Inventing Leadership: The Challenge of DemocracyEdward Elgar, 2007 - 404 pages The tension between ruler and ruled in democratic societies has never been satisfactorily resolved, and the competing interpretations of this relationship lie at the bottom of much modern political discourse. In this fascinating book, Thomas Wren clarifies and elevates the debates over leadership by identifying the fundamental premises and assumptions that underlie past and present understandings. The author traces the intellectual history of the central constructs: the leader, the people, and, ultimately, the relationship between them as they seek to accomplish societal objectives. He begins with a discussion of the invented notion of the classical paragon of a ruler. Next he pursues the invention of the countervailing concept of a sovereign people, and finally, the need for the invention of a new construct - leadership - which embodies a new relation between ruler and ruled in regimes dedicated to power in the people. In doing so, he draws upon the giants of the Western intellectual tradition as well as the insights of modern historians, political scientists, sociologists and leadership scholars. The book concludes with a proposed model of leadership for a modern democratic world. Elegantly written and masterfully argued, this comprehensive study will be essential reading for students and scholars of leadership and democracy. |
From inside the book
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... social contract provides the solution.223 This statement of the problem and its solution sounds remarkably Lockean , and is the chief justification for the liberals ' tenuous claim to Rousseau . The reality was quite otherwise . A ...
... social contract . ' The legislator's task , in a sense , is to complete the passage from the state of nature to the civil state that Rousseau describes in ... the Social Contract . ' Or , as Rousseau himself puts it , the legislator ...
... social contract that structures expectations of behavior . That social contract , where each party ( leaders and the people ) come to expect certain contributions from the other , is , in turn ( to complete the circle ) , the root of ...
Contents
The classical ideal of the leader | 13 |
The classical ideal in republics | 46 |
2 | 88 |
Copyright | |
12 other sections not shown