Reconstructing Public Opinion through Informal Community Leadership in the Age of Fragmented Authority
Keywords:
informal leadership, public opinion, community sociology, symbolic capital, civic engagement, social networks, communication structuresAbstract
This study investigates the sociological function of informal leadership figures in shaping public opinion within community environments. It aims to identify and analyze the mechanisms such as cultural proximity, symbolic capital, and interpersonal trust that enable these figures to act as intermediaries between communities and broader political or informational narratives. Through a literature review approach, it examines how individuals who are not formally elected or institutionally appointed nonetheless exert substantial influence on collective perception and civic behavior. The research identifies key mechanisms such as cultural proximity, symbolic capital, and interpersonal trust that position these figures as intermediaries between communities and broader political or informational narratives. As formal structures of communication become increasingly fragmented, these informal voices fill the gap, translating complexity into shared meaning and mobilizing communal responses. The paper also explores how these dynamics are amplified in digital spaces, where traditional hierarchies of communication are disrupted. Findings suggest that understanding the emergence and function of informal leadership is crucial to grasp the true contours of public discourse, particularly in societies where institutional trust is volatile or contested. This study contributes to the academic discourse by integrating classical and contemporary theories to provide a conceptual foundation for further empirical investigation.
References
Al Hakim, Y. R., D. S. Sagita, & M. Irfan. 2022. Leadership Influence in Shaping Responsive Organizational Culture in the Face of Ongoing Change, Journal of Social Science Studies, 2(1), 207 – 212.
Ayres, S. 2022. A Decentred Assessment of the Impact of ‘Informal Governance’ on Democratic Legitimacy. Public Policy and Administration, 37(1), 22-45.
Bennett, D. L., C. Boudreaux, & B. Nikolaev. 2023. Populist Discourse and Entrepreneurship: The Role of Political Ideology and Institutions. Journal of International Business Studies, 54(1), 151-181.
Berger, P. L. & T. Luckmann. 1966. The Social Construction of Reality: A Treatise in the Sociology of Knowledge. Anchor Books, Garden City, New York.
Bherer, L., P. Dufour, & F. Montambeault. 2023. What Is Informal Participation?: Introduction to the Special Issue: Quietly Standing Out: Understanding Informal Forms of Political Engagement. International Journal of Politics, Culture, and Society, 36(1), 1–16.
Boulianne, S. 2015. Social Media Use and Participation: A Meta-Analysis of Current Research. Information, Communication & Society, 18(5), 524-538.
Carnabuci, G., C. Emery, & D. Brinberg. 2018. Emergent Leadership Structures in Informal Groups: A Dynamic, Cognitively Informed Network Model. Organization Science, 29(1), 118-133.
Chouliaraki, L. & M. Georgiou. 2019. The Digital Border: Mobility Beyond Territorial and Symbolic Divides. European Journal of Communication, 34(6), 594-605.
Crow, D. & M. Jones. 2018. Narratives as Tools for Influencing Policy Change. Policy & Politics, 46(2), 217-234.
Engelbert, L. H., M. van Elk, M. Kandrik, J. Theeuwes, & M. van Vugt. 2023. The Effect of Charismatic Leaders on Followers’ Memory, Error Detection, Persuasion and Prosocial Behavior: A Cognitive Science Approach. The Leadership Quarterly, 34(3), 101656.
Fenster, M. 2020. Populism and Transparency: The Political Core of an Administrative Norm. U. Cin. L. Rev., 89, 286-343.
Flick, U. 2009. An Introduction to Qualitative Research (4th ed.). SAGE Publications, London.
Fung, A. 2015. Putting the Public Back into Governance: The Challenges of Citizen Participation and Its Future. Public Administration Review, 75(4), 513-522.
Glaser, J. E. 2016. Conversational Intelligence: How Great Leaders Build Trust and Get Extraordinary Results. Routledge, New York.
Harnois, Y. G. & S. Gagnon. 2022. Fighting Corruption in International Development: A Grounded Theory of Managing Projects Within a Complex Socio-Cultural Context. Journal of Advances in Management Research, 19(5), 677-712.
Heavey, C., Z. Simsek, C. Kyprianou, & M. Risius. 2020. How Do Strategic Leaders Engage With Social Media? A Theoretical Framework for Research and Practice. Strategic Management Journal, 41(8), 1490-1527.
Hendriks, C. M. & J. Lees-Marshment. 2019. Political Leaders and Public Engagement: The Hidden World of Informal Elite–Citizen Interaction. Political Studies, 67(3), 597-617.
Irfan, M. & A. R. Putra. 2021. Leadership Approaches to Preserving Quality of Services and Products Amid Organizational Uncertainty, Journal of Social Science Studies, 1(2), 273 – 278.
Johansson, M. 2017. Everyday Opinions in News Discussion Forums: Public Vernacular Discourse. Discourse, Context & Media, 19, 5-12.
Katz, E. & P. F. Lazarsfeld. 1955. Personal Influence: The Part Played by People in the Flow of Mass Communications. Free Press, Glencoe, IL.
Li, Y. 2016. Measuring Social Capital: Formal and Informal Activism, Its Socio-Demographic Determinants and Socio-Political Impacts. In Social Measurement Through Social Surveys (pp. 173-194). Routledge, London.
Mardikaningsih, R. & D. Darmawan, D. 2022. Situational Leadership Strategies to Improve Change Management and Team Performance, Journal of Social Science Studies, 2(1), 247 – 252.
Marion, R., J. Christiansen, H. W. Klar, C. Schreiber, & M. A. Erdener. 2016. Informal Leadership, Interaction, Cliques and Productive Capacity in Organizations: A Collectivist Analysis. The Leadership Quarterly, 27(2), 242-260.
Maton, K. 2019. Semantics From Legitimation Code Theory: How Context-Dependence and Complexity Shape Academic Discourse. Academic Discourse: Systemic Functional Linguistics and Legitimation Code Theory. Routledge, London.
Mihaylov, N. L. & D. D. Perkins. 2015. Local Environmental Grassroots Activism: Contributions from Environmental Psychology, Sociology and Politics. Behavioral Sciences, 5(1), 121-153.
Polletta, F. 2022. Personal Storytelling in Social Movements. In The Routledge Companion to Narrative Theory (pp. 104-116). Routledge, New York.
Potluka, O. 2021. Roles of Formal and Informal Leadership: Civil Society Leadership Interaction with Political Leadership in Local Development. In Handbook on City and Regional Leadership. Edward Elgar Publishing, Cheltenham.
Putnam, R. D. 2000. Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community. Simon & Schuster, New York.
Rogers, E. M. 2003. Diffusion of Innovations. 5 th Edition. Free Press, New York.
Ryan, S., I. Conway, & K. Cassedy. 2022. The Commercialization of Influence Operations. In The Great Power Competition Volume 3: Cyberspace: The Fifth Domain (pp. 167-195). Springer International Publishing, Cham.
Salkin, W. 2022. Democracy Within, Justice Without: The Duties of Informal Political Representatives 1. Noûs, 56(4), 940-971.
Schmidt, G. B. & S. A. Van Dellen. 2022. Leadership of Place in Virtual Environments. Leadership, 18(1), 186-202.
Schulte, B., F. Andresen, & H. Koller. 2020. Exploring the Embeddedness of an Informal Community of Practice Within a Formal Organizational Context: A Case Study in the German Military. Journal of Leadership & Organizational Studies, 27(2), 153-179.
Silverman, D. 2006. Interpreting Qualitative Data: Methods for Analyzing Talk, Text and Interaction. SAGE Publications, London.
Sullivan, J., Y. Zhao, & W. Wang. 2023. China's Livestreaming Local Officials: An Experiment in Popular Digital Communications. The China Quarterly, 256, 1036-1052.
Tönnies, F. 2001. Community and Civil Society. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
Tur, B., J. Harstad, & J. Antonakis. 2022. Effect of Charismatic Signaling in Social Media Settings: Evidence from TED and Twitter. The Leadership Quarterly, 33(5), 101476.
Ud Din, I., K. A. Awan, A. Almogren, & J. J. Rodrigues. 2023. Integration of IoT and Blockchain for Decentralized Management and Ownership in the Metaverse. International Journal of Communication Systems, 36(18), 1-35.
Venkatesan, S., R. Valecha, N. Yaraghi, O. Oh, & H. R. Rao. 2021. Influence in Social Media: An Investigation of Tweets Spanning the 2011 Egyptian Revolution. MIS Quarterly, 45(4).
Yin, R. K. 2003. Case Study Research: Design and Methods (3rd ed.). SAGE Publications, Thousand Oaks, California.
