Vlad The Impaler Essay

Vlad the Impaler was not a transformational leader due to his unwillingness to collaborate or delegate power to his boyars or anyone but himself. Since the beginning of the Wallachian principality, power was shared equally between the boyars and the prince. In fact, the boyar establishment was created before the principality itself. Because of Vlad’s overbearing nature, his idea of his role of sovereignty and idealization of the nation-state, collective leadership was ineffective. His vision included annihilating the power of boyars and nobility, centralizing administration, and creating a self-serving military force. On the first Easter of his reign, he began systematically purging his boyars. The location of the first attack was a dinner
At the beginning of his reign, his terror tactics were highly horrific and violent, yet proved effective in eliminating crime. Vlad used impalement as punishment for committing any crime, giving citizens a great incentive to abide by the law. Not only were citizens impaled, but as a terror tactic, Vlad held public impalements. He would hang the corpses on trees and walls that surrounded the kingdom, turning the entire state into a massive graveyard, constantly smelling of death. While this tactic was excessively gruesome, Vlad proved he was an effective communicator, a skill necessary in effective transformational leadership. His fear inducing method was successful in eradicating crime. In order to demonstrate this, Vlad had a golden chalice placed in each district, unsupervised at all times, and it was not stolen even once over the period of his reign. Even the poorest people did not dare try to steal the chalice, fearing the unthinkable outcome. This power made Vlad feel invincible, causing him to continue his horrendous habits. Vlad quickly grew tired of civility, so for his own amusement, increased fear tactics and further denied citizen’s independence. He began impaling women for no reason, claiming they were not working hard enough. He took immense personal enjoyment from impaling innocent women. Additionally, each