Lord of the flies is an allegorical novel written by William Golding that illustrates how regardless of age, humans will always have savage tendencies, and the ability to control these instincts will vary, like the wielder of a sword. Throughout the novel, Jack and Ralph are shown to have strong leadership skills. Whether it is Jack commanding his hunters or Ralph making sure the fire stays lit, they both make sure that their orders are followed. Their leadership styles, however, are very different. Ralph uses the conch to keep everyone in line, and to get everyone to maintain order, whether through calling assemblies, or having rules such as the whoever has the conch may speak rule, his control, however, diminishes as the story progresses, because Jack begins to strive for power. I found that however good each leader may be, they were both lacking in one area or another. Ralph is a democratic leader, similar to that of Franklin Roosevelt, American President at the time, he tries to do whatever is in his ability to keep the peace, and his way to do so is through speech, demonstrated by his many assemblies. Through these assemblies, he would decide on what actions to take, what jobs should be done, and by whom, and any other matters. The negative aspect of Ralph’s leadership is that he spends a lot of time thinking, and less time doing, and often relied on Piggy’s intellect, and slowly throughout the story Ralph’s control over the group begins to crumble, through the many insults that he hurls at jack and the hunters, until they split. Jack lead the hunters from the beginning and proved to be a good leader as he came up with tactics spontaneously about what to and not to do. The only thing lacking in Jack’s leadership was the quality of his decisions, the spontaneous decisions often meant that his plans were impulsive, and poorly thought out. This leads to him making rash and decisions that can result in major consequences, especially for those around him. Ralph and Piggy acted as peacekeepers, whereas Jack and his hunters constantly preached violence through their chants, chants such as “Kill the beast! Cut his throat! Spill his blood!” and such chants also showed to have an influence on the highly impressionable ‘Young’uns.” One of Jack’s worst decisions was not a decision, but him not being sensible enough to control his savage impulses, and that was what lead to the death of Simon. Simon’s death was unfortunate, and m...
