How Much Can One Individual Alter History? More and Less Than You Think

History Unplugged Podcast

History Unplugged

Society & Culture, History

4.2 • 3.7K Ratings

🗓️ 2 February 2023

⏱️ 46 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

How far can a single leader alter the course of history? Thomas Carlyle, who promoted the Great Man Theory, says that talented leaders are the primary – if not the sole – cause of change. This view has been challenged by social scientists who understand that leaders are not only constrained by their societies, but merely products of them. Whatever this interplay between a personality and his society, it raises the question of whether dictators are as unconstrained as they seem, and if so, how do they attain that power?

Today’s guest is Ian Kershaw, author of Personality and Power. We look at an array of case-studies of twentieth-century European leaders – some dictators, some democrats – and explore what was it about these leaders, and the times in which they lived, that allowed them such untrammelled and murderous power, and what factors brought that era in Europe to an end?

Transcript

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0:00.0	Can one person single-handedly change his or her nation?
0:08.7	If you would have asked somebody that question 200 years ago, specifically Thomas Carlyle,
0:13.2	who came up with the Great Man Theory of History, the answer is, unreservedly, yes.
0:18.6	Change in history comes about by heroes or great men.
0:21.8	People who have incredible courage, superior intellect, extraordinary leadership abilities,
0:26.1	or divine inspiration, who cause systemic change.
0:29.0	It's almost like society is a forest, and these great men are the gardeners who bring
0:34.1	order to things and choose how things are organized.
0:37.2	But for the last 150 years, scholars of the humanities have pushed back against this idea,
0:41.3	and said that social change also comes about by the accumulation of the acts of less powerful people.
0:46.3	A critic of Carlyle, Herbert Spencer, said that so-called great men are merely products of their social environment.
0:51.8	So for example, we all remember Hitler, Napoleon, and Alexander the Great for changing society
0:57.0	and entire continents in the span of a few short years, but they were also products of societies
1:02.0	that were incredibly educated, technologically advanced, and just so happened to have the
1:05.9	world's most powerful military-their disposal.
1:08.0	They couldn't have done the same thing if they were products of tribal societies in isolated
1:12.2	islands, or leading a second or third-tier power like the Netherlands or Luxembourg.
1:17.0	Today's guest is Sir Ian Kershaw, author of the book, Personality and Power.
1:21.1	Builders and Destroyers of Modern Europe.
1:23.1	We're going to look at a number of 20th-century leaders and explore what it was about them
1:27.8	that allowed them to have such untrammeled and murderous power, whether they were as unconstrained
1:32.3	as they seemed to be, and if so, how they attained that power, what factors brought this
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