Course Objectives
	Advanced Preparation
	Learning Approach

Leadership for a Democratic Society
Policy in a Constitutional System

Thank You, James Madison!

Overview: In his Virginia Plan, the sage from up the road at Montpelier consciously designed a Constitutional system of balancing and co-equal powers. This was not a slapdash operation - he himself, of course, was a "man of affairs," with extensive political experience. Further, he was an intense and highly serious scholar, both at the college of New Jersey (now Princeton) and throughout his life. In preparation for the Constitutional Convention he read widely in Greek and Latin, histories and political and philosophical thought, including especially a "Cargo of Books" his mentor, Thomas Jefferson, sent him from Paris. Unlike the other Founders who were imbued with the Newtonian thinking of the time and so searching for the structural - almost mechanical - solution, Madison was well aware of human drives and passions, especially those religious in nature, and bequeathed to us a system of counterbalancing factions and powers. His aim, of course, was to protect the citizens against both potential tyrants and blithering idiots. He'd seen plenty of both. Like his contemporaries, he was a classical liberal - government, he believed, should be restricted to being, in John Locke's thinking, the watchman in the night. So what? So thanks to you, James Madison, we are stuck with organizations explicitly designed to make it very hard for us to get done what we are supposed to get done. To be more precise, we have to worry about our line boss, the Congress, the media, subordinates, etc. In this course, we will take a manager's look, an operational look, at dealing with these centers of power. Hopefully, we will emerge with some improved ideas and skills, some insights about how to keep ourselves from being hamstrung by them, how to use them to accomplish our task. We will do this by comparing experiences and ideas rather than by listening to a sage on the stage. We will have a series of true stories of real public managers struggling with these issues in order to see what we can learn from what they did, both effective and ineffective.

Course Objectives: Upon completion of this course, participants will be able to:

• Exchange ideas about the most useful ways to work effectively with bosses, subordinates, the press, the Congress
• Exchange ideas on ways to make our Constitutional system and all the players it empowers work with us rather than against us

Advance Preparation : We will have a couple of written stories (cases) each day about real public managers trying to deal with real issues. Reading and thinking about them and their problems before each session is a requirement of the course.

Return to LDS Course List

Top of Page

General Information :: About our Courses :: Participant Login :: Agency Partners :: Knowledge Links :: Privacy Policy :: Contact & Help :: Site Map :: Leadership Home