The Mobilization of Charisma

Charismatic authority is typically ephemeral. Weber argued that it was therefore subject to a process of "routinization", where the original form of authority became detached from a particular person and could become the charisma of a specific office. While the process of routinization is historically important, charisma can also be intentionally mobilized in order to accumulate legal and traditional forms of authority without thereby becoming routinized. In such cases, charisma is not routinized but mobilized and as it were "invested" in the creation of other forms of authority. In this paper I thus explore the processes through which charismatic authority is mobilized in modern states to accumulate formal or informal authority, paying special attention to the processes that result in the accumulation and concentration of legal authority in the hands of charismatic chief executives. I also argue that this process is asymmetrical; it is not always possible to mobilize formal or informal authority to accumulate charismatic authority due to the nature of the charismatic bond.