Lord Of The Flies Maslow's Hierarchy Of Needs

Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs is a theory that basically states the reasoning and needs that encourage the human behavior. It is usually depicted as a pyramid starting with the most basic and progressing to the more advanced needs; physiological needs, safety needs, belongingness and love needs, esteem needs, and finally self-actualization needs. This theory was thought of by a man of the name Abraham Maslow in 1943. Maslow believed that human beings are motivated by unsatisfied or incomplete needs. The theory also states that because of this humans feel encouraged to look for more, moving up the pyramid, but only once all of the needs are met from the previous level.
People have even gone as far and made a “2.0” version of this, seeing as though each could be broken down into more things. The creators of the more improved list divided it into three sections: survival needs, successful needs, and transcendent needs. Also now including not only physical health, and emotional health, but intellectual health, and spiritual health.
Lord of the Flies is a perfect job of depicting this theory in the way of leadership.
The book shows how leaders are more inclined to be at the top of the list because they are able to help others achieve their needs. It also shows what happens or more so what does not happen when you try to more from a level without having the needs met. Along with this the book and the theory show that leader and people higher on the pyramid will not follow or have leaders who are lower on the system. I think the best way to describe this in the book is to go backward or from the top of the pyramid to the bottom. The major players we see the theory in are Ralph, Piggy, Jack and Simon.
The first level of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs are the physical needs, food, water, shelter, air, etc. The boys first started to have their needs when they found water and started to build shelters. One interesting thing though is that before they found all of this the boys picked a leader, something they deemed a necessity. This is after they realize that they are no longer in society and no longer have the needs that they had before. We see this throughout the novel the boys acquiring all of their physiological needs. Their leader was the main one with rational thoughts and from the beginning, readers can tell he is higher up on the pyramid the rest of the boys stuck on the island. The second level was met when Ralph explored the island accompanied by Jack and Simon.
Another way this level of safety was met, is by the conch. It was a signal to tell other people that there were other people on the island. Which also not only met their needs but the rest of the boys along with that. Along with the first and second levels being met the third level is met not just with friendships being made, like Piggy and Ralph, but in general, just the boys being in a group gave them a sense of being a part of something. The fourth level, esteem, was something not everyone reached and the ones who do achieve did not initially have. This requires confidence, the main person who exemplified that was Ralph. "I was chief, and you were going to do what I said." From this, we can clearly see that he has confidence and assures
to(Golding,46)
When they were building shelters the group started to split apart. The ones who built the shelter achieved the basic needs and the ones who left did not. Readers will also notice that the ones who went with Jack and left Ralph as their leader did not accomplish much because Jack had not met the needs required to be happy let alone a good leader, that helps others reach self-actualization, the last level of the pyramid.
Self-actualization is the realization or fulfillment of one's talents and potentialities, especially considered as a drive or need present in everyone. It is the final step or the step where you reach happiness and fill complete. People who have reached this level are often described as realistic and rational, happy and independent. In correlation to the book, some will do anything to make sure others do not achieve self-actualization, even though they have not reached it themselves. Many probably do not even realize that they are doing it in efforts to achieve happiness. Maybe in hopes that they will achieve it faster. We see this with Jack and his followers when they kill people who have reached it, for example when they killed Simon and Piggy. They did this because Piggy and Simon had reached the level of self-actualization.
"Fancy thinking the beast was something you could hunt or kill! … You knew, didn't you? I'm part of you? Close, close, close. I'm the reason why it's no go? Why things are what they are?” (Golding,206)Simon hears this when he travels up the mountain in chapter eight. Out of all of the boys, Simon is the only one who wants to face The Beast head on. He is the only one at this point with rational thoughts. While the mountain he talks to the beast who is also the lord of the flies, which is a pig head covered in flies. The flies then start to cover Simon, but he does not seem to mind. Simon is hallucinating, but aside from that, he is having a conversation with himself. The lord of the flies explains that the beast is not real and that the beast is just the darkness and fear within all of the boys; it is not a physical thing or being but is the evil hiding in the boy’s minds. Simon felt that the beast was The beast was harmless and horrible, and the news must reach the others as soon as possible. He feels this because many who have achieved happiness want nothing more than for others to achieve it too.
Before he reached the final level and starts to fully understood what was happening, inside of the boy’s minds. Simon had to meet all of his other needs. The basic needs, which consist of safety, a sense of love and belonging, and of course physical needs. They have found a way to forge and hunt for food, they have water, the boys also have each other, they have a fire. We also see that he has the esteem level by the way he treats the littluns and the way he has confidence in himself. He met all of these by being with the group, more importantly being in Ralph’s group.
Which brings me to the point that I made before, a good leader who is further up on the pyramid, the people who follow them get to move along on the pyramid based on their leader’s successes. Another thing that happens that refers back to the pyramid is when piggy dies, Ralph does not have the proper esteem needs nor the feeling of love and belonging. This brings him down, he needs to have the basic needs in order to feel some sort of happiness. “He came to the smashed acres of fruit and ate greedily”(Golding,184) Ralph is in dire need of something to feel assured.
In the novel, Golding shows that having a good leader can lead to the succession of a group and having a bad leader can lead to failure and jealousy, which is clearly represented by Maslow’s Hierarchy of needs. We see the effects of having a good leader with Ralph, and the bad leader in Jack. We also see that there is the necessity of achieving certain things before trying to meet other needs. In addition, we as readers learn the importance of those who do well want others to succeed.