The Historical Change of Human Nature Hypothesis and the Style Evolution of Leadership Behavior

This chapter draws together the themes of the book and looks forward to the later-seventeenth century. It argues that for much of the sixteenth century politics was subordinate to religion; temporal authorities needed the additional sanctions provided by religious belief if they were to exert any power over the consciences of individuals. The effect was to entangle temporal power in the deepening conflicts over religious truth, and thus to reveal the brittleness of any conception of political authority which relied on the support of the Church. At the same time, older traditions of political thought did not go away and often became stronger. The circulation of classical ideas, the discovery of new peoples, the growing interest in historical change and development all suggested alternative ways of legitimizing political power, often using natural law and avoiding any reliance on specifically Christian commitments. What happened in the early-seventeenth century, and most obviously in the writing of Hugo Grotius, was a move not only to ground political society in a particular conception of human nature (conceived of juridically, as a source of rights and obligations) but also to detach Christianity from that view of human nature. It was this understanding of human beings which enabled the development of a social contract tradition through the seventeenth century and beyond, and became an important source for modern liberalism. The questions it raised would help to shape the thought of the next century.

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Do Work Characteristics Mediate the Negative Effect of Transformational Leadership on Impaired Well-Being?

Zeitschrift für Arbeits- und Organisationspsychologie A&O ◽

10.1026/0932-4089/a000249 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 61 (4) ◽

pp. 167-180 ◽

Cited By ~ 6

Author(s):

Sylvie Vincent-Höper ◽

Sabine Gregersen ◽

Albert Nienhaus

Keyword(s):

Transformational Leadership ◽

Focal Point ◽

Leadership Behavior ◽

Workplace Health Promotion ◽

Well Being ◽

Mediating Effect ◽

Equation Modeling ◽

Related Factor ◽

Work Characteristics ◽

Role Clarity

Abstract: In recent years, transformational leadership as a health-related factor has become a focal point of interest in research and practice. However, the pathways and mechanisms underlying this association are not yet well understood. In order to gain knowledge on how or why transformational leadership and employee well-being are associated, we investigated the mediating effect of the work characteristics role clarity and predictability. The study was carried out on 618 employees working in the health-care sector in Germany. We tested the mediator effect using structural equation modeling. The results indicate that role clarity and predictability fully mediate the relation between transformational leadership and negative indicators of well-being. These results give credit to the notion that work characteristics play an important role in identifying health-relevant aspects of leadership behavior. Our findings advance the understanding of how to enhance employee well-being and have implications for the design of leadership-related interventions of workplace health promotion.

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The Emergence and Maintenance of Ethical Leadership in Organizations

Journal of Personnel Psychology ◽

10.1027/1866-5888/a000055 ◽

2012 ◽

Vol 11 (1) ◽

pp. 7-19 ◽

Cited By ~ 33

Author(s):

Silke Astrid Eisenbeiß ◽

Steffen R. Giessner

Keyword(s):

Cultural Values ◽

Ethical Leadership ◽

Leadership Behavior ◽

Peer Group ◽

Organizational Characteristics ◽

Future Research ◽

Environmental Complexity ◽

Group Influence ◽

Analysis Society ◽

Different Levels

The present paper gives a review of empirical research on ethical leadership and shows that still little is known known about the contextual antecedents of ethical leadership. To address this important issue, a conceptual framework is developed that analyzes the embeddedness of organizational ethical leadership. This framework identifies manifest and latent contextual factors on three different levels of analysis – society, industry, and organization – which can affect the development and maintenance of ethical leadership. In particular, propositions are offered about how (1) societal characteristics, notably the implementation and the spirit of human rights in a society and societal cultural values of responsibility, justice, humanity, and transparency; (2) industry characteristics such as environmental complexity, the content of the organizational mandate, and the interests of stakeholder networks; and (3) intra-organizational characteristics, including the organizational ethical infrastructure and the ethical leadership behavior of a leader’s peer group, influence the development and maintenance of ethical leadership in organizations. This list of factors is not exhaustive, but illustrates how the three levels may impact ethical leadership. Implications for managerial practice and future research are discussed.

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