Leadership in Crow society was not inherited, not appointed, and not permanent in the way that European political authority was understood to be.

Chiefs were people who had earned the respect and loyalty of their followers through demonstrated ability — through success in battle, through wisdom in council, through generosity with their wealth, and through the kinds of interpersonal skills that make other people want to follow you.

Denig, who observed Crow leadership closely, described the Crow as a society in which “females were regarded in an inferior light in every way” — meaning that women as a category did not participate in formal councils, did not typically hold positions of political authority, and were not expected to engage in warfare.

This was the general norm.