I like the idea of a “leadership class.” It’s not a phrase I coined, but rather columnist and commentator David Brooks. I first noticed he used it several years ago – it reappears big time in a piece he wrote for this month’s Atlantic. The article is titled, “How the Ivy League Broke America: The Meritocracy isn’t Working. We Need Something New.”
When Brooks uses the term “leadership class” he refers to the “meritocracy” that’s in the title of his piece. Or he alludes to the “elite,” another word he uses interchangeably both with “leadership class” and “meritocracy.” At one point in the article he asks, “Did we get a better elite?” At another he lists the “six sins of the meritocracy.” And at still another he concludes, “It’s not obvious that we have produced either a better leadership class or a healthier relationship between our society and its elites.” In short, Brooks uses “leadership class,” and “meritocracy,” and “elite” synonymously.
My intention is not to criticize Brooks’s writing. Instead I am asking if those who constitute America’s “leadership class” are different from – or should be considered different from – those who constitute America’s “meritocracies” and its “elites.”
My question is about definition. Not so much the definition of a meritocracy, or of an elite, as of a “leader.” As anyone who has been – as I have – around the leadership block for years knows, the words “leader” and “leadership” are plagued by literally hundreds of different definitions. Usually though by no means always the word “leader” refers to someone who is in a leadership role. And usually though by no means always the word “leadership” refers to someone in a leadership role who is controlling or directing their followers.
But not every member of either a meritocracy or of an elite is in a leadership role or is exercising leadership. To be at the top of a meritocracy means you have clambered up the ladder due to your intelligence, skill, or ability. It does not mean that you necessarily are controlling or directing anyone. Similarly, an elite. You are in the top tier of some group or organization because of some attribute or asset you have, not because you are in any way, necessarily, engaging with others.
Let’s be clear. Leadership is a relationship. You cannot be a leader without at least one follower. The same does not however apply either to those who are members of meritocracies or of elites. In neither of these cases is any relationship necessary or implied.
Let’s not, though, throw out the baby with the bathwater. The idea of a “leadership class” is valuable – as is the term. So, let’s confine members of the leadership class to those who are in a leadership role and, or, who get others to follow where they lead. In most cases leaders get their followers to follow because they, the former, rank higher than the latter. But in some cases, leaders get their followers to follow without the privileges and advantages of rank, of title. So long as Cindy can get Sam to go along, she is a leader, and he is a follower. But once Sam balks, once he refuses to do her bidding, it’s over. She has dropped out of the leadership class.