Review: Ethics and Leadership in Public Administration

Abstract

Political philosophy might sound far removed from professional education but the three philosophers examined at length in this book were gifted teachers with remarkably ambitious interests in helping public leaders to think and act more philosophically. In this concluding chapter, it is time to move closer to practice to see some of the ways we might expect administrators to bring philosophy alive in their professional practice as public leaders. Here we sketch out a more detailed case study of the bleak complexity of everyday administrative practice, based on recent Australian developments watched at close quarters by this Australian author. Readers unfamiliar with democratic governance in Australia may skip over this tale of woe, and pick up the story later in the chapter where we sketch a framework for helping public administrators (and their teachers) think constructively about ethics and leadership in democratic public administration. The chapter concludes by laying out some general principles of leadership ethics: principles sitting between the high but abstract declarations of political philosophy and the low but compromised practices of everyday life. These general principles could provide a sounding board on public ethics and leadership for administrators in public service training courses or indeed in academic inquiry and reflection.