ABSTRACT
This chapter is an in-depth exploration of the significance of heroism and heroes in creating, maintaining, and challenging political communities, including but not limited to the state. Drawing on the literature on state-building, political community, and leadership, the chapter argues that this relationship is iterative and bidirectional rather than uni-causal; while political community may be a by-product of the process of creating heroes, or an explicit process of social construction undertaken by an existing state or political community, these processes are most often self-reinforcing. The chapter points out that heroes are particularly valued and valuable during times of crisis, when they can be used either to shore up the existing political and social order or as rallying points for contending visions of alternative, future orders. The capacity of states or other groups to use heroes to shape community depends largely on the negotiation of the heroic narrative between the individual committing the (potentially heroic) act, the group seeking to put that narrative to use in building political community, and the audience which must accept the hero and the heroic narrative as representative of their values.
