Word: moralisms
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...legitimately award him with the badge of leader. A dictator would not qualify because, theoretically, he would not have to respond to anyone's wishes but his own. A tyrant has no followers, only subjects, Burns argues. As a competitor in "a political marketplace," a leader must also have moral purpose to appeal and respond to his followers' wants and needs. In Burns's judgment, the Spiro Agnews and Adolph Hitlers of the world who pander to "the base instincts of persons" embody "the very negation of leadership." Leadership moves humanity towards betterment, not destruction...
Burns's standards of leadership are provocative, but inadequate both in theory and historical applications. Leaders will be beloved by the "bar of history" because they are moral and successful, but Burns neglects the role of human interaction--between the leader and the led--in his theory of human leadership. He lets the historian's job of separating the good from the evil take precedence over helping us to understand how the relationship between the leader and the led changes peoples' lives for better or worse...
After the nightmare of World War II, we need to go beyond making obvious moral judgments of human beings in history. Unfortunately, James MacGregor Burns's book doesn't change the fact that "leadership is one of the most observed and least understood phenomena on earth." The mystery remains...
...amounts, allow the council to "move beyond charity and involve itself in the redistribution of power." The anti-racist money, raised separately from regular W.C.C. dues, is earmarked for welfare purposes, not military spending, but the W.C.C. does not monitor its use. Opponents say the grants amount to a moral endorsement of terrorism. Even America's pro-ecumenical Christian Century editorialized that because the welfare grants merely free funds for war use, those backing the armed struggle in Rhodesia should be candid about their role as "vicarious doers of violence...
...World is less tolerant and straightforward than the Old. Although prostitution is officially a crime, the U.S. supports an estimated half-million hookers, while trying to put them out of business with an incredible hodgepodge of laws. Both in letter and spirit the laws entangle the states in ambiguous moral and constitutional questions, often with confusing results...