Washington and Leadership

Washington D.C. is the most conflict driven city in the United States. There is never ending conflict between all politicians on each side of the aisle. There has been a heavily talked about debate in recent years over whether or not Washington is broken. The source of this is healthy versus unhealthy conflict. When healthy conflict occurs people have legitimate differences of opinion and the impact the decision will have. However in the past decade a lot of unhealthy conflict has come in to play on capital hill. Many politicians have hidden agendas and conflict therefore arises between individual and group goals. 

Many times we go along with what these people are doing because they have legitimate power. When someone has legitimate power it is based on the recognition and acceptance of a person's authority. Since the average person doesn't have time to actually see what politicians are doing we either simply accept it or criticize them for everything. However this is America and what people say matters. There is unequal power in society however with high-status people having more say than low-status people because they have more which they can give to the political candidate of their choice. In recent elections it is proven true that the more funding one campaign receives, the are most likely to win. 

Sometimes it is extremely difficult to see what a leader is about because they can hide behind their charismatic personality, motivation of others, effort, and so forth. The fact is leaders are both born and made. This can be exemplified by both the situational and contingency approach. The situational approach states that leaders are only important at certain moments and in most day-to-day operations their impact is small. The contingency approach is also very important because it links traits and behaviors to situations. 

The problem in Washington is not going to go away anytime soon. I believe the system is broken and it is going to take people to realize the unhealthy conflict and do something to stop it. Political candidates should not be voted into office based on their reward power and what they can do for lobbyist but rather on expert and information power where people are elected on their credibility and knowledge of the problem at hand.

http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2010/09/broken-washington-201009

http://www.hrbartender.com/2010/training/7-types-of-power-in-the-workplace/

http://www.drnadig.com/conflict.htm

http://www.nwlink.com/~donclark/leader/leadchr.html

http://www.enotes.com/contingency-approach-management-reference/contingency-approach-management