Dark entanglement: narcissistic leaders, their followers, and the contexts they create

This chapter describes the complex interplay between narcissistic leaders and their followers and how different contexts influence this dynamic relationship. In contrast to the traditional narcissistic leadership literature, which has concentrated on the leader’s characteristics and tendencies, we apply a relational-based perspective to argue that followers can enhance or suppress these characteristics of the leader. We also discuss how contexts also have a similar effect on leaders and followers. Narcissistic relationships flourish under certain circumstances and wither under others. We argue that a complete understanding of narcissistic leadership requires understanding of and empirical study of the entangled nature of these three variables.