Featured Member Publications

ILA members publish on the topic of leadership from a variety of perspectives. We are pleased to feature a selection of these publications on our Web site.  On occasion we may feature a publication written by someone who is not currently a member if we feel it is of particular interest to our members. Follow the links below to learn more about each work and download complete chapters. If you have a recent publication and would like to be featured on these pages, please contact the ILA at ila@ila-net.org.

Featured Publication:

Public Sector Leadership: International Challenges and Perspectives
Jeffrey Raffel, Peter Leisink, and Anthony Middlebrooks, Eds.

ILA Members, login to read an interview with editors Jeffrey Raffel and Anthony Middlebrooks in the January 2010 Member Connector

A truly international examination of public sector leadership, this book explores the ways leaders of developed nations are addressing current challenges. The overriding question explored by the authors is how public leadership across the globe addresses new challenges (such as security, financial, demographic), new expectations of leaders, and what public sector leadership means in the new era. The book allows the reader to view a large number of situations across the globe to better understand the relation between context and leadership. It integrates the two fields of leadership and public administration, providing a wide-ranging and complementary empirical context to the topic. Transcending state-centered perspectives, the authors include new developments in governance and public-private sector collaboration while retaining a focus on the public values involved. The chapters address public sector leadership issues in a wide array of nations, integrating international perspectives with a globally diverse authorship. Several chapters address issues of collaboration across sectors, changing roles in the New Public Management paradigm, and corresponding new visions of leadership. Several of the chapters are explicitly comparative, including a study of mental health leadership training topics in eight nations, central banking in Europe, and efficiency studies in Britain, Denmark, and Norway. The chapters can be used as thought-provoking case studies as part of a supplemental text, and are accompanied by substantial bibliographies. Scholars, students, and practitioners in leadership, public policy and administration, and organization studies will find this volume a useful reference.

Sample Chapter

Chapter 17: Is Public Sector Leadership Distinct?

The federal government in Canada is confronting a severe public sector human resources challenge. Not only has working in the public sector become much more complex, but the public service is also facing a number of new pressures that threaten its ability to fulfill its role as a ‘vital national institution’ that can meet the needs of Canadians (Clerk 2006, p. 1). Specifically the challenge is to recruit and retain the best and the brightest to work in the public sector at a time when governments are trying to hire in a much more competitive labor market, the Canadian population is becoming much more diverse and the demand for new employees with the ability to lead others, particularly at the most senior levels, is so great. The reality is that the majority of federal public sector employees are over 45 years of age, whereas fi fteen years ago the converse was true. The situation is equally dire at the executive level: about three-quarters of all public service executives are between the ages of 45 and 59, with an average age over 50. Furthermore nearly 20 percent of this group is currently eligible to retire (Clerk 2007, p. 39).

Download Complete Chapter

Download Chapter 17: Is Public Sector Leadership Distinct? (pdf). Please Note: Chapter Downloads are only available to current ILA members. If you are not already logged into the 'Member's Only' section of the Web site, you will be prompted to do so, after clicking on the above link. Once you are logged in, please follow the navigation link to 'Chapter Downloads' to select the chapters you wish to download. If you are already logged in, you will be taken directly to the 'Chapter Downloads' page.

Jeffrey Raffel is the Charles P. Messick Professor of Public Administration in the School of Urban Affairs and Public Policy at the University of Delaware. He served as director of the school for ten years, was the co-founder and first director of the Delaware Academy for School Leadership, and led the integration of the undergraduate leadership program into the school. He has conducted research on state and local management as well as educational policy issues and has served as chair of COPRA, the U.S. accrediting agency for masters programs in public affairs.

Anthony Middlebrooks is Assistant Professor in the Leadership Program in the School of Urban Affairs and Public Policy at the University of Delaware. He helped develop the doctoral program in leadership as a professor at Cardinal Stritch University, and spent ten years prior in non-profit leadership positions, culminating in writing, consulting, and presenting on a variety of leadership topics. Currently, he teaches courses in leadership theory, decision-making, organizational leadership, and research methodology.

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Resources : Featured Member Publications

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This page last updated on February 4, 2010.