Leadership and Power in Public Organizations: Cross-Country Analysis from the Brazilian Perspective

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to present the actual scenario of leadership and power in the public sector as well as the challenges in the further development of theory in this subject. This paper shows a cross country analysis conducted by analyzing the themes approached by recent literature in different countries related to this subject-leadership and power in public organizations. The documental analysis allows-besides the comparison-an integrative review about leadership and power in public organizations, what also presents the evolution of the theme in the last few years. The integrative review is conducted by summarizing available publications. It was identified authors, contexts, perspectives and focus, then synthesized main results, findings and conclusions. Then the cross-country analysis shows that different countries have different trending topics and some patterns were detected. As observed in the leadership literature values such as honesty and its impacts in leader behavior-and leadership process-are the most sensitive challenges in public service on lower adjusted GDP countries. The lack of ethics may result in significant misuse of power. There is an urgency in to design metrics about this kind of power misuse to avoid individuals to destroy organizations while achieving personal goals. It is presented a maturity gradient, from basic ethics to professionalization and competences on process-till efficacy. So this study presents trending topics embraced by leadership and power in public organizations’ nowadays, a debate and integrative review on these topics.