“Leading peripheries”Using socio-political concepts in analysing leadership in peripheral places

Martiene Grootens, University of Tartu, Estonia

First PUPOL international conference: “Leadership challenges in a global world” Nijmegen, 7-8 April 2016

- WORK IN PROGRESS -

IntroductionLeadership has been recognised as the missing link in regional development (Rodríguez-Pose 2013). As this sounds quite promising for regions around the world, what exactly do we mean by leadership and how should we study an almost inevitably positive concept as leadership in less successful peripheral contexts. In this paper I will analyse leadership in the context of the development of peripheral places and provide some theoretical concepts, which can be useful in understanding leadership in peripheral places.

Regarding the studies on leadership, there has been an emphasis on successful cases, which does not help to understand the role of leaders in regional development processes and merely result in a confirmation of what is assumed to be successful leadership. Therefore in this paper I will go beyond identifying the “stars” of regional development and point attention to the role of public leaders, embedded in (various) institutional environments, and in their (co)shaping of “peripheral” places. Hereby I will move away from a normative way of ranking leadership experiences or regional performance, but closely analyse the ways peripherality is (co)produced or reproduced by these local actors. The focus hereby is on the practices and relations of these leaders in the process of peripheralisation. In this way rather than being seen as powerless and economically marginal, these regions (and their actors) can be seen as co-producers in the process of peripheralisation, a process to which both (actors in) the core regions as (actors in) the peripheries are contributing.

The aim of this paper is to introduce some concepts which can provide more insights in the ways these supposedly crucial leaders acting in processes of peripheralisation. These concepts will guide the following empirical research, which will be carried out in Estonian as well as Dutch peripheral places in different institutional and structural contexts, acknowledging the role of structural processes but also the ability of agency and in particular leadership to shape places.

Expanding the contextFurthermore in the current literature on leadership of place, the focus has been on Western European contexts which raises the question if these insights are also applicable in less dense institutional contexts, such as the peripheries of Estonia. Most studies on leadership of place have been done in a Western European context and do not consider the specificities of the Central or Eastern European context and their institutions. The rapid institutional changes from Soviet to radical neoliberal thinking (whose policies even further increase the already existing disparities within Central and Eastern European countries), and also elements of contingency from the socialist past, make this region different and therefore interesting in generating a more complete picture of leadership experiences around Europe. Moreover, the often institutionally thin environments of peripheral regions, combined with centralisation tendencies of national governments, create a very different environment for the role of leaders than in the more institutional thick and lesser

centralised countries of Europe. But more than pointing to the specificities of context only, this research will also look for similarities across contexts. Stenning and Hörschelmann (2008) mention the importance of conceptualizing geographical difference (between the CEE and the WE countries and among CEE countries) as also the importance of the past while not necessarily falling into the trap of determinism or historicism. Thelen (2011) also proposes to not emphasize the post-socialism as only different, but also to take similarities seriously. Socialism could then be seen as a variant of the modern instead of a deficient form of modernity and hereby we can try to move away from normative analyses, primarily derived from economic perspectives of development, but take a more open look towards development.

LeadershipLeadership in general has been studied intensively from varying research disciplines. Depending on the strand of literature, different conceptualization and definitions can be found. In the literature the terms leader and leadership are often used interchangeably. In the definition by Kellerman and Webster (2001) a leader is seen as the one: “who creates or strives to create change, large or small” (p. 487). Leaders in this definition can, but do not necessarily hold formal positions. Leadership is then seen as the process in which this change is created by the interaction between leaders and followers. In this research I will focus on public leaders, in which the word “public” refers to the domain of individuals and institutions dedicated to governance and public policy, as also understood by Kellerman and Webster (2001). Hereby not attributing beforehand already the promises that they will be the change makers of the regions, but instead looking at them as actors with this potential.

Type of leadership Main focus Usefulness

“Great man” approach to leadership

Focus on the characteristics and achievements of individuals, personal traits

Not suited to study the complex interrelationships between leaders and their environment

Contingency theory Focus on leadership when challenges arise, crisis generates new leaders and energizes existing ones

Trap of overly positive accounts of leadership, too much structure, too little agency

Behavioural perspectives, transactional

How do leaders lead their followers? Focus on the daily interactions of leaders

Partly useful, especially in how leaders interact with the community

Behavioural perspectives, transformational

Focus on how leaders contribute to organizational change

Partly useful in seeing the actions of leaders, but too much focused on change necessarily

Horizontal leadership Focus on leading through collaboration and networking, leading the system

Partly useful, but a too narrow account of leadership in a hierarchical organizations and networks

Ethical leadership Focus on the leading by values; intent of leaders, the proper means and the proper ends in leadership

Different focus

Complexity Leadership theory Focus on complex processes of change Especially relevant in complex fast-changing environments, and less in the leadership in peripheral regions

Policy leadership (Ideational leadership, policy entrepreneurs, institutional entrepreneurs)

Focus on (political) actors initiating change

A too narrow focus on leaders working towards change

Place leadership Focus on collaborative, crossing thematic, geographic, disciplinary and institutional boundaries, formal and informal

Most useful in studying the complex environment of peripheral regions.

Figure 1: Different strands of leadership theory (based on van Wart 2013; Beer and Clower 2013; Meijerink and Stiller 2013)

This table is not exhaustive, but gives a general overview on the wide variety in studying the phenomenon of leadership. While some of them might not be suitable in studying the complex environment of public leaders in regions (transactional, transformational), others would focus on other elements which is not the point of study here (great man, ethical and contingency approach). As Liddle (2010, 658) mentions:

“ Several flawed assumptions have arisen from applying individualistic ‘traits’ models of leadership and reductionist/mechanistic models of organisations to complex multi-agency situations/environments inhabited by 21st-century public leaders.”

Also as Beer and Clower (2013) argue:

“too often leadership is associated with the near deification of great persons”(p.5).

Most relevant in the context of regional development is the literature on leadership of place, which considers leadership not as a solo-activity but as a multi-facetted process of multiple actors operating within and beyond the region. Leaders in these bodies of literature have the ability or the willingness to be “system thinkers, boundary spanners, conceptualizers and connectors”, as Sotarauta, Horlings, and Liddle (2012) mention. The question to be answered is then: in which ways

do these public leaders behave, strategize, talk, lobby or relate to community etc. in within and beyond the region; how do they (if they do at all) try to influence the development of the region?

Collinge and Gibney (2010) mention in particular the role of formal leaders in the leadership of place literature and that these leaders receive too little attention in the debate on regional development. Formal leadership is seen as a crucial factor in adapting to the rapidly changing social and economic circumstances that this modern world offers for public leaders and regions. Liddle (2010) mentions that these leaders of place have to deal with a limited amount of resources available and hereby have to identify clear priorities and leaders are expected to engage in partnerships, networks and collaborations. Especially when looking at peripheral regions, this scarcity of resources can be an important issue. While identifying priorities, leaders in these places should seek legitimacy for their resource agenda and actions. This legitimacy is then needed to build confidence in places. As Liddle (2010, 660) says when discussing public leadership:

“building trust is perhaps the greatest challenge faced by leaders, with so many groups still excluded from political processes.”

Especially the leader is an interesting starting point, because it allows to discover the potential for agency rested with actors embedded in diverse institutional environment. Understanding their role can give insights into the production of peripheries, without beforehand focusing only on the change makers of the region and hereby reemphasizing the possibility of change.

PeripheralisationThis paper will focuses on places which can be seen as in a process of peripheralisation. This process-based approach moves beyond the study of peripheries as static localities, but looks at the production of peripheries “through social relations and their spatial implications” (Kühn 2015, 368). In this approach the material as well as the discursive processes, very much linked to processes of centralisation are important elements. This also connects to the view of Lang (2013) who emphasizes the relational nature of studying peripheries. In this relational conceptualisation, the region is constantly being produced and reproduced by various actors and at different scale. As a consequence agency is again recognised with actors of these regions. Kühn (2015) mentions the fuzziness of the concept of peripheralisation due to the many different elements it entails: seeing peripheralisation as relational, process-centred, multidimensional, multi-scalar and temporal does not make it an easy process to analyse and understand. In this paper I will mainly focus on the political and social elements of the peripheralisation process and the actors contributing to these elements. With the move from studying peripheries as static localities, defined by their population figures, distance to the centre etc. to studying the process of peripheralisation, attention is drawn back to the actors in the process. Especially the actors in key positions, the so-called peripheral elites, can become an interesting entrance into understanding this process of peripheralisation.

From a political perspective, processes of peripheralisation and marginalisation are mainly associated with power in decision making process and control over agenda setting. Going beyond structural, economic approaches toward development, I take a socio-political view on peripheralisation processes, characterized by an uneven distribution of power, and exclusion of networks and resources. Kühn (2015) mentions the possible conflicts between central and peripheral elites, the exclusion from resources of power and the overall insufficient possibilities, abilities or willingness to create counter power. In this regard the space for negotiation is seen as limited and the peripheries are affiliated with powerlessness and the core with power. There is on the other hand perhaps also another perspective possible, in which power can be identified with the peripheral actors and even the cores can be seen as powerless. This question, as Kühn (2015)

mentions: what power to resist do peripheral elites actually have? is a question what needs to be analysed empirically.

Furthermore, Herrschel (2011) makes the divide between spatial and social-communicative peripherality and talks in this sense about peripheries as characterized by a certain ‘inbetweenness’. This peripherality is then based on exclusion from networks, instead of being excluded on the basis of territory only. As a consequence in his opinion new peripheries result from communicative distance to core networks, and not primarily from spatial distance between core and peripheral areas.

A consequence of emphasizing these social relations as conditional to the development of spatially peripheral regions, is again an interest in the actors making up these networks, and the power of the so-called “peripheral elites” (Kühn 2015) or leaders in peripheralisation processes. These actors, as potential nodes in networks, can be seen as crucial development actors. This connects the literature on peripheralisation to the more actor-oriented leadership of place literature.

Relational regions This importance of relations and networks resonates with the debates on relational versus territorial regions. Conceptions of the region have changed considerably throughout the years; while in the 1980s constructionist view on human agency in region was popular, in the 90s the regions was seen in more relational way and in the new millennium new combinations of different ways of seeing the regions were used (Allen and Cochrane 2007; Jones and Paasi 2013).

A debate that has been going on for quite some time in the study of regions is about the degree to which they can be seen relationally or as Lagendijk and Varró (2013) have said the radical versus moderate relationists debate. Although most scholars agree that relations matter for regions and that they are relationally constructed, they do not agree on how far this relationality stretches. While the radicals see places as meeting points of which the relationships within and beyond the place are crucial in understanding the place (Amin 2004; Massey 1991), the more moderate relationalists do acknowledge that relations are important in the construction of the region (Hudson 2007; Jonas 2012 ), but hereby do not wash away the importance of the territorial. Goodwin (2013) mentions in a similar vein that that it remains the case that “a lot of practical politics continues to be conducted in, through and against a set of institutions whose jurisdiction is precisely territorially defined.” (p.1183) and especially for politicians, they are held accountable through territorially defined elections.

Jonas (2012) mentions that the flaws of the more radical relational notion of place is the emphasis that is placed on the relationships between the global and the local, while the relationships inside the region are often not much analysed. He argues that

“questions of territory and territorial politics must remain salient in regional development theory”(p.6)

and therefore favours research on regions to be done in both traditions; looking at relationships in the region, beyond the region and also looking at the power dynamics at play inside the region. Hudson (2007) also proposes to look beyond either de relational or the territorial view on regions by saying that:

“Depending on the circumstances and the specific situation of particular regions, policy and politics may be informed by a bounded territorial and hierarchical conception or by a relational conception

that emphasizes a flat ontology of networked connections as the more appropriate perspective from which to view the region.” (p.1156)

But then, what does it matter? Amin (2004) poses that it matters politically. He wants to go beyond the mere fetishizing of regions and look at regions and their politics as embedded in a globalized world and also moves away from the assumption that there is a defined geographical space over which actors can have effective control. Although he does not want to plea against the strengthening of regions or regional identity as such, he points out that in the interconnected world that we live in today, strengthening the region must be about:

“exercising nodal power and aligning networks at large in one’s own interest, rather than about exercising territorial power” (p.36).

This connects with what Allen and Cochrane (2007) mention that the developments of the South East of England can best be understood by seeing territoriality as a language used by an assemblage of regional actors, a language which is mobilizing through networks rather than through hierarchical arrangements. This language however can itself be seen as a powerful political construction. They mention for example the construction of a “coherent” region which is a result of mobilizations by political or professional actors. Actors thus seem to play a role here mainly in the construction of regions by mobilizing interests, enrolling, translating, brokering and bridging, all in a regional assemblage. Massey (2004) also mentions that actors can use the hegemonic territorial image in a very relational way. By negotiating in vertical and horizontal networks, but actually making use of a very territorial grammar. Public leaders especially, with their powerful position in the region, can be seen as users of this territorial discourse and show how territorial and relational notion of the region come together.

For studying public leaders in these processes, it seems then that as well the relational as the territorial notion of viewing places is needed. This fits well together in the work done by Paasi (2010). He has very well described regions as being first and foremost socially constructed. The region has meaning through the process and roles of actors and social relations in these regions. Many actors and processes are involved in this “making” of the region (by actors living in the region), but also outside the region (by national discourses, marketing campaigns, globalization etc.). Because of the involvement of many actors operating at different levels, the concept of agency is rather complex and involves a multitude of actors. Also scholars construct the region, when trying to conceptualize the region to make it empirically “measurable”. The making of the region can in this sense be intentional by activists defending the regional boundaries, but also unintentional by processes that are not specifically aimed at the region. This sometimes called region-building must not be viewed as a functionalist exercise, according to Paasi (2009), but rather as a “constellation of agency, social relations and power” (p. 133) in which (regional) economic, political and cultural/media elites have an important role (Paasi 2009).

Combining this relationality and the social constructivist notions of (peripheral)places, and at the same time not ignoring the territoriality and power relations inside these places, will be the way in which the agency of public leaders in peripheral regions can be studied most appropriately. Massey (2004) is helpful in this regard. She does not see places as victims of globalisation (of the local-global relations) but sees them as places of negotiation and power struggles and potential sites of owing agency through influencing these relationships or changing the politics of the place. Agency is found with the actors, institutions and relations in this region. This connects with Paasi’s view (2010) on this agency or capacity (2010), where he defines this as:

”a complex set of practices, discourses, and competences related to social positions, expectations, motivations and advantages that will emerge during the institutionalization process.” (p. 2300).

In order to understand in which ways public leaders (co)construct the (peripheral)region, exactly these practices and relationships should be the focus of research.

A “new” leadership for peripheral places As already said before the emphasis on successful showcases does not help to understand the process of leadership and merely results in a confirmation of what is assumed to be successful leadership (Beer and Clower 2013). The intention should not be to normatively rank leadership experiences or regional performance, but to closely analyse the ways places are (co)produced or reproduced by these actors. The attention can then be more on the places which are outside the bigger agglomerations, to the places which struggle to get into the attention of national decision making bodies. Therefore we need a different discourse on leadership.

Mabey and Freeman (2010) provide an overview of what they call four discourses on leadership of place which are helpful in seeing different ways of analysing leadership of places. They distinguish the functionalist, constructivist, critical and dialogical discourses to studying leadership, in which they divide these four discourse along two axes: consensual versus dissensual and duality versus dualism. In the table below the different discourses on leadership of place are being shown.

Figure 2: Four leadership of place (LP) discourses: research agendas (adopted from Mabey and Freeman (2010)

Most studies tend to focus on either a functionalist account, supposing consensus and dualism. As for example Sotarauta (2005) mentions that in Northern Europe it is argued that the most successful city-regions are the ones that have been able to utilize European and national institutions to their advantage. This study of leadership only reemphasises the importance that is placed on the ability to attract funding and narrows leadership down to an act of getting money into the region. Taking only this functional approach, this denies any agency to regions for which it is less easy to attract funding and overresponsibilises the actors in these region, while other equally important factors are left aside. Less attention is there for a dialogical discourse, which sees place as a production of social practices or for the critical discourse in which power distribution and emancipating particular groups is emphasized. What I aim to show with these different discourses is that leadership can be analysed in a lot of different ways and instead of an only positivistic functional discourse, which would almost quantifiably measure the effect of leaders on certain outcomes (which almost automatically denies leadership in peripheries), another approach would be more open to understanding the process of leading places, in which there is attention for the question leadership for who? (and for whom not?) and also for a more process based approach, which looks at the actions and relationships of leaders in peripheral places. In which ways do these public actors behave, strategize, talk, lobby or relate to community etc. in this environment; how do they (if they do at all) try to influence the peripheralisation of the region, this would be the main focus in this research. In this less functionalistic account of leadership, attention can be given to the complex relation between power and networks in the development of places.

Networks & power As Beer (2014) among other have mentioned: “communities are effectively denied the capacity to determine their own future. The centralisation of power in metropolitan regions effectively rules out a ‘voice’ for rural and regional towns and settlements.” (p. 256).

This citation connects the understanding peripheralisation not only as a structural economic process, but also as a political and social phenomenon and point attention to more relational accounts of power. Beer (2014) mention the overlap of the concept of “network governance” and leadership of place. In several definitions focusing on place-based or local leadership a few keywords are visible: collaboration across sectors, between institutional actors, mutual trust and cooperation. There seems to be an increased interest in networks, governance, partnerships etc. in studying regional development. Question marks can be placed with the importance of this network governance for regions outside the core regions. For example Nagy, Nagy, and Timár (2012) mention that although networks gained in importance in a border region in Hungary, this was mainly between cities and not for the rural peripheries inbetween. Networks can in this way be seen as resource, and an unequal access to these resources might even exacerbate uneven access to resources. When applying this to the context of the more peripheral regions within European countries, (which are not often the focus of any growth-oriented policy measures), it is not evident that network governance can only be seen as a resource for peripheries in strategies for deperipheralisation. Furthermore by focusing on more networked structures of governance, the older structures of government, hierarchy and power cannot so easily be ignored as well.

In order to advance to a more appropriate concept, neither government, nor governance in particular, but at the concept of power comes in focus. Increased interest in networks instead of hierarchies and governance instead of government, moves attention away from the power relations which still play a role.

In a very general form Mintzberg (1983) uses a definition of power which derives from the word pouvoir, which comes from the noun power and the verb to be able, herein, power is seen as the capacity to effect (or effect) organizational outcomes. In this sense the definition of power comes close to the understanding of agency.

I will use the reading from Allen (2004) who sees “power as a relational effect of interaction, which is traced through relations of connection and simultaneity”. In his reading there is no such thing as a centre of political, economic or cultural power, there are only invariably territorially embedded assets and resources, which may be mobilised, misused, abused etc. (p.24). These resources themselves on the other hand are not seen as power, according to Allen (2004), but the media of power. He makes the distinction between the capacity or capability as a dispositional quality which actors can hold, and the actual exercise of that power. Talking often about the capabilities and locating them at some point, scholars tend to not go further in the analysis. Therefore it is important to make the distinction between capacity or resources and the actual exercise of power. This actual exercise of power is usually not focused on, but could exactly be the role of leaders in social and political peripheralisation processes.

When the focus shifts to the practices of power, one immediately comes to speak of politics. Politics I understand here in the way that (Grémian 1976, in Carter and Pasquier 2010) have noted it: as actor interactions in the exercise of authority and in the name of the local—a politics in the formation of collective decisions.”. It is in this understanding about the negotiation over the terms that govern the use of space and place.

Trapped or privileged between as well the local politics and the politics of the local, is where the role of public leaders can be placed in peripheralisation processes. This would help me in answering the questions that also Beer (2014) asked us. What strategies and tactics used by local leaders to negate the hegemonic tendencies of centralised governments? And at the same time, how do they keep their legitimacy in their own community? It is thus at the same time the politics inside the periphery as the politics of the periphery that are important when we look at the role of the political leader in the local context. I will further specify these two kinds of politics along two lines, which (Amin 2004) has distinguished as politics of propinquity and politics of connectivity.

Politics of propinquity

Important in this is the heterogeneity of interests in politics and about the negotiation of these different interests. This is not necessarily a politics around issues played out in the locality only, it is rather the management and negotiation of different interests in people’s everyday living environment, which can also cross the boundaries of the locality. This can for example be the sharing of space between migrants and longer residing people in a locality or the negotiation about land for either nature or business purposes.

Or how Amin (2004) has framed it himself “different microworlds find themselves on the same proximate turf, and that the pull on turf in different directions and different interests needs to be actively managed and negotiated, because there is no other turf. Even though this is not particular for any given spatial scale, the specific about this politics is that it is commonly perceived as a lived space. “The politics of propinquity then maybe read as a politics of negotiating the immanent effects of geographical juxtaposition between physicals spaces, overlapping communities, contrasting cultural practices. “ (p. 39).

Politics of connectivity

These politics of connectivity are more seen as connected to the negotiation over a certain sense of place for the locality. “It is a matter of making explicit, and of choosing between, different senses of place and place attachment on the basis of agonistic engagement between different coalitions of cultural and geographical attachment.” (p.42). Amin mentions in this case the examples of either choosing for a specific cultural image of a locality and how this is negotiated on certain levels or the choice for a specific economic strategy for the future. Here the focus is much more on politics of the peripheries instead of the politics in the peripheries.

Connecting these politics of the peripheries to the process of peripheralisation, it can be argued that being powerless is often related to lacking the resources, lacking the media of power, instead of losing the complete capacity to shape their future. Defining peripheries as powerless as done by Blowers and Leroy (1994) then removes the agency rested within actors in these peripheries. This research will then look at how, as being supposedly underprivileged in resources, there can still be power for the peripheries. In order to have a more nuanced understanding of power relations between the core and the periphery, the research will go beyond only looking at the resources to the actual exercise of power of different actors in the peripheries.

Beer (2014) also points in this context that even though sometimes the formal power of communities seem to be muted, there is also an unseen power which makes it possible for rural communities to shape their future. In this sense it might not be so much the very visible revolutionary change of powers, but more subtly in the place shaping of the localities.

ConclusionCombining the aforementioned bodies of literature will offer us a framework to analyse leadership of place in processes of peripheralisation from a relational perspective. By focusing on leadership in peripheral places, the crucial role of agency can be better understood in these seemingly structurally deterministic processes of peripheralisation. I have argued that leadership can be better understood by analysing not just densely institutionalised “showcases” of successful leadership, but by also taking the peripheral context into account. Even though Kühn (2015) highlights the insufficient possibilities, abilities or willingness to create counter power by local actors in peripheries, I assume that power to change still rests with these peripheral actors by taking an actor-oriented perspective.

The question, which power do these leaders really have, deserves empirical investigation. Acknowledging that power is shared among multiple actors in places, such research might provide insights into the complex relationships of power and networks in peripheral regions. The challenge here is to look beyond the simple resistance to or domination of the core to the more subtle negotiation and manipulation as exercises of power by actors. This goes beyond a local (good) and global (bad) dichotomy and sees places (their actors) as agents themselves in local-global or core-periphery relations (Massey 2004). Even though the resources for leaders of peripheries are often limited, there is still room for individual actors or coalitions of actors to show more or less subtle ways of power.

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