LEAD 425
Senior Seminar: Leadership and the Anxieties of Democracy Spring 2025
Division II Writing Skills
Cross-listed PSCI 357

This course, the senior capstone for Leadership Studies, examines the challenges and opportunities facing political leaders in contemporary liberal democracies. We will begin by seeking to place our current moment in the longer arc of history, examining the distinctive institutional and structural constraints facing contemporary political leaders and examining in detail previous eras in which the American political system has come under great pressure. Then, we will look at some important factors that shape how followers approach would-be leaders: inequality and economic precarity; identity and group consciousness; notions of membership, community, and hierarchy; and fraying institutions. While the course will focus primarily on the United States, our conceptual framework will be global. Our primary questions will be these: Why does transformative leadership seem so difficult today? How does political leadership in the 21st century differ from leadership in earlier eras? What conditions are necessary to sustain effective leadership in the contemporary world? As a final assignment, students will craft an 18-20-page research paper on a topic of their choice related to the themes of the course.