By: Jenna Kilgore
“The German calamity of years ago repeats itself: People acquiesce without resistance and align themselves with the forces of evil.”—Albert Einstein, (Calaprice, 2011)
Every collective atrocity has had similar contributing factors, including the Holocaust, the South-African Apartheid, and the Rwandan genocide. Each of these “evil” events in history included destructive leadership, susceptible followers, and situations wrought with instability. These three factors are known as the Toxic Triangle (Padilla, Hogan, & Kaiser, 2007). Furthermore, the countries associated with these atrocities also had minorities that were easily victimized by the majority, which are typically groups that are approaching power and have previously been derogated by society (Voldhardy & Campbell-Obaid, 2016).
Let us first focus on the factors associated with destructive leadership. Padilla and authors (2007) suggest five distinct features:
- There are good and bad results of destructive leadership
- Destructive leadership involved dominance, manipulation, and coercion.
- Destructive leaders are selfish and focused on their personal needs rather than the needs of the collective.
- Effects of destructive leadership effect the quality of life of the collective.
- Outcomes are not only the result of leaders but also followers and environments.
Taken together, these features generalize destructive leadership and its effects, but there are also common characteristics of individual leaders that make destructive leadership more likely. Destructive leaders typically exhibit characteristics of charisma, self-interest, manipulation, egotism, lack of empathy, and lack of honesty. Furthermore, these leaders typically instill an ideology of hate (Book, Visser, & Volk, 2014; Padilla et al., 2007; Thoroughgood et al., 2012). These leaders tend to share these ideologies with their followers through dangerous speech.
Similar to destructive leaders, there are important characteristics of susceptible followers. Specifically, there are two distinct types of followers: conformers and colluders (Padilla et al., 2007). Conformers are individuals that are susceptible due to their basic needs not being met. They often view themselves negatively, have difficulty with reasoning, and may desire clarity in otherwise chaotic situations. Some conformers support destructive leaders because they fulfill their needs or provide a group with which they can identify. However, other conformers support these leaders due to rule-following beliefs or passivity. Colluders, on the other hand, are individuals motivate by ambition and may support the leader’s world views. Some colluders follow these leaders based on opportunity to get ahead, while others truly believe that the leader is qualified and holds beliefs similar to their own.
Taken together, destructive leaders and susceptible followers must have a conducive environment for violence to ensue. Conducive environments center around instability. Circumstances such as war, political unrest, perceived threat, economic difficulty, and autocratic states typically produce environments conducive to leaders and followers melding, resulting in atrocities such as mass genocide (Padilla, et al., 2007).
All of this being said, how does the current political climate and interaction between leaders, situations, and followers support the increase in hate crimes and violence against minorities? Let us begin with characteristics of our current leader. Donald Trump exhibits several characteristics associated with destructive leadership, including narcissism, charisma, lack of honesty, manipulation, and self-interest. He also lead a campaign seemingly based on the greater good of the collective (“Make America Great Again”) while insulting and scapegoating minorities through his speeches. Here you can find a mild example of his dangerous speech.
Followers of Donald Trump fit within both the conformer and colluder groups, with some followers truly supporting his racist, divisive beliefs while others feel as if he is providing support to the currently threatened white majority. His emotionally heightened language encourages further separation of groups, which can lead to group-based violence (Roozen & Shulman, 2014).
Despite clear examples of destructive leadership and susceptible followers, the current situation in America is actually somewhat protective. There is a political system of checks and balances that ultimately prevents a autocratic leader. Further, there are also followers in the majority that do not support Donald Trump.
In sum, research on the Toxic Triangle suggests that destructive leadership, susceptible followers, and conducive situations all play a role in collective atrocities. Individual leadership factors such as charisma and hateful ideology interplay with beliefs of both conforming and colluding followers, leading to a majority that is quick to scapegoat and attribute situational difficulties to minority groups. These relationships combined with dangerous speech and emotional arousal may lead to intergroup violence (i.e., hate crimes). In the current political climate, we see characteristics of destructive leadership and susceptible followers. However, our current environment, although conducive to a rise in hate crime, is ultimately protective against mass genocide and further atrocities.
- Book, A., Visser, B. A., & Volk, A. A. (2015). Unpacking “evil”: Claiming the core of the Dark Triad. Personality and Individual Differences, 73, 29-38.
- Padilla, A., Hogan, R., & Kaiser, R. B. (2007). The toxic triangle: Destructive leaders, susceptible followers, and conducive environments. The Leadership Quarterly, 18(3), 176-194.
- Roozen, B., & Shulman, H. C. (2014). Tuning in to the RTLM: Tracking the evolution of language alongside the Rwandan genocide using social identity theory. Journal of Language and Social Psychology, 33(2), 165-182.
- Thoroughgood, C. N., Padilla, A., Hunter, S. T., & Tate, B. W. (2012). The susceptible circle: A taxonomy of followers associated with destructive leadership. The Leadership Quarterly, 23(5), 897-917.