Leadership Struggles in 'Lord of the Flies'

The great debate throughout all of the novel, Lord of the Flies, was that of finding out who was the best leader for the boys. Some thought that Jack was a better leader, and others stuck with Ralph until their death. So after all is said and done, who truly is the best leader? I firmly believe the easy answer here is that Ralph was clearly best fit to be leader because he was the most orderly and leader-like boy on the island.

Early in the novel, we saw almost immediately that Ralph was focused on what was most important. While most of the other boys were distracted by hunting and playing games, Ralph was focused on what was most important for the boys to get home safely. These important things included the fire and shelters. Most of the other boys could not be bothered by the idea of tending the fire or building shelters. Ralph on the other hand, was bothered only by the fact that the other boys refused to do these things. Just as they had the chance to be rescued, Ralph realizes there was no chance they would, as the hunters let the fire go out. Angrily, Ralph confronts Jack about this and says, “There was a ship. Out there. You said you’d keep the fire going and you let it out.”(70) This shows that between Ralph and Jack, Ralph was the only one seriously concerned with their

The conch was used to call meetings and was a symbol of authority at those meetings. If a boy had the conch in their hand, it was their turn to speak. This rule helped to keep order at meetings so that they were not shouting matches. The creator of this rule was none other than Ralph. During a meeting he says, “I’ll give the conch to the next person to speak. He can hold it while he is speaking. And he won’t be interrupted.” (33) This rule seems simple and unimportant, but really did wonders to keep meetings in order and make sure that things got