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1 – 5 of 5Jan G. Langhof and Stefan Güldenberg
This study aims to include two major objectives. Firstly, Frederick’s leadership is explored and characterized. Secondly, it is examined as to why a leader may (or may not) adopt…
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to include two major objectives. Firstly, Frederick’s leadership is explored and characterized. Secondly, it is examined as to why a leader may (or may not) adopt servant leadership behavior in the case of Frederick II, King of Prussia.
Design/methodology/approach
The applied methodology is a historical examination of Frederick II’s leadership, an eighteenth-century’s monarch who has the reputation of being the “first servant of the state.” The analysis is conducted from the perspective of modern servant leadership research.
Findings
This study shows Frederick remains a rather non-transparent person of contradictions. The authors identified multiple reasons which explain why a leader may adopt servant leadership. Frederick’s motives to adopt a certain leadership behavior appear timeless and, thus, he most likely shares the same antecedents with today’s top executives.
Research limitations/implications
The authors identified various antecedents of individual servant leadership dimensions, an under-research area to date.
Originality/value
To the best of authors’ knowledge, this study is the first to look at Frederick's leadership style through the lens of modern servant leadership.
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Dan Mertens, Salvador G. Villegas, Marlon G. Ware, Edward F. Vengrouskie and Robert Lloyd
The purpose of this paper is to establish a supported and validated reference point for Machiavellianism as an antecedent to the contemporary management philosophy of business…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to establish a supported and validated reference point for Machiavellianism as an antecedent to the contemporary management philosophy of business process reengineering (BPR).
Design/methodology/approach
This paper analyzes BPR and Machiavellianism by using the seminal work of Hammer and Champy (1993) on BPR and the original writings of Machiavelli coupled with the personal correspondence of Machiavelli with his contemporaries.
Findings
The findings of this research indicate that the constructs of Machiavellian thought transcend the five centuries since the publication of The Prince, and can be found in the contemporary managerial framework of BPR. This comparison of historical leadership frameworks demonstrates how recent management decisions in companies show the rise of Machiavellian as BPR. In an analysis of these theories, the authors show similarities in five significant tenets of business leadership and argue how these repackaged ideas and prescriptions undermine employee-centric advances.
Research limitations/implications
This comparison reviews the managerial frameworks presented in Machiavelli’s The Prince and Hammer and Champy’s book Reengineering the Corporation through the theoretical tenets of leadership.
Practical implications
Employment of Machiavellianism and BPR results in an expendable utilization of followers and employees. Implications abound for modern managers, as the authors emphasize the elements and outcomes which lead to deleterious organizational outcomes.
Social implications
In an analysis of these theories, the authors argue how these strategies undermine employee-centric advances within human relations by embracing these repackaged ideas and concepts.
Originality/value
This research leverages historical perspective to provide a qualitative understanding of the follies of recycled versions of Machiavelli’s ideas. The overall study and inquiry of BPR from a leadership perspective is not robust and leaves antecedents and influences critically unevaluated.
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The paper combines the systems theoretical perspective on the evolution of societal differentiation and the emergence of codes in communication. By combining the approach by…
Abstract
Purpose
The paper combines the systems theoretical perspective on the evolution of societal differentiation and the emergence of codes in communication. By combining the approach by Niklas Luhmann with a historical theology on the development of Christian morality split between God and Devil, it recreates a sociological point of observation on contemporary moral forms by a temporary occupation of the retired Christian Devil.
Design/methodology/approach
The article combines a Luhmannian systems theoretical perspective on the evolution of societal differentiation with a concept of emerging codes in communication. The latter is based on on the development of a Christian view of morality being split between God and Devil. It establishes a sociological point of observation on contemporary moral forms through the temporary invocation of the retired figure of the Christian Devil.
Findings
The proposed perspective develops a healthy perspective on the exuberant distribution of a health(y) morality across the globe during the pandemic crisis of 2020–21. The temporary invocation of the retired Christian Devil as point of departure in this sociological analysis allows for a disturbing view on the unlimited growth of the morality of health and its inherent dangers of dedifferentiating the highly specialised forms of societal differentiation and organisation.
Originality/value
By applying the diabolical perspective, the analytical framework creates a unique opportunity to observe the moral encodings of semantic forms in detail, while keeping the freedom of scientific enquiry to choose amongst available distinctions in the creation of sound empirical knowledge. This article adopts a neutral stance, for the good of sociological analysis. The applications of the term “evil” to observations of communication are indifferent to anything but itself and its qualities as scientific enquiry.
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Ernest Alan Buttery and Ewa Maria Richter
Machiavellian principles are deemed to be applicable to our modern enterprises and have been said to offer critical advice to, and decisive discourse on, management thought and…
Abstract
Machiavellian principles are deemed to be applicable to our modern enterprises and have been said to offer critical advice to, and decisive discourse on, management thought and education. The paper revisits Machiavelli’s original arguments and examines these in the light of modern management theory. In particular, the paper scrutinizes the theory for relevance to today’s enterprise given that it was conceived in an era of competitive fragmentation of the Renaissance. The authors comment on a number of topics on which Machiavelli has offered advice, including takeovers of principalities, change, alliances, governance, and leadership principles for applicability to business. The paper concludes that the best way to manage complex business organizations is not through corrupting best management practice with the ideology of Machiavelli but to foster visionary well communicated business principles and practices.
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The purpose of this paper is to develop a theory of sovereign entrepreneurship, which is a special kind of political entrepreneurship.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to develop a theory of sovereign entrepreneurship, which is a special kind of political entrepreneurship.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper uses qualitative methods/historical survey.
Findings
Sovereignty is rooted in self-enforced exchange of political property rights. Sovereign entrepreneurship is the creative employment of political property rights to advance a plan.
Research limitations/implications
Because a polity’s constitution is determined by its distribution of political property rights, sovereign entrepreneurship and constitutional change are necessarily linked. The author illustrated how sovereign entrepreneurship can be applied by using it to explain the rise of modern states.
Practical implications
In addition to studying instances of sovereign entrepreneurship in distant history, scholars can apply it to recent history. Sovereign entrepreneurship can be especially helpful as a tool for doing analytic narratives of low-n cases of political-economic development, especially when those polities attract interests for being “development miracles.”
Originality/value
This paper uses treats sovereignty as a political property right.
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