Leadership as an Emotional Process

Abstract A growing literature has recently focused on evolutionary perspectives on both leadership and followership. Distinct from traditional approaches—rooted especially in organizational psychology and management—this body of work has mainly concentrated on the adaptive value and the phylogeny of leadership, while generally neglecting the role of emotions in structuring the emergence and effectiveness of leader-follower relationships. This chapter reviews theoretical and empirical results from both organizational and evolutionarily informed approaches to leadership and emotions, with the aim of bridging these literature streams. Ultimately, the authors ask, can we better understand leadership and followership in small groups or large organizations by studying jointly the evolutionary and emotional processes underpinning them? Within a multidisciplinary framework touching upon psychology, biology, and anthropology, they highlight how these fields can increasingly intersect in future research, discussing especially (but not only) the illustrative example of charismatic leadership.