslam's earlier Psychology in Organisations: The Social Identity Approach (2004) applies the same theory across the whole of organizational psychology, so it is the natural companion for readers who want the wider framework. Weick's sensemaking books and Schein's Organizational Culture and Leadership treat shared meaning and culture from different starting points and make a useful contrast with the social identity view of how leaders shape groups.

How to Use This Book

The book is aimed at students of psychology, management and organization studies, and at practitioners interested in leadership. Some background in social psychology helps, particularly for Chapter 3, but the book is written to be accessible.

Read the chapters in order, because chapters 4 to 7 build on the social identity concepts in Chapter 3. If time is short, read Chapters 1 and 2 quickly as a review of earlier approaches, then give most attention to Chapter 3 and to the chapters on prototypes, champions, entrepreneurs and embedders. Chapter 8 is a good starting point for applying the ideas to a particular case. As an exercise, take a leader you know about and ask in turn whether they act as a prototype, a champion, an entrepreneur of identity and an embedder of identity, citing specific actions for each.