Sciences de la Société- N° 53 - mai 2001
Leadershipet arrangements territoriaux
 Dossiercoordonné par Andy Smith et Claude Sorbets

Andy Smith, ClaudeSorbets, Leadershipon parole ?
AlainFaure, Inter-municipal dynamics, leadership and territory.Does local power affect public politics ?
Christian Le Bart,Leadershipand indecisiveness. Locally elected politicians confronted withthe Erika oil slick
François Baraize,Whattype of leadership for French urban areas ?
Emmanuel Négrier,Territory,leadership and society. Georges Frêche and Montpellier
Stéphane Cadiou,Urbanleadership. Variations around the function of expertise
Jacques de Maillard,Thedifficult consolidation of urban leadership
FrançoiseMassart-Piérard, Regional and community leadership in federal Belgium
Michel-Alexis Montané,Thedimension of leadership faced with territorial change. The caseof mesogovernment in France
Romain Pasquier,Autonomousprocess and regional leadership in Spain
VéroniqueDimier, Leadership and institutionalization of the EuropeanCommission. The case of DG VIII (1958-1975)
Eric Kerrouche, Who governsus ? State representatives’ perception of the local politico-administrativesystem

CHRONIQUE
Guy Jalabert, The city : an autonomousresearch object or a society mirror ? (2)Social change and urban dispersion

 
AlainFaure,Inter-municipal dynamics, leadership and territory. Does localpower affect public politics ?

Abstract
Althoughin France significant examples of co-operation between municipalitiesare to be found, the intermediary concepts which have emergedin academia (governance, networks, the institutionalisation ofcollective action, policy communities, institutional matrices,neo-localism...) refuse to deal directly with the local politicalcompetition as an analytic category. This conceptualisation ofcollective action, seen as just anecdotal, improper or impossible,could nevertheless be enlightening. For those interested in theterritorialization of public action (for specialists of administration),in the effects of geographic location on collective action (forthe specialists of economic development), or even in the legitimacyof representation and participation (for the specialists of socialmovements), political competition and problems of leadership arealways a major element, and very often the key element. Thesethree ways of looking at local public action give rise to thehypothesis that localised forms of power change public-policymakingas a whole because local electoral strategies and intra-partypositioning are not only jousts for access to power at local authoritylevel, but are also about setting up new forms of political sovereigntyand the frontiers of public intervention.

Keywords: local power, co-operation between municipalities, territorializationof public action.

 
ChristianLe Bart,Leadership and indecisiveness. Locally elected politiciansconfronted with the Erika oil slick

Abstract
The leadershipexercised by local politicians cannot be understood just fromthe point of view of their role in decision-making. In the extremecase of apparent powerlessness (after the Erika oil disaster),their leadership did not just disappear. Indeed, quite the contraryoccurred. This dimension of leadership includes a posture of performance(mobilisation and proclamatory discourses), or even an expressiveposture, as much as a decision-making posture.

Keywords: leadership, mayors, discourse, Erika.

 
FrançoisBaraize,What type of leadership for French urban areas ?

Abstract
The new Frenchrules about urban co-operation have invented a new territorialunit : the urban area. This paper examines the institutionalizationof such structures, by assessing the impact of demographic, geographicand legal frameworks on their development. It thus considers thethesis of a lack of democracy in these new areas of action. Thequestion of their political leadership is considered in two ways.The paper first argues that it is a pertinent variable in analyzingthe role of the French prefect within the different urban settings.Moreover, the paper questions the approach of leadership towardsa better understanding of this " new urban public action".

Keywords: Chevènement law, leadership, territory, prefect, localdemocracy, political culture

 
EmmanuelNégrier,Territory, leadership and society. Georges Frêche andMontpellier

Abstract
The implementation in Montpellier of the new rules about urbandistricts highlights the role of Georges Freche's political leadershipover more than twenty years. The different dimensions of sucha leadership are successively analysed in terms of material andcollective goals, in terms of Montpellier’s political sceneand by assessing the role played by the Mayor and his followersin the symbolic construction of the city and its territorial destiny.

Key-words : mayor, Montpellier,political leadership, followers, urban history, personal politicalstyle

 
StéphaneCadiou, Urban leadership. Variations around the functionof expertise

Abstract
This articleanalyses change in urban leaderships from the point of view ofthe way expertise is used at this level. Following a period dominatedby state-employed engineers, today elected politicians tend tosurround themselves with experts specialized in negotiating andcharged with bringing some coherence to fragmented patterns ofpublic action. The difficulty for local politicians stems fromthe need to arrive at global and homogenous consensus at a timewhen policies and mechanisms of public intervention are growingalong with the number of potential "partners".

Keywords: political teams, systems, expert, capacities, information

 
Jacquesde Maillard,The difficult consolidation of urban leadership

Abstract
The present article questions how urban leaderships are constitutedand how they last, in the case of social policy implemented throughcontracts — a policy area marked by a high pluralism -. Itis based on a study of two towns : Montpellier and Pessac. Treatingleadership from complementary points of view (organisational andsymbolic), it stresses three features : administrative and politicalstaff are mobilised to manage urban areas in an integrated manner; contemporary public action is dominated by a plurality of protagonists,a phenomenon that constitutes a high constraint on the actionof these teams ; some intermediaries allow some form of cooperationand partial integration between those actors.

Keywords: leadership, town, public action, political institutions, associations.

 
FrançoiseMassart-Piérard, Regional and community leadershipin federal Belgium

Abstract
Do regionalautonomy and territorial leadership induce each other ? This isthe main issue in the article. Federal Belgium is an interestingpoint in case, since the country is involved in a constitutionally-guaranteedprocess of federalisation through split-up. In the process, thefederate entities are largely autonomous, even though the powerof partitocracy remains extremely strong. It is therefore interestingto carry out surveys to try and establish whether the combinationof regionalist dynamics and institutional autonomy facilitatesthe emergence of regional or community-level leadership phenomena ;and further, to assess whether such phenomena can result in newstate reforms, initiated by the Minister-Presidents and favourableto regions and communities.

Keywords :Belgium, leadership, régions, communities, minister-president.

 
Michel-AlexisMontané, The dimension of leadership faced withterritorial change. The case of mesogovernment in France

Abstract
Analyzingthe relationship between political leadership and territory isfacilitated by a situation where both are changing, thus revealingtheir reciprocal relations. Mesogovernment, today in France, isthe object of territorial reforms in which existing leadershipstry to intervene: they have an impact in particular on the negotiationof territorial institutional policies, which reorganise inter-citynetworks and local contractualisation. However, far from managingto maintain their institutional positions and the territorialityinherited from the post-decentralisation years, infra-nationalleaderships are now more dependent upon the very elements thatconstituted them in the first place.

Keywords: political leadership, territory, mesogovernment, institutionalreforms, territorial change.

 
RomainPasquier, Autonomous process and regional leadershipin Spain

Abstract
Based upon an analysis of regional leadership dynamics in Spain,this paper aims to give an alternative vision of the evolutionof the Spanish autonomous process. Indeed, the traditional institutionalizedvision which is put forward is one in which constitutional ambiguitiesand conflictual relations between the Catalan and Basque nationalistparties and the central government continuously affect the decentralisationprocess. From the examples of two autonomous communities, Galiciaand Rioja, we argue that from a sociological perspective autonomizationhas differentiated logics of regional spaces and influenced thepolitical repertory of regional leaders. In this way, the studyof two major regional political repertories, one differentialistthe other neoregionalist, and the analysis of their rival interactions,provide an innovative vision of the reshaping of territorial policiesin Spain.

Keywords: decentralisation, Spain, political repertoire, political space,leadership, territory, regionalization, regionalism.

 
VéroniqueDimier, Leadership and institutionalization of theEuropean Commission. The case of DG VIII (1958-1975)

Abstract
We will analysehow former French colonial administrators in Tropical Africa playeda role of leader in the institutionalization of the Directorategeneral Development (dg viii) transferring their methods of territorialleaders based on negotiation and personal relationships to thisdg. Within the European commission, this dg has been in chargeof the Yaoundé and Lomé conventions with the acp(Afrique, Caraïbes, Pacific) states, more precisely of themanagement of the European development fund. Following P. Selznick'stheory, we mean by institutionalization giving an organisationa specific identity, that is : defining or specifying its mission(aims, methods, principles, types of public action) and insertingthis mission into a social structure through recruitment, socialisationprocess, and a specific power organisation. We will deal withthe following questions : which circumstances (institutional...)allowed these men to " colonize " the dg viii and playtheir role of leader in its institutionalisation ? In which sensewas this role made easier by their " esprit de corps ",their former experience and personal qualities ?

Keywords: European commission, colonial administration, Directorate generaldevelopment, institutionalization, administrative culture

 
EricKerrouche, Who governs us ? State representatives’perception of the local politico-administrative system

Abstract
Based upona mixture of quantitative and qualitative analysis, this articleunderlines the " enchanted " perception thatthe state's representatives have of the French politico-administrativesystem as well as the way they consider their relationships withvarious local institutions, elected or otherwise. If the dichotomygeneral interest vs. special interests is still a useful way ofunderstanding the attitude of the prefectoral corps, in practicemany prefects and sub-prefects have integrated the idea of partnershipinto their practices because this has become an essential partof local politics (be it at the level of the " arrondissement "or the " département "). In addition,if they clearly recognise the leadership role of the most powerfullocal politicians, they still consider themselves as having apre-eminent role as regards representation and impetus in thesphere of local politics, even if the territorial change currentlyunder way seems likely, ultimately, to upset this fragile equilibrium.

Keywords: prefect, sub-prefect, prefectoral corps, representations, localsystems, local government, local politicians.