from a unique, transitory gift of grace of extraordinary times and persons into a permanent possession of everyday life.”[69] It is for this reason that charisma is subject to perennial decay: charismatic movements attempt to institutionalize the authority associated with the charismatic leader, adopting strategies of rationalization and bureaucratization that make authority stable and transmissible. While the organizations that evolve out of this process may continue to benefit from a lingering charismatic aura, on a dayto-day level their operations look much the same as those of any other rationalized enterprise and generally bear little resemblance to the charismatic leader’s original vision.
Each of these three characteristics of charisma can be usefully contrasted with the characteristics I have associated with the concept of exemplarity. While exemplarity proposes that some individuals are especially accomplished, for example, it is less conducive to a rigid distinction between leader and follower, since examples must, in some sense, be accessible to those expected to imitate them. Rather than treating the exemplar as a quasi-divine figure in possession of unique qualities, exemplarity envisions people operating on a more or less equal plane of ability. Exemplarity presumes, in other words, that exceptional people do not have a monopoly on the qualities they exemplify, and that the proper response to exemplary behaviour is not genuflection or obedience, but an effort to discover and develop similar qualities in oneself. Both Day and Maurin, as we have seen, demurred when characterized by others as saints, and, like most exemplars, downplayed their own exemplarity by claiming merely to be imitating even worthier predecessors. Furthermore, they articulated an egalitarianism of aspiration according to which all members of the movement were invited to adopt saintliness as their own ideal. Day went even further, in fact, by consistently highlighting saintly qualities in the actions of figures outside the movement altogether, including the many secular radicals she counted as personal friends.
Exemplarity also differs from Weber’s charisma in that it is, by its very nature, less likely to be employed as a means of legitimating domination. The actions of the exemplar, unlike the charismatic leader, have little to do with amassing and commanding followers.[70] The exemplar is generally content to exert an indirect
