佛羅里達州帕克蘭的學生登上了《財富》2018年全球50位最偉大領袖(World’s 50 Greatest Leaders)排行榜的榜首,#MeToo運動排在第三位。今天,社會運動同樣重要。個體團結在一起可以推翻公司高管,破壞一個行業,左右選舉結果,并對政策計劃造成嚴重破壞。 隨著社交媒體和其他民主化技術的出現,有許多媒體在討論這種“新力量” — 去中心化的網絡如何碾壓更傳統的、自上而下的模式。但社會變革者們對這種新力量并不陌生。 雖然每一次運動都表現為集體領導的形式,但并非所有運動都是生而平等的。有些運動團結在一個共同的愿景之下取得了成功。但有些運動未能獲得動力,最終失控或者只是曇花一現。 一項運動能否成功,取決于其領導方式。任何一組熱情澎湃的人都可以在華盛頓組織一次抗議或游行,但社會變革終究是一種領導行為。 社會運動的強弱,區別就在于勝利者都是“集體領導”。他們會讓出權力,而不是緊抓不放。他們為人們指明方向,而不是發號施令。運動的集體領導者不會為誰才是組織游行的功臣或者誰“擁有”捐贈者的名單,或者誰應該上CNN或福克斯新聞頻道露臉而爭論不休,他們會分享權力、權威和媒體的關注。在“為我們的生命游行”中,帕克蘭的郊區學生們把話筒遞給了城里的同學,因為后者每天在學校和街道都會面臨了槍支暴力,就是集體領導的一種表現。 集體領導的運動在兩個極端之間取得了平衡:它們既不是沒有領導者,也不是由領導者主導的運動。 還記得占領華爾街運動嗎?那些99%的人的支持者都采取了“無領導者”的扁平化治理結構,并且提出了20多項不同的要求,結果運動很快便煙消云散。另外一種極端情況是,一些運動往往過于傾向于由領導者主導:上層試圖自上而下控制運動,結果扼制了運動的發展。 而集體領導的運動卻不會這樣做,他們會有意識地將權力交給基層,授權給地方的分會。他們將資金、媒體關注和培訓工具分配給普通成員。他們鼓勵問題的親歷者作為運動的領導者,比如幸存者、遇難者家屬或者其他習慣于相關事業的人。當代取得勝利的所有社會運動,如控煙運動、擴大持槍權運動和LGBTQ群體婚姻平等運動等,之所以成功都是因為領導者采取了自下而上的方式。領導者更像是管弦樂隊的指揮,而不是軍隊的指揮官或公司CEO。 以美國全國步槍協會(National Rifle Association)為例:它所采取的是倒金字塔領導結構,上方是協會成員,下方則是為他們提供支持的協會工作人員。雖然媒體關注的焦點是有鋼鐵般意志的全美步槍協會執行副總裁兼CEO韋恩·拉皮埃爾,但該協會真正的權力來自于其數百萬的成員和成百上千位現場組織者,他們隨時準備維護或者擴大持槍權,并用選票表達他們的主張。全美步槍協會不斷在全國以及各地方培養和擴大支持者網絡,并利用這些網絡促進持槍權的發展,除了個別州外,在各州選舉出對槍械友好的政治候選人。 雖然持槍權運動采取了集體領導的方式,但控槍運動卻一直由領導者主導。不過這種情況也在發生變化。新出現的槍支改革機構,如在2014年紐敦悲劇發生后成立的“每座城鎮都要維護槍支安全”(Everytown for Gun Safety)以及現在的#NeverAgain等,都在奮力追趕全美步槍協會。據“每座城鎮都要維護槍支安全”的網站顯示,其支持者在短短幾年內迅速增加到超過400萬,并在50個州建立了分會。該組織在積極阻止全美步槍協會的議程,包括推動在校園內禁槍,以及在國會反對待決的《隱蔽攜帶槍支互惠法案》等。 槍支改革最終變成了集體領導,這意味著它為自己博得了一個機會。(財富中文網) 注:本文作者Leslie Crutchfield是《變革如何發生:社會運動成敗的秘密》(How Change Happens: Why Some Social Movements Succeed While Others Don’t)一書的作者,并在喬治城大學全球社會企業倡議行動任執行主任。 譯者:劉進龍/汪皓 |
The students of Parkland, Fla., top Fortune’s 2018 list of the World’s 50 Greatest Leaders, and the #MeToo movement clinches the third spot. Movements matter—today as much as ever. Individual crusaders when joined together can collectively topple corporate executives, undercut industries, upend elections, and wreak havoc on policy plans. With the advent of social media and other democratizing technologies, much is written now about “new power”—how decentralized networks often triumph over more conventional, top-down models. But new power is old news to social change makers. While every movement embodies collective leadership, not all campaigns are created equal. Some successfully coalesce around a common vision. Others fail to gain traction, spinning out of control or momentarily flaring bright, then fizzling. Whether a movement succeeds is determined by how it is led. Any group of impassioned people can mount a protest or organize a march on Washington, but social change making at the end of the day is an act of leadership. The difference between strong movements and weaker ones is that the winners are “leaderfull.” They give power away, rather than hoard it. They provide common direction, rather than commands. Instead of squabbling over who gets credit for organizing the march, or who “owns” the donor lists, or who appears on CNN or Fox News, leaderfull movement figureheads share power, authority, and the limelight. The suburban students from Parkland displayed leaderfullness when they passed the microphone at the March for Our Lives to urban peers who face daily gun violence in schools and streets. Leaderfull movements strike a balance between two extremes; they are neither leaderless nor too leader-led. Remember Occupy Wall Street? Those champions of the 99% had a flat “leaderless” governance structure and a list of more than 20 disparate demands—and soon faded. At the other extreme, some movements are too leader-led: The top dogs attempt to control the movement from above, suffocating it. Leaderfull movements, on the other hand, purposely push power out to the grassroots, vesting authority in local chapters rather than controlling from the top. They disburse money, media attention, and training tools out to rank-and-file membership. They encourage people with the lived experience of the problem to lead—whether they’re survivors, victims’ families, or otherwise inured to the cause. All of the winning movements of modern times—such as tobacco control, gun rights expansion, and LGBTQ marriage equality—were successful because leaders embraced bottom-up approaches. Their top brass acted more like orchestra conductors than military commanders or corporate CEOs. Take the National Rifle Association: Its leadership structure is an upside-down pyramid, with its members at the top and staff supporting them from underneath. While the media spotlights the NRA’s steel-willed EVP and CEO Wayne LaPierre, the real power of the NRA derives from its millions of members and hundreds of thousands of field organizers, always ready to defend or advance gun rights—and vote for them. The NRA nurtures and grows its networks of supporters at state and local levels, and has leveraged those networks to advance the gun rights cause and elect firearm-friendly political candidates in all but a handful of U.S. states. While the gun rights movement has been leaderfull, gun control has historically been too leader-led. But that’s beginning to change. New gun reform groups like Everytown for Gun Safety, established in 2014 after the Newtown tragedy—and now #NeverAgain—are catching up to the NRA. In just a few years, Everytown’s supporters ballooned to more than 4 million (according to its website), and with chapters in all 50 states, it is aggressively working to block the NRA’s agenda—preventing guns in schools and on campuses, and fighting the Concealed Carry Reciprocity Act pending in Congress. Gun reform is finally becoming leaderfull, and that means it stands a fighting chance. Leslie Crutchfield is the author of How Change Happens: Why Some Social Movements Succeed While Others Don‘t and executive director of Georgetown University’s Global Social Enterprise Initiative. |