Jared Diamond’s latest book, *Profits, Prophets, Coaches and Kings: (When) Do Leaders Make a Difference?*, explores the complex question of whether individual leaders significantly influence the course of history or merely reflect broader forces at play. Diamond, an American scientist and historian best known for his Pulitzer Prize-winning *Guns, Germs, and Steel* (1997), confronts this longstanding debate by examining leadership’s true impact across political, business, religious, and sporting domains.

At the core of the book is Diamond’s attempt to navigate between the “Great Man Theory,” which credits individuals with shaping history, and the opposing view that larger trends, luck, or structural factors determine outcomes. He ultimately adopts a middle ground, arguing that leaders sometimes do make a difference, but not always. This nuanced position, however, leaves readers without a definitive theory, emphasizing the difficulty in isolating the precise influence of individual leaders.

To avoid what he terms the pitfalls of the “biographical method,” where the life of one charismatic figure is overemphasized, Diamond employs what he describes as “natural experiments” in his case studies. These aim to compare actual leadership outcomes with plausible alternatives, seeking to gauge the unique contributions of particular individuals.

One of his principal examples is Botswana’s first president, Seretse Khama, who led the country through a critical post-independence period marked by the discovery of diamond reserves. Diamond credits Khama’s decision to place diamond rights under national ownership as pivotal in enabling Botswana’s subsequent prosperity. Using his self-coined “Hamlet test” — questioning whether anyone but a specific leader could have achieved the same outcome — Diamond contends that Khama’s role was indispensable, making him a rare example of transformative leadership. Notably, figures such as Nelson Mandela receive less focus in the analysis, while Margaret Thatcher is mentioned briefly.

Diamond also examines Rachel Carson, the environmentalist whose 1962 book *Silent Spring* raised awareness about pesticide dangers and helped catalyze the formation of the US Environmental Protection Agency in 1970. While acknowledging Carson’s influence, Diamond debates her classification as a political leader, given her lack of formal political office or a broad organizational base. He further highlights other contemporaneous factors that boosted the environmental movement, such as major pollution disasters and vivid imagery of Earth from Apollo missions.

When considering business leaders, religious figures, and sports coaches, Diamond remains skeptical of their unique impact. He suggests that chief executives’ achievements could likely have been replicated by others, though this stance downplays the role of innovation and individual vision. His assessment of sports coaches is particularly controversial, asserting their effect may be overstated and that replacing coaches is often a matter of chance. For religious leadership, he concludes that success depends not just on the leader but on the convergence of the right time and place.

Throughout the book, Diamond emphasizes the importance of context and circumstances in shaping historical outcomes, perhaps at the expense of the power of ideas and innovations themselves. While his conclusions are sometimes inconclusive or provoke debate, his rich array of examples, especially Botswana’s trajectory, offers valuable insights into the interplay between individual agency and structural forces in history.