PSCI442 - LEADERSHIP:Theory and Practice

"Leadership" is a topic of cutting-edge research in many different branches of the social sciences, but it is also a topic on which scholars in the humanities have had much to say, and on which journalists, business consultants, and ostensibly successful "leaders" themselves have also had (too!) much to say. More than 30,000 different books on "leadership" have been published in English in recent years, and "leadership training" is now an industry that attracts billions of dollars a year from governments businesses, media corporations, military organizations, and nonprofit organizations, too. Anchored in what will be defined as a "political science perspective on leadership," this seminar will explore multiple and competing concepts and theories of "leadership," engage second-semester political science seniors in a host of related "live case studies" and exercises, and conclude with each student developing his or her own "Leadership Traits and Skills (LTS) Profile" and "Five-Year LTS Plan." Sub-topics will include leadership and democracy; leadership and psychology; leadership and gender; and "cross-sectoral" leadership.