Good Leadership in Social Movement Organizations

* Article: The struggle for good leadership in social movement organizations: Collective reflection and rules as basis for autonomy. By Ruth Simsa and Marion Totter. Ephemera, volume 20(4). Special Issue: Work, reconfigured

URL = http://www.ephemerajournal.org/contribution/struggle-good-leadership-social-movement-organizations-collective-reflection-and-rules PDF

abstract

"This paper analyzes how leadership is practiced in social movement organizations (SMO). Drawing arguments from Critical Leadership Studies, and based on qualitative empirical research conducted within the organizations of the Spanish protest movement 15M, this paper analyzes the perceptions of leadership, fields of tension and practices for dealing with these tensions. By empirically investigating a rather unexplored area of research, the paper makes three contributions. First, it offers in-depth investigations of leadership-practices in SMO, showing that activists are highly aware of the importance of leadership. Second, it contributes to leadership theory by confronting views of critical leadership studies with the empirical results. Activists share quite precise views on what good leadership means for them, which we propose to characterize as autonomous, reflexive and rule-based. Third, with the emphasis on collective reflection and rules, it highlights two aspects of leadership in SMO that have been widely ignored in discourses, but turn out as important means of dealing with challenges of autonomous leadership."

Contextual Quote

"What is rejected, in fact, by all interviewees are leadership positions whose holder´s influence on decisions is only based on the position. Nevertheless, leadership positions held by individuals are accepted, as long as they fulfill the following conditions: The position must serve the collective, and it must be based on permanent legitimization by the other members. Usually, this implies the temporary holding of leadership-positions by individuals (for instance, the facilitator of a meeting). Only exceptionally, more stable positions arise (for instance, the long-time spokesperson of the nation-wide organization against evictions). This ideal of autonomous leadership implies certain difficulties in practice. While activists emphasize many aspects of success, they also are aware of the challenges. Issues that arise when groups seek to renounce the role of a single leader while at the same time acknowledging the importance of leadership, are informal hierarchies and inefficiencies. Not surprisingly, the emergence of informal hierarchies and implicit leadership positions is mentioned as a problem. Besides differences in communicative skills and charisma, also different individual time-resources contribute to informal hierarchies."

- Ruth Simsa and Marion Trotter [1]

Excerpts

Critical Leadership Studies

By Ruth Simsa and Marion Totter:

"Critical leadership studies are a particularly apt theoretical basis for studying leadership practices in SMO (social movement organizations). They have a radically different understanding of leadership than the mainstream management literature. In classic models, the assumption persists that leadership is the result of designated leaders and their acting. Therefore, an organization is perceived as shaped by its leader’s decisions, style and personality. Leadership is ascribed to a person with certain qualities, a formal position within a hierarchy and the exercise of authority. Different approaches of dominant models focus on the leadership style (Bass and Riggio, 2005; Burns, 1978; Lewin et al., 1939; Wunderer, 2009), on the innate characteristics of the leader (Avolio and Gardner, 2005; Bolden and Gosling, 2006), on the relationship between leaders and followers (Stippler and Dörffer, 2011), or on a combination of the organizational context and specific styles of leadership (Fiedler et al., 1975; Hersey et al., 1988). The common feature of these approaches is the emphasis on a clear top-down hierarchy, a distinction between leaders and followers (Collinson, 2011) and the neglect of the contribution of followers to leadership (Western, 2013).

With critical leadership studies, there has been a shift in the focus of leadership research; ‘to understanding the emergent, informal, and dynamic “leadership” brought about by the members of the collective itself’ (Contractor et al., 2012: 994). Critical leadership studies have theoretically decentered the leader (Wood, 2005).They interpret leadership as a process, which is a relational, socially-constructed phenomenon realized through the interaction of diverse actors (Bolden, 2011; Gronn, 2002). Critical leadership studies distinguish clearly between leaders and leadership. The effects of leadership are not only seen as resulting from individual persons, but from the dynamics within the respective system; this ‘complementary perspective approaches leadership as a social process that engages everyone in the community’ (Day, 2001: 583). In line with this perspective, Lichtenstein and Plowman (2009) argue that dynamic interactions between individuals lead to emergent outcomes, and that conceptions of leadership thus should be reframed.

As critical leadership studies interpret leadership as a socially constructed and culturally specific phenomenon, different forms and practices come into view. Alternative forms of leadership are described with different terms, such as ‘shared’ (Pearce and Conger, 2002), ‘collective’ (Contractor et al., 2012), ‘collaborative’ (Chrislip, 2002), or ‘distributed’ leadership (Binci et al., 2016; Bolden, 2011; Gronn, 2002; Spillane, 2012; Spillane et al., 2004). They all understand leadership ‘as a dynamic, interactive influence process among individuals in groups for which the objective is to lead one another to the achievement of group or organizational goals or both’ (Pearce and Conger, 2002: 1), with fluid processes of taking leadership roles according to contextual conditions (Pearce and Sims Jr, 2002), and outcomes understood as co-constructed by leaders and followers, thus ‘recognizing leadership as inherently a collaborative act’ (Ruben and Gigliotti, 2016: 469). This interactive perspective characterizes leadership as a complex process, which is open to for innovative organizing practices (Lichtenstein and Plowman, 2009; Lichtenstein et al., 2006).

Autonomist Leadership, which comprises ‘non-hierarchical, informal and distributed forms of leadership’ (Western, 2014: 673), is also a noteworthy framework within the critical leadership studies to analyse organizational dynamics in new social movements. The prefix ‘autonomist’ shall resolve ‘the paradox of leadership being enacted in leaderless movements’ by breaking ‘the emotionally binding ties that link leadership with hierarchy, elitism, authoritarianism and coercion’ (ibid.: 676). Autonomist Leadership encompasses the five principles of autonomy, spontaneity, mutualism, networks and affect that drive and guide the leadership in emancipatory social movements.

Consequently, Fairhurst and Connaughton (2014) conceptualize leadership actors as the plurality of individuals who may be involved in acts of leadership, including formal or informal leaders, followers, or other stakeholders; they distinguish between leadership positions and leadership acting. Bendell et al. (2017) depict leadership as relationally co-constructed; as a behavior instead of a position or the inherent quality of an individual.

While the concepts of critical leadership studies are convincing, they still have two pitfalls. First, it is criticized that even alternative approaches often emphasize exceptionalism, ‘an individual locus of action and a generalised other that is the object of leadership’ (Bendell et al., 2017: 419). Second, there is a temptation to just change words from leaders to facilitators, spokespersons or simply members, which covers up more than it clarifies, as simply excluding individual leaders per definition prevents one from seeing differences in the leadership roles assumed that might exist in practice. Thus, ‘by refusing to acknowledge any kind of leadership, organizations may be at risk of re-creating the same hierarchical relations they seek to abolish as informal hierarchies rooted in power are likely to emerge’ (Sutherland et al., 2014: 763).

To avoid these traps, we will intensively draw on our empirical material, guided by the following definitions:

Following Crevani (2018), we suggest a focus on the phenomenon rather than on individuals, and conceptualize leadership as an ongoing social process, in which leadership work contributes to the production of direction in organizing. Leadership work is enacted in interactions and refers to the cocreation of relationships (Crevani, 2018; Fairhurst and Uhl-Bien, 2012). Drawing on Sutherland et al. (2014), we assume that it consists of individual acts of agency, which manage meaning, define reality and provide a basis for organizational action. Leadership work is done by specific actors but not necessarily by people holding leadership positions.

(http://www.ephemerajournal.org/sites/default/files/pdfs/contribution/20-4SimsaTotter.pdf)

Practices to deal with the challenges – collective reflection and rules

Reflection

"Regarding the question of how actors strive to overcome the described tensions, our data showed two recurrent practices, namely collective reflection and rules. Both are frequently referred to by activists as the organizations’ methodology, and as a means to deal with the difficulties of implementing ideal concepts of leadership.

Reflection is the review, interpretation, and understanding of experiences to guide present and future behavior (Boud et al., 2013). It is characterized as crucial for transformative learning (Mezirow, 2006). Activists stress the necessity of collective reflection to understand organizational dynamics, and to learn to ensure efficient organization without hierarchies. In this context, they often state: ‘We move slowly, because we have a long way to go’. Activists are highly reflexive about the power of organizational structures, and specifically about leadership structures. Many interviewees emphasize the need to invest time in internal organizing, collective learning, and the development of tools and practices. Often, this is framed as using collective intelligence to empower the organization and as collective learning.

- One of the things we realized, is the power of collective intelligence. The moment you put so many people together to think, things came out all the time, very powerful things. Then, we realized that we really have a capacity. (I59). It sometimes is still a bit chaotic. Still, I think that we have been learning a lot in these years. (I67)

Reflection goes along with experimentation. Activists engage in theorizing and experimenting with alternative forms of organizing, like participatory democracy, decentralization and horizontal decision-making. They emphasize the need for the creation of secure spaces in assemblies, where rules, organizing skills and proceedings are tested, evaluated and revises.

- It worked by assembly, in a democratic manner… we wanted the politicization of everyday life, we understood that democracy had to be a fundamental thing. That's very difficult. Democracy is very laborious. It is very necessary, but very laborious. (I61)

In the SMO investigated, the collective reflection of leadership is a core underlying principle of what is believed to be good leadership. People who engage in leadership practices have to be open to permanent vigilance, comments, discussion, and learning. Reflecting on internal processes is part of daily activities. In many SMO, for example, the moderator role rotates, and at the end of each meeting, the group gives feedback and discusses which interventions had been helpful and what could be improved. Cases of absence of reflection, such as unwillingness to take part or un-reflected dominance, are heavily criticized.

Rules

The second important means of overcoming tensions are rules. They are often mentioned regarding their purpose of impeding formal or informal hierarchical structures and consequently fixed leadership positions. Besides very general rules, for example, that nobody should be able to impose their will on everyone else, a number of concrete rules are mentioned that guarantee participatory decision-making, mutual respect, and a productive way of dealing with conflicts. One group, for example, worked out explicit and detailed guidelines to guarantee ‘good’ communication. Many rules are dedicated to gender equality, such as a zipper system for speakers at meetings or for the nomination of delegates, or the techniques to secure equal speaking time.

Often, these rules are accompanied by specific techniques:

- We are learning to implement mechanisms that allow everybody to speak, with limited time. There are certain techniques … Everybody who comes to an assembly gets a pink and a yellow card. The pink one means three minutes talking in the first part of the debate, the yellow, one or two minutes in the concluding part… Or, for example, we do closed rounds. Like, only seven persons may speak, then we close the round. Then we open a new round and five persons may speak (…). This works. It seems magic. (I85)

- Methodologies of transparency … were necessary because they allowed for trust …also between people who did not know each other personally. (I59)

Other activists describe implicit rules – mainly regarding communication – that have been established without any explicit guidelines.

- What we like most is that we do not have a document that explains our discursive strategies; it is not necessary because we – for some reason or the other – have internalized a specific language … we are not monolithic, but from outside, a certain cohesion appears. That results from daily work. (I40)

The high importance of rules is remarkable, as movements and their organizations are usually characterized as specifically spontaneous. The organizations investigated share the goal of spontaneity only in the context of the goal to avoid fixed leadership positions. Nevertheless, our analysis shows that rules are a highly contentious issue; very controversial discussions are held on the extent to which existing rules are sufficient."