Political Leadership in Times of Crisis

Abstract

It is clear that political leaders play a central and prominent role in contemporary democracies. Leaders are seen not only as key decision-makers who dominate state executives and shape government strategies, but also as the key elite integrators, the main public communicators of government actions, and the principal repositories of public trust and confidence. At perhaps no time has this centrality of leaders been more evident than during the ongoing trans-Atlantic economic-political crisis. Laments about the inadequacy of national and supra-national leaders have been equaled in number only by demands that they act more decisively. The crisis is in many respects a crisis of political leadership. Papers analyzing the roles played and not played by paramount political leaders - prime ministers and presidents, finance ministers, party leaders (including leaders of parties widely seen as 'extremist' in their stances), as well as top EU, ECB, IMF, and Federal Reserve leaders - are invited, as are papers that reflect on what the crisis-born successes and failures of these leaders imply for stable democracy in the trans-Atlantic world.

Title	Details
The Impact of Crises on Political Leadership	View Paper Details
Political Leadership in Times of Citizen Unrest	View Paper Details
The Centrality of the Sense of Leadership in the Economic Crisis	View Paper Details
Communicating Austerity: Evolving Political Narratives in an Age of Economic Crisis	View Paper Details
Prime Ministers in Crisis: CEE and Baltic States Compared	View Paper Details