ABSTRACT
The anarchist art critic Herbert Read, in an essay published during the Second World War entitled 'The Cult of Leadership', suggested that there was a close link between the idea of leadership and a fascist politics. He proposes that the alternative to the glorification of leadership is 'collective responsibility', in which members of the 'body politic' are differentiated according to their function, but socially equal. Once the concept of leadership has been conjured, its manifestations are found everywhere – in the kinship arrangements of tribal societies, the relationship of angels to god, the social structure of chimpanzees, or the decision making of armies, sports teams and orchestras. The concept of leadership gets in the way of thinking generously about the idea of 'organisation' because it implies that human beings can only come together in particular patterns, usually pyramidal ones.
