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The aim of this chapter is to argue that charisma is a collective representation, and that charismatic authority is a social status that derives more from the “recognition” of the followers than from the “magnetism” of the leaders. I contend further that a close reading of Max Weber shows that he, too, saw charisma in this light.

I develop my argument by a close reading of many of the most relevant texts on the subject. This includes not only the renowned texts on this subject by Max Weber, but also many books and articles that interpret or criticize Weber’s views.

I pay exceptionally close attention to key arguments and texts, several of which have been overlooked in the past.

Writers for whom charisma is personal magnetism tend to assume that charismatic rule is natural and that the full realization of democratic norms is unlikely. Authority, in this view, emanates from rulers unbound by popular constraint. I argue that, in fact, authority draws both its mandate and its energy from the public, and that rulers depend on the loyalty of their subjects, which is never assured. So charismatic claimants are dependent on popular choice, not vice versa.

I advocate a “culturalist” interpretation of Weber, which runs counter to the dominant “personalist” account. Conventional interpreters, under the sway of theology or mass psychology, misread Weber as a romantic, for whom charisma is primal and undemocratic rule is destiny. This essay offers a counter-reading.

To consider anew the classic debate between Herman Finer and Carl Friedrich in the history of public administration that has shaped both the theory and practice of government since the 1940s in much of the Western world, and in other parts of the world influenced by the Western example.

A study of the original contribution of both Finer and Friedrich in their own times, which is then put into the current context of reducing the size of government.

The central argument is a distinction between accountability which means obeying orders and responsibility which means acting on a judgment of the greater good.

The paper reminds readers that accountability to a minister and responsibility to the public good may not always coincide.

This essay focuses on institutional leadership in complex public organizations. Using an expanded version of James A. Stever’s organizational scepticism framework, an argument is presented that the concept new occupies a privileged and unique position in the modern conception of leadership. The concept’s status is due, in part, to its intimate relationship with other favorable concepts, most notably progress and radical change. It is argued that the modern fixation with new, progress and radical change is troublesome. The scholarly community is encouraged to commit more intellectual resources to developing alternative models of leadership that recognize the usefulness of, but are not limited by, the underlying values and assumptions of modernity. The model of administrative conservatorship is offered as one such model.

Being extensively used in metallurgy, rotating magnetic fields are also becoming increasingly interesting for application in crystal growth, where they are intended to act by stabilizing the melt flow. For this purpose, it is important to understand the basic interactions of the magnetically induced flow and other flow components like time‐dependent buoyant convection. So a three‐dimensional finite volume method was developed in order to numerically study the effect of a rotating magnetic field on convection in a cylindrical melt volume. The equations of mass, momentum, and heat transport are solved together with the potential equations describing the electromagnetic field. The numerical computation of the Lorenz force distribution is validated by comparison with an analytical solution. The effects of magnetic field parameters on the temperature distributions and the flow patterns in the considered configurations are analysed.

To examine how public servants are depicted in film, I discuss the changes over time of Batmanʼs Commissioner Gordon, particularly his character arc in the contemporary The Dark Knight trilogy. An important aspect of Gordonʼs evolution is in contrast to the filmsʼ other prominent public servant, District Attorney Harvey Dent. The Gordon-Dent contrast illustrates aspects of the Friedrich-Finer debate over administrative discretion, a classic debate in public administration. The trilogyʼs verdict on public service is mixed: the flawed, rule-bending, expedient public servant survives while the fabricated hero is a sham. Commissioner Gordon is far more interesting than he had been for decades, but is he just an expedient bureaucrat ultimately pursuing self preservation? In contrast, the (pre-villain) Harvey Dent, who refuses to compromise his principles, is ultimately undone by his absolutism. For the complexity of his character and its centrality to the plot, I judge the depiction of Commissioner Gordon-warts and all-to be better than simplistic caricatures of bureaucrats and promising for future public servants in film.

Pragmatism in the sense of harmonizing rules and reality for the sake of appropriate problem solving and overall performance is a ubiquitous phenomenon in organizational life. As such it has been generalized as an everyday requirement of making organizations work and a virtue of human decision making under the condition of complexity, strategic dilemmas or “wicked problems.” This chapter addresses both the theoretical and the normative dimensions of pragmatism in organizations, public administration in particular. The main statement is that the necessary theoretical clarification concerns the distinction between pragmatism and what is referred to as a logic of appropriateness while the normative limits of pragmatism refer to the necessity of ranking logics of appropriateness and related values plus the ability to act on the basis of accurate judgment which is primarily, even if not exclusively, a matter of leadership.

This paper presents a model of government saving in order to examine several questions regarding the personal and professional saving preferences or inclinations of a national sample of local government finance managers. First, is personal propensity to save related to a preference for local government saving? Second, is personal propensity to spend related to the finance managers' opinions about their local government's spending? Third, what are the determinants of finance managers' propensity to save or spend, both personally and for their local government? Results confirm that finance managers have a personal propensity to save and a positive view toward local government saving. The opposite, propensity to spend, is also influenced by personal preference. Determinants of these behaviors are explored.

The chapter questions the low demand for scholarly (scientific research) competence of civil servants through identifying practical and transformative uses of scientific knowledge in professionals’ practice, thus arguing for a particular type of scholarly competence in professional degree programs.

The chapter conceptually develops a theory of practitioners’ knowing in action that reframes use of scientific knowledge as part of practical inquiry.

The chapter formulates the notion of extended ‘scientific temper’ to open up spaces for reflection in the context of everyday professional practice and avoid the pitfalls of technical rationality. It argues for an ontological – as opposed to mere epistemological – dimension of knowing in action. It suggests that changes in practitioners’ stance in line with the extended ‘scientific temper’ enable specific uses of scientific knowledge and help achieve aims of emancipation and transformation.

The chapter sketches a list of scholarly competencies and principles of didactics of training scholarly competence of civil servants in line with the notion of extended ‘scientific temper’ and post-structuralist paradigms in science.

The chapter’s value lies in reconceptualising the use of scientific knowledge in relation to everyday professional practice in public administration.

This article re‐examines the theoretical foundation of self‐directed teamwork theory in light of current developments in organizational America, and suggests propositions about the relationship between teamwork and organizational policies such as downsizing. Teamwork is the exercise of creativity and autonomy by employees in pursuit of organizational goals. Effective teamwork requires a sense of trust and inclusion on the part of these employees. Organizational practices such as downsizing and contingent labor can erode this trust. If organizations wish to avoid undermining the financial, productivity and morale gains of teamwork, while observing their broader social responsibilities, they should reconsider their reliance upon downsizing and contingent workforces as a quick and dirty means of achieving cost savings.