Who makes history?Great men
or the masses?
• The Great Man theory:
• Thomas Carlyle (d.1881), “ The history of the world is but the biographyoes of great man”
reflecting his belief that heroes shape history throught both their personal attributes and divine inspiration.
• In his book On Heroes, Hero-Worship and the
Heroic in History, (Muhammad, Shakespeare,
Luther, Rousseau, and Napoleon)
• "Such are all great historical men, whose own particular aims involve those large issues
which are the will of the World Spirit. ... World historical men - the Heroes of an epoch - must be recognized as its clear-sighted ones; their deeds, their words are the best of that time.
Great men have formed purposes to satisfy themselves, not others."Georg Wilhelm
Friedrich Hegel (d.1831)
• Criticism:
• Herbert Spencer (d.1903) believed that the men Carlyle called ‘great men’ were merely products of their social environment.
• “ You must admit that the genesis of a great man depends on the long series of complex influences which has produced the race in which he appears, and the social state into which that race has slowly grown…Before he can remake his society, his society must make him.” H. Spencer
• “ Owing to his personal features, or to a chance, or to his social standing, or to the peculiarity of the epoch, an
individual by the very fact of his existence, by his ideas or actions (or inaction) directly or indirectly, during his
lifetime or after his death may have such an influence
upon his own or another society which can be recognized significant as he left a noticeable mark (positive, negative or unambiguous) in history and in the further
development of society.” Leonid Grinin
• So Grinin concludes that the role of Great Man depends on a number of factors, or none at all.
• “Despite great man important role in leading the overturn of the old social order, it is not they who determine either the outbreak or the progress of
the revolution. These are determined by the mass of the people whose aims and actions are the driving force of history. If social conditions for a revolution have not yet matured, then no matter how brilliant the individuals or potential leaders may be , any
attempt at revolution will inevitably fail; there will be no actual revolution.”
