In the story Animal Farm, we see how the farm is being organized and it has changed overtime. One of the most important thing of running a community or organization is the leader or the person in power. Only the smartest one will become the leader, being the boss is not the easy job. “Power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely”. In animal farm we see that when a person is on top of the society, he then becomes hubris and does not look at or try to sense how their followers are feeling, they would only care about the strong position they had gained and do whatever it takes to stay at their current status of the ladder.
Power corrupts ones behavior and attitude. At the start of the story, we are introduced to the owner of the farm, Mr. Jones. He is the owner and the leader of his farm: “he had locked the hen-houses for night, but was too drunk to remember to shut the pop-holes.” (p.1) Mr. Jones is a drunken man, he is obsessed with drinking. With the power he has with his farm and the money he has, he have a lot of spare time to drink, but it is corrupting both his health and his mental emotions. When Mr. Jones thinks his farm is running well, he thinks he had achieved absolute power, therefore he totally slacks off: “For whole days at time he would lounge in his Windsor chair in the kitchen, reading newspapers and drinking.” (p.11) as you can see, the man is totally off it. He used to be a hard working man at his younger ages which brought the farm up into a profitable organization. Now that when he thought that he had achieved absolute power, it had corrupted Mr. Jones into a lazy, useless and senseless man.
One, who has power, can sacrifice anyone, including his friends, race, teammates and comrades. When Snowball and Napoleon raises up, they both already had power, but the power corrupted them and made them want more: “He was running as only as a pig can run, but the dogs were close on his heels.” (p.35) .This was the scene when Napoleon commanded his dogs and drove Snowbell out of the farm. As you see, the two pigs use to be partners ruling the farm; they were running it strongly together. The power they had gained had drove the power of teamwork away and making Napoleon want to work alone. Napoleon had a really good comrade at the farm, one who always obeyed him and follow every word he said. It was Boxer but the power of friendship is not strong enough: “Do you not understand what that means? They are taking Boxer to the knackers’!” (p.82). Napoleon, after being the leader of the farm, had gained absolute power. He had sent one of his best friends to death just because he wants a little more money.
When you are the leader, you simply think yourself as the most important central part; you forget the feelings of others around you. Napoleon used to be a little pig just when the Old Major introduced the idea of rebellion and such. He had also showed the farm a song called Beasts of England; everyone loved it. When Napoleon thought it was unnecessary, he took it out immediately without good understanding of others: “Beasts of England had been abolished.” (p.59). that shows when you have power, you just care about yourself, you would not look into the feelings of others. Once Napoleon achieved absolute power, it had really computed him. He did not care the feelings of others but also killed a lot of animals just so the other animals will be afraid of him: “All the animals were slain on the spot.” (p.57). This clearly shows the power has made Napoleon once a caring pig when he was thinking about revolution when he was small and turned into a harsh leader with no mercy just to get more and more power.
When one is on top of the leader, the people below them are not important, once you have achieved absolute power you will do what ever you can to stay at the top, it will corrupt your attitude, relationships with others, and sympathy from your heart. Leadership is the art of influencing human behavior to accomplish a mission so as desired by the leader. People at the top will do what ever they can to finish their goal; they also fear that they will be overthrown so they make sure everyone is scare of them beforehand. They want things done according to their own way. “Power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely”, we can definitely reflect all this to the ruling of Mr. Jones and Napoleon in the book Animal Farm.
