Upholding democracy beyond selfinterest: perceptions of sustainability and change: a qualitative study of public leaders

Abstract

The Earth is rapidly losing its carrying capacity because of human action. At the same time nations search for solutions for complex challenges. The aim of the thesis was to deepen the understanding of the perceptions of central government’s leaders related to sustainability and change, and to produce insights for the development of public leadership. The theoretical framework was in theories of systemic change and system and transformative leadership. The work was based on the UN 2030 Agenda framework and the values and principles of public leadership. In the qualitative study, five central government leaders from agencies under four ministries were interviewed.

As results of thematic analysis, interpretations of the perceptions were presented. Further, insights for the development of leadership in the context of sustainability in central government were offered. Leaders perceived sustainability as a multi-level set of socio-economic challenges, but explicitness, emphases and integrations of dimensions varied. The strongest dimension was the economic combined with the social with less attention to the ecological dimension. The set of the values and principles of public leadership - enhancing justice and public good - supported leaders’ deep reflections of future-oriented and ethical public leadership. The perceptions of change implied that leaders are developing a broader view of the complex socio-economic challenges. The ecological dimensions and exploring multilevel conditions of change need more attention. The leaders’ perceptions of acting for change had relations to practices of transformational and system leadership theories. Perceptions reflected more a socio-economical worldview than on socio-ecological.

For leadership development, it was suggested to use the leaders’ emphasis on the socio-economic sustainability as a bridge to the ecological dimension. System leadership skillset was seen as useful for practicing change in a future- and value-driven and inclusive way. Experimentations with transformative practices including explorations of the human-planet relationship are suggested. In addition, the set of values and principles of public leadership was seen to be connected to all the dimensions of sustainability, especially the ecological, to support impactful transformations of public leadership in sustainability.