Alternatives to the Great Man Theory?

Everyone knows of the unpopular theory that history is driven forward by men (or women) who innovate and deny trends, my question is what exactly are the alternatives? Would something like Whig History or Historical Materialism be described as alternative theories attempting to explain the same phenomenon? If not, what?
 
Well, I can't give you an academic alternative, but some have pointed out that circumstances come, and it's the toss of a dice who uses those circumstances to their advantage/to make history.
Example: Rome's Evolution from Republic to Empire:The Roman Republic expanded it's borders signifigantly from 500 BCE -0 CE. Rome was giving this job of expansion to legions of men who swore loyalty to their generals. This set the Republic up for it's own demise. The Generals had large loyal armies which obeyed their command. The Power that a General wields may very well corrupt most men who find themselves in that position. It's not hard to make a many greed for more than just a loyal army. Government royal to him, perhaps?
It could have been Marius, Caesar, Pompey, any Roman General could have done it given the right circumstances.
 
What do you mean by alternatives. Alternatives in modern historical scholarship, or those that could have taken its place historically? You have to remember that the "great man" theory is not as widespread outside the Anglosphere as within it. In the 19th cenntury German tradition, it was much more common to assume a superorganic development in which inevitable onward development is driven by nations or communities as primary actors. All rather Hegelian. Traditional historiography, of course, often goes with the idea of history as theologically informed, either as an example of divine intervention or decision, or as a narrative towards universal salvation. The Chinese tradition tends to think of it in terms of a struggle to preserve or restore harmonic and appropriate social relations (not having them displeases the Heavens). Of course, there were also materialist and evolutionary conceptions fairly early, and in the nineteenth century these became quite popular, too (though the vanilla Marxist model is too telic to be thought of as properly materialist). All of these ideas could well prevail over the "great man" idea in popularity.

In actual reality, very few serious historians subscribe to the "great man" model. That doesn't mean it doesn't structure their thinking, of course.
 
Everyone knows of the unpopular theory that history is driven forward by men (or women) who innovate and deny trends...

Unpopular with who though? It may be unpopular with sociologists and such, but it's fairly popular with storytellers.

Really the question of "what is history?" depends in large measure on "what determines the course of human events?". If you believe that human events are the result of a combination of human choices, made with free will, and chance, then the Great Man Theory sounds a lot better than more Determinist philosophies like Historical Materialism (or, technically, Whig History).

Of course, that doesn't mean one follows from the other -- even assuming the role of Human Free Will, there's still the question of how the mechanics that govern how groups of people (societies, nations, civilizations, etc) go about making collective decisions, which Great Man Theory does little to elaborate on.
 
Can't we both have Great Man (like Washington, who could have been king or dictator but refused) and trends (like the Roman general thing)?
 
Well, there's no denying there are great men. Without Temujin, the world would have been radically different. And he wasn't the product of a general trend, as far as I can see.

Iulius Caesar or Alexander ('the Great') were a product of general trends (the republic would have collapsed anyway, and Alexander merely used the stuff his father left to go on a conquest spree), but they were also great men, as in, someone else might have done the same as they did, but they probably wouldn't be as successful or such.

So yeah, I'd argue both 'general trends' and 'great men' are true.
 
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