The aim of this master thesis is to examine how leadership in public libraries is constructed discursively in the Swedish library field of today. The empirical material reviewed is job postings and articles from three library related journals.The thesis seeks to identify what different leadership discourses can be found by looking at definitions, forms of address, present actors and themes emerging. It also aims to examine the contingent presence of late modern leadership theories in the order of discourse. The leadership theories primarily investigated are New Public Management (NPM) and value-based leadership.The theoretical starting point of the thesis is discourse theory, developed by Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe. In the analysis a model of four phases is used; in which central concepts of discourse theory help identify the discourses. Three different discourses are identified in the material:The change discourse is based on the idea that change is a general condition for leadership in public libraries. The presence of NPM can be seen in this discourse in terms of a rational view of the employees.The relation discourse is oriented towards development of the individual and the relationship between leader and personnel. One can see many characteristics of a value-based leadership but also a tendency of wanting to justify their operations in terms of NPM.The participatory discourse is a mainly critical discourse. There are some elements of value-based leadership, but the perspective is the employees’ and focus lies on a collective sense of professional community. / Program: Bibliotekarie
Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA1/oai:DiVA.org:hb-16960 |
Date | January 2013 |
Creators | Svensson Haglund, Aili |
Publisher | Högskolan i Borås, Institutionen Biblioteks- och informationsvetenskap / Bibliotekshögskolan, University of Borås/Swedish School of Library and Information Science (SSLIS) |
Source Sets | DiVA Archive at Upsalla University |
Language | Swedish |
Detected Language | English |
Type | Student thesis, info:eu-repo/semantics/bachelorThesis, text |
Format | application/pdf |
Rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess |
Relation | Masteruppsats, ; 2012:9 |
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