Dominance meets competence: A socio-ecological perspective on leadership and human social hierarchies

Dominance has been evolutionarily salient in shaping power relations across species, and recent social-psychological work has revived the concept in the study of human social hierarchies. Yet previous research has produced mixed findings and inconsistent interpretations of the effectiveness of dominance. This article clarifies the role of dominance, particularly in the context of leadership selection. We relax the strict view of dominance as inherently equated with physical aggression and antisociality, often assumed to be inherited from nonhuman primates. Instead, its instrumental value depends on how followers evaluate its capacity to benefit them. We situate this reframing within a unitary evolutionary model of human status, in which diverse traits and behaviours contribute to leadership through a single pathway of competence. We then outline the socio-ecological conditions under which dominance-based leadership emerges. We argue that groups grant leadership to individuals who demonstrate contextually relevant competence, particularly when contexts demand (a) resolving and preventing intragroup conflict, (b) securing and defending resources, and (c) managing external threats. We invite future research to examine how socio-ecological contexts shape diverse forms of leadership, moving beyond explanations focused on a fixed set of individual motives and strategies for status attainment.