Leadership and Power

Abstract

Leadership does not exist without power. Thus we have to reflect on power in order to lay a theoretical foundation for responsible leadership. This interdisciplinary article collects insights from the disciplines of theology, sociology, and crosscultural management. It provides a concise summary of what a Christian leader should know about power in order to use his/her power in an adequate way. The theological reflection reminds us of the fact that, according to the Judeo-Christian tradition, God gave power to humankind. Two opposite dangers are described in this article, namely the abuse of power on the one hand and the misconception of powerlessness as a Christian virtue on the other hand. The sociological section describes different forms of power. Following French and Raven (1960), it introduces seven power bases, which are illustrated by examples from society and the church. The next section describes the different cultural perceptions on power. It shows how the cultural parameter of power distance may influence the appropriate leadership style. It is argued that our understanding of a right or wrong use of power is strongly influenced by the culture in which we grew up. The article concludes with a list of ethical guidelines on the use of power for responsible Christian leaders.

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1. Introduction

My hypothesis is that leadership does not exist without power as understood in a broad sense. Thus, we have to reflect on power in order to lay a theoretical foundation of responsible leadership. This article attempts to discuss different facets of the phenomenon of power. The aim is to give a concise summary of what a Christian leader should know about power in order to use his/her power in an appropriate way.

The approach of this article is interdisciplinary. Researchers from different academic disciplines have investigated the phenomenon of power. Often, these discussions are focused within one discipline: theologians quote other theologians and sociologists quote other sociologists. However, in both disciplines the intercultural aspects are often neglected. By combining insights from different disciplines, this article wants to contribute to a more holistic understanding of the phenomenon of power. This will enable us to derive ethical guidelines for responsible leadership from these insights, which is also the aim of this article. Since different academic disciplines contribute to the understanding of the phenomenon of power, we will consult these disciplines in order to obtain a theoretical basis for responsible leadership. Key aspects of the investigation of responsible leadership include: What is power? (Philosophical reflections, section 2); What does the Judeo-Christian worldview teach about the origin and the use of power? (Theology, section 3); How can power be exercised? (Sociology, section 4); and How is power perceived in different cultures? (Cross-cultural management theory, section 5).

1.1 Personal motivation

One cannot lead without power. This insight was not always evident to the author. Born in 1962, my German school education was influenced by the so-called "68-movement" which was very anti- authority. I was, therefore, strongly sceptical about hierarchy and formal power. In a somewhat naïve understanding of servant- leadership, I used to give talks titled "Leading without power". It took me some time to understand the following three facts about power:

• Power is more than formal power
  
• Power is not bad in itself
  
• One cannot lead without power
  

2. Defining leadership and power

There is a great deal of debate about the correct definition of leadership. Neuberger lists 39 different definitions from the German literature alone – and even this list is not complete. In this article I use the word leader in a very broad, pragmatic sense inspired by Greenleaf: A leader is a person whom other persons follow; i.e. a person who dares to say "I will go come with me" and where people follow this call. A leader in this sense might be a boss in a typical workplace hierarchy, a leader within an organisation of volunteers, a teacher at a university, a speaker or an author who has influenced people through his/her ideas, et cetera.

By using the term Christian leadership I refer to two different groups. Firstly, I refer to leaders in a specific Christian context like a church congregation or a Christian non-governmental organisation (NGO). Secondly, I refer to leaders who work in a secular environment like the business world or the government, but who want to lead their staff/followers according to their Christian worldviews and ethical standards, whether or not these followers share the Christian worldview of the leaders.

Of course, the literature on power is marked by a deep disagreement over the basic definition of power. Instead of offering a new definition I will refer to four classical definitions, because these are widely accepted and they cover the most essential aspects. My starting point is three classical monographs on power. These famous monographs were written in the context of the two World Wars, perhaps because during times of war the human experience of power and powerlessness is very intense. Firstly, consider the German sociologist Max Weber and his volume Economy and society, published posthumously in 1921, which is still "widely considered the most important single work in sociology". Weber's definition of power has often been quoted:

In 1938, in anticipation of the next World War, the British mathe- matician and philosopher Bertrand Russell, wrote a book on power in which, among other things, he analysed the power play of the Nazi regime. According to him "power may be defined as the production of intended effects".

After the Second World War, people all over the world, and especially the German people, were very wary of the abuse of power after their experiences during the War, especially with the destructive power of the atom bomb. In 1951, the Italian-German philosopher Romano Guardini had the following special message for those people who were reluctant to use power at all:

Guardini gives a short and concise definition of power: "Power is the ability to move reality".

These three academics agree on the fact that power is the potential, the ability, to do something. It is irrelevant whether the instrument of the power is actually used. In most cases it suffices that people believe that a powerful person could do this or that. Incidentally, each of these authors had a different worldview: Max Weber was protestant, Bertrand Russell was an avowed atheist, and Romano Guardini was a Catholic priest.

Another famous definition of power was given by the American political scientist Robert Dahl: "A has power over B to the extent that he can get B to do something that B would not otherwise do". Dahl explicitly uses an expression, which is also implicit in Weber’s definition, namely power over. Russell and Guardini de- fine power more broadly as a capacity to achieve intended effects, namely power to. Dowding suggests to use the terms outcome power for "power to" and social power for "power over". This article deals with both aspects.

3. Theological reflections on power

3.1 The origin of human power according to the Judeo-Christian tradition

Despite many examples of tremendous abuses of power in human history, the Judeo-Christian tradition espouses the simple fact that human beings have power, because God – creator of heaven and earth – gave it to them. The creation story links the creation of humankind directly to the command to rule, to power over the other creatures:

This is high praise of humankind – human beings are made in the image of God. Unfortunately, there is a huge speculative overload on the concept of God's image. In contrast to its heavy anthropological and theological impact in Christian theology and beyond, the term God's image only appears at three places in the Hebrew Old Testament: Genesis 1:26, 27; 5:3; 9:6. The Hebrew word used here is zelem, originally meaning statue. In the Old Orient, the statue of a king represented the king himself and his power. It demonstrated his dominion in a particular geographical area. The isolated position of Genesis 1:26 has left much room for theological speculation. During the twentieth century, Old Testament science began to free itself from dogmatic overload and speculation.

Today, the consensus within the Old Testament theology seems to be that being God's image means being God's representative, God's deputy. By being God's representative human beings have power! Benno Jacob, a Jewish theologian who had great influence on Old Testament theologians like Von Rad, wrote in 1934: "In the dominion over the earth and the animals, man is the earthly representative of God". In 1973, Wolff wrote in his well-known Anthropology of the Old Testament:

Psalm 8:5-8 celebrates the high and powerful position the human beings were granted by God:

The lordship includes the ability to exercise power:

As Genesis 1:27 clearly shows, the imago Dei refers both to man and woman. Both are created in God's image, both are God's earthly representatives, both were given the command to rule, to exercise power over the earth and its creatures.

Genesis 9:6 and Psalm 8:5-8 indicate that God's image was not lost after the fall (as opposed to what was taught by Augustine, Luther and Calvin who more or less identified God's image with the status of original righteousness, and this identification led to the dogma that the imago Dei was lost after the fall in Genesis 3). Today, every human being still bears God's image as was meant in Genesis as being God's representative – notwithstanding the fact that this dominion was often misunderstood and led to the exploitation of God's creation.

3.2 Lordship as service: power and responsibility

If we remember that human power has its roots in the imago Dei this should encourage the use of power with good conscience. But this relation also includes a sense of human responsibility. According to the understanding of leadership in the Old Orient, a leader was responsible for his subordinates. In the Bible power is always connected with accountability or responsibility. A leader is account- able to those who have entrusted him/her with power and for those who find themselves in his/her sphere of influence. Guardini summarises this:

As God's representative, a human being has lordship and power. As God's representative she/he should always exercise this power with responsibility towards God.

The passages quoted above from Genesis 1 and Psalm 8 deal with power over non-human creatures. They do not refer to power over other people, which is the case in the context of leadership in the way we defined it. Indeed, the Old Testament sets certain limits on the use of power. Human beings shall not have dominion over other human beings as they have over animals, because the other human beings are also created in God's image. As will be discussed later in the context of cultural power distance, the Old Testament also limited the power of kings and other authorities. The kings of Israel never had absolute power like the kings of the surrounding countries, and they were upbraided by the prophets if they ignored these limitations.

Ultimately, according to the Christian worldview, all human power, including the power over other human beings, is derived from God's power; see Romans 13:1b: " ... for all authority comes from God, and the existing authorities are instituted by Him". Thus, God will hold those given power accountable for the way they exercise their power.

3.3 Authority versus power?

Sometimes Christians would argue: "We are interested in authority, not in power". The word authority sounds more positive and more spiritual, whereas the word power tends to have negative connotations. However, building up a contrast between authority and power is not as spiritual as it might seem at first glance. Luke 4:36b reports that Jesus had authority and power: "What is there in this man's words? He gives orders to the unclean spirits with authority (exousia) and power (dynamis), and they go". The Greek word dynamis means the ability to do something. It can be translated with force, strength or power. The Greek word exousia refers more closely to the permission, the legitimation to do something. A bank robber with his gun has the power to get money but not the legitimation. In other situations people may have the legitimation to do something but lack the power to enforce this right. Jesus had authority and power – and passed on both to his disciples: "He gave them power (dynamis) and authority (exousia) to overcome all demons and to cure diseases". Authority and power should go hand in hand.

3.4 The ethics of power

When is it legitimate to use power? A short answer is: the exercise of power is legitimate if and only if it is carried out in order to create something good or to prevent something bad. Of course, in a specific situation it is often difficult to decide whether a certain act will really lead to good or prevent bad. This formula at least shows a direction.

There are two big dangers of exercising power wrongly: the first danger is the abuse of power, while the second one is the exact opposite: no use of power at all (power vacuum). Some Christians wrongly interpret powerlessness as a Christian virtue.

The Bible has much to say about abuse of power. Many passages of the Old Testament prophets like Micah 2-3 and Ezekiel 22:27; 34:2- 5 accuse the reigning parties of abusing their power. The New Testament mentions many power addicted persons like King Herod or the Pharisees. It also gives the name of a power addicted church leader, Diothrepes, "who enjoys taking the lead", and who tries to expel other Christians from the congregation in order to gag his opposition. Diothrepes has become a prototype of power addicted people in the Church. Sadly enough, church history is full of examples of power abuse. The psychological reasons for abusing power are manifold: it may be greed for money and/or power, or for prestige; or it may be as a result of insecurity in a leadership position – especially if the leader has just recently been promoted; or it may be that the leader simply lacks leadership abilities. See Kretzschmar (2002:53-58) for suggestions on how to develop authentic Christian leaders through moral and spiritual formation.

However, the Bible does not condemn the wish to take the lead in the church. The desire for power be- comes a problem if power is treated as an end in itself. Power is a legitimate means. But power shall never be an end in itself. Those who aim at power as an end in itself, and who aim at power just for the sake of power, miss the right target – which corresponds to the original meaning of the Greek word hamartia (sin). The Jesuit priest Kiechle, rightly remarks that whoever looks for power as an end in itself, does not regard it as a gift from God, but starts to idolise power, binds him-/herself to power and abuses it. Aiming at power for power's sake leads to power addiction.

Some people are so concerned about the abuse of power that they do not dare to exercise power at all. The difficulty is that if a leader does not exercise his/her power, there will be a power vacuum – and power addicted people will try to fill this power vacuum. Actually, it is essential that leaders with the right character take responsibility and exercise their power wisely, adequately, but nevertheless use their power, if they love their people.

Greenleaf coined the term servant-leadership for the business world in 1970, and describes the consequences if gifted persons with the right attitude refuse to lead:

The conclusion is obvious. It is a misunderstanding to regard powerlessness as a Christian virtue. Leaders need to use power in order to lead towards a better society.

4. Power as a sociological process

The fundamental theological reflections in section 3.1 were on power in a broad sense (power to), regardless of whether other people are involved or not. Since this article is on leadership, which always involves other people, we will now focus on social power, i.e. power involving other people. Thus we need a definition that covers both aspects: power over other people and power to. Zaaiman's proposed definition is suitable for our context: "Power is the ability ... to influence the actions and the opinions of people and so causes effects in affairs and people".

4.1 The essence of power relations

According to Russell power is a core term in sociology:

In the course of this book I shall be concerned to prove that the fundamental concept in social science is Power, in the same sense in which Energy is the fundamental concept in physics. Like energy, power has many forms ...

Max Weber's definition of power already indicates that power pre-supposes a social relationship. Power is a social process between human beings or groups of human beings. In order to exercise power there have to be two actors, either two persons or two parties: the powerful actor, indicated by P, and a subordinate actor, indicated by S, and there must be a social rela- tionship between both. For example, a teacher living in South Africa and a student of an elementary school in Germany usually would not have any social relationship. The South African teacher thus cannot exercise any power over the German student.

Figure Power Relations: Power relationship between the powerful P and the subordinate S

Power relations are asymmetric: the bold line in Figure 1 shows that P has power over S. The subordinate S has, at least, some power, indicated by the dotted line. Sometimes S's power is merely the power to withdraw from P's area of influence either by terminating the work contract, seceding from church, fleeing or in extreme situations by committing suicide, as the Zealots did in Masada 73 AD during the Jewish-Roman war. They preferred to die as free persons. The conclusion that can be drawn from this extreme example is that P has power over S only if S allows it. There is no leadership if nobody follows. Even in the case of brute force S has a choice, namely to follow P or to give up his/her own life. Sub- ordination means that S allows P to exercise power over him/her.

It needs to be emphasised that the subordinate S also has power. Many people feel powerless although they are not without power. They try to abdicate responsibility by complaining, "I cannot change it". They keep on complaining about their boss and/or their church elders for years and years. These people do not notice that they have a choice. They could, for example, terminate the work contract. They may have good reasons for not doing so, for example because they have an obligation to feed their family. But then it is their decision not to leave. They choose to stay.

4.2 The different bases of social power

Social power can be exercised in many different ways. Russell listed three: "A. By direct physical power over his body ...; B. By rewards or punishments as inducements; C. By influence on opinion".

In 1959, French and Raven published an essay listing five different bases of power. By basis of power they meant the relationship between P and S, which is the source of the power.

These five bases of P's power are:

These definitions indicate that it is irrelevant whether P really is able to mediate rewards/punishments or whether P has a legitimate right or expert knowledge. It is only relevant whether S assumes this, rightly or wrongly.

Many authors built on this essay by French and Raven and intro- duced further bases of power. In Table 1, I follow French and Raven but I split up the referent power into two different power bases. These seven power bases are classified into four groups, and ordered along a continuum between "positional power" and "personal power". Positional power is connected to the position a person holds whereas personal power depends on the traits or qualities of a person. The power base no. 1 refers to a pure positional power, and the power bases no. 6 and 7 are pure personal power, whereas the power bases no. 2-5 are a mixture of the two.

Table 1: Taxonomy of seven power bases

5. Power in intercultural perspective

The previous example illustrating the generational problem within the church shows that our understanding of a right/wrong use of power is strongly influenced by the culture in which we grew up. The differences become even stronger when we look at the perception of power in totally different cultures.

In 1980, Geert Hofstede from the Netherlands published the first systematic study on intercultural management. He interviewed IBM employees in 50 countries and three regions. This IBM study generated four dimensions to mea- sure cultural differences, namely power distance, individualism versus collectivism, masculinity versus femininity, and uncertainty avoidance.

Hofstede and Hofstede defined power distance as "the extent to which the less powerful members of institutions and organizations within a country expect and accept that power is distributed unequally". Note that power distance is measured from the perspective of less powerful, ordinary people, whereas most modern leader- ship literature is written from the perspective of powerful people. Leadership can only exist together with followers. Thus leaders cannot be successful if they ignore the cultural parameter of power distance. A large power distance means that the less powerful people of this kind of culture accept and partly even expect power to be distributed unequally and that the powerful people will demonstrate their insignia of power. Behaviour like this would not be accepted in a culture with a low power distance.

In 1991 the USA management professor Robert J. House, initiated another research project on intercultural management, known as the GLOBE research project. It involved far more people than Hofstede's IBM study two decades before. During 1994-1997, 170 researchers interviewed 17 300 managers from 951 organisations in 62 cultures. They used nine dimensions of cultural variation and changed some of Hofstede's dimensions. However, they stuck to his definition of power distance is an important parameter for describing a culture.

Table 2: Differences between large and small power distance

According to Hofstede and Hofstede, there is a strong correlation between collectivism and power distance. Almost all collectivist countries such as Asia, Latin America and black Africa, score high on power distance. Most of the individualistic countries score low on power distance. They are from the Anglo-Saxon world (UK, USA, Canada, Australia, white population in South Africa), Scandinavia, and the Germanic countries (Germany, Switzerland, Austria, the Netherlands). Latin Europe is indeed different. They combine high individualism with mid-range power distance. Top managers in France may blatantly declare: "I have power", whereas German top managers may describe their position as "having opportunities to do something".

The GLOBE study identified four main phe- nomena influencing the power distance index of a culture. It argued that "a society's predominant belief system and its religion or philosophy will have the most profound and enduring influence on power distance", and exemplified as follows:

This statement is further supported by looking at the beginning of the Reformation. That an unknown monk like Martin Luther would dare to stand up and to speak against the powerful Pope sets an example for small power distance. Although the word protestantism was coined after the special protest at the Reichstag zu Speyer in 1529, it also describes something inherent in the Protestant movement where people often protested against the authorities, which finally led to the fragmentation of the Protestant movement.

Our conclusion is that our understanding of power, authority and submission, and our judgement of whether a particular use of power is good or bad is first and foremost shaped by the culture in which we grew up.

We should be aware of this dependency. Often authors who claim to be describing "the biblical leadership" end up describing what they consider to be good leadership from their cultural perspective. There is always the danger of focusing on those Bible verses that support one's own view on leadership culture and ignoring other Bible verses.

One might ask whether there is an ideal power distance index in line with Christian ethics. On the one hand, the Bible teaches us to respect authorities. On the other hand, it clearly condemns might prevailing over right. Since the Bible's focus is on the ethics of power and not very much on the organi- sational structuring of power, we cannot derive a specific ideal number for a "Christian" power distance index. A serving leader simply has to take into account the power distance of the people or staff whom he/she is serving. In a country where people maintain a large power distance, they expect directive leading and might be confused by a western-oriented participative leadership style. The staff might even draw the conclusion that the leader is incompetent, because he/she does not tell them what to do. On the other hand, if a leader comes from a high power distance culture to a country with a low power distance without changing his/her leadership style, the staff might easily allege an abuse of power.

How do we know whether we exercise our power adequately? The first problem is our blind spot. We do not see our own deficiencies as leaders. It can easily happen that we preach and teach about servant leadership in the full conviction that this is exactly the way we lead – whereas our immediate environment might judge our actual exercise of power very differently. The second problem is that subordinates often do not dare to speak openly. In cultures with a high power distance an open criticism of a leader might even be regarded as inappropriate behaviour. The Dutch leadership expert Kets de Vries suggests that each leader needs a "licensed fool" in his/her environment, a person who dares to tell the truth, who holds up a mirror, even if it hurts. The danger of relying on one's own self-image is already demonstrated by the Old Testament proverb "A fool's conduct is right in his own eyes; to listen to advice shows wisdom".

6. Conclusion

This article has introduced us to various facets of power in the context of Christian leadership. I trust that it has become clear why it is worthwhile to listen to the views emerging from within different disciplines and to bring together various insights on power. Especially in the context of leadership, it is important to overcome a monocultural view, because in most cases leaders influence people from different cultures.

By way of a conclusion ethical guidelines for Christian leaders that arise from the previous sections are provided below.

Ethical guidelines for exercising power as a Christian leader

• Say Yes to power. Power is a gift from God.
  
• Remember that every power is on loan from God – and we are accountable to Him.
  
• Exercise your leadership as a responsible service: serving God, serving the organisation, and serving the people outside and inside of the organisation.
  
• Use your power for good or to prevent bad. But never strive for power as an end in itself.
  
• Which power base are you willing and able to use (depending on your context and your personality)? Each power base may be used appropriately or abused.
• Respect the culture of the people you lead and especially their perception of power. Where does biblical ethics demand a transformation of the culture (e.g. if might prevails over right)?
  
• Be open to criticism of your use of power. Ask mature persons for feedback on your leadership style.