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sábado, 14 de noviembre de 2009



LEADERSHIP AND RESPONSIBILITY



Leadership:



Leadership has been described as the “process of social influence in which one person can enlist the aid and support of others in the accomplishment of a common task”. A definition more inclusive of followers comes from Alan Keith of Genentech who said "Leadership is ultimately about creating a way for people to contribute to making something extraordinary happen." According to Ken Ogbonnia (2007), "effective leadership is the ability to successfully integrate and maximize available resources within the internal and external environment for the attainment of organizational or societal goals." Ogbonnia defines an effective leader "as an individual with the capacity to consistently succeed in a given condition and be recognized as meeting the expectations of an organization or society."
Leadership is one of the most relevant aspects of the organizational context. However, defining leadership has been challenging. According to Ann Marie E. McSwain, Assistant Professor at Lincoln University, “leadership is about capacity: the capacity of leaders to listen and observe, to use their expertise as a starting point to encourage dialogue between all levels of decision-making, to establish processes and transparency in decision-making, to articulate their own values and visions clearly but not impose them. Leadership is about setting and not just reacting to agendas, identifying problems, and initiating change that makes for substantive improvement rather than managing change.”
The following sections discuss several important aspects of leadership including a description of what leadership is and a description of several popular theories and styles of leadership. This article also discusses topics such as the role of emotions and vision, as well as leadership effectiveness and performance, leadership in different contexts, how it may differ from related concepts (i.e.,
management), and some critiques of leadership as generally conceived.



Social responsibility:




Is an
ethical or ideological theory that an entity whether it is a government, corporation, organization or individual has a responsibility to society at large. This responsibility can be "negative", meaning there is exemption from blame or liability, or it can be "positive," meaning there is a responsibility to act beneficently (proactive stance).
Businesses can use ethical decision making to secure their businesses by making decisions that allow for government agencies to minimize their involvement with the corporation. (Kaliski, 2001) For instance if a company is proactive and follows the
United States Environmental Protection Agency‎ (EPA) guidelines for emissions on dangerous pollutants and even goes an extra step to get involved in the community and address those concerns that the public might have; they would be less likely to have the EPA investigate them for environmental concerns. “A significant element of current thinking about privacy, however, stresses "self-regulation" rather than market or government mechanisms for protecting personal information” (Swire , 1997) Most rules and regulations are formed due to public outcry, if there is not outcry there often will be limited regulation.
Critics argue that Corporate social responsibility (CSR) distracts from the fundamental economic role of businesses; others argue that it is nothing more than superficial window-dressing; others argue that it is an attempt to pre-empt the role of governments as a watchdog over powerful multinational corporations (Carpenter, Bauer, & Erdogan, 2009).

Juan Montalvo



Juan María Montalvo Fiallos (
April 13, 1832, AmbatoJanuary 17, 1889, Paris) was an Ecuadorian author and essayist, generally thought to be one of Ecuador's best writers of the period. A political liberal, Montalvo's beliefs were marked by anti-clericism and a keen hatred for Ecuador's two caudillos that ruled during his life: Gabriel García Moreno and Ignacio de Veintemilla. After an issue of his book, El Cosmopolita, viciously attacked Moreno, Montalvo was exiled to Colombia, where he would write most of his later works. He was a dedicated champion of democracy, was said to have a lucid and inquisitive intellect and a strong, semi-romantic temperament.
His
1880 book Catilinarias made him famous throughout intellectual circles in the United States, Europe and the rest of Latin America. Alongside full length books, Montalvo was an accomplished essayist, and his Siete Tratados (1882) and Geometría Moral (published in 1902, after his death) were popular in Ecuador and were banned by Veintemilla.
He also wrote a witty
sequel to Miguel de Cervantes's Don Quixote, called Capítulos que se le Olvidaron a Cervantes ("Chapters Cervantes Forgot"). Juan Montalvo died of tuberculosis in Paris, France. His mummified body now rests in a mausoleum in his birthplace of Ambato.
Juan María Montalvo (1832-1889) was an Ecuadorian writer. Perhaps the most outstanding polemicist of Hispanic literature, he had a wide appeal in Latin America for his denunciation of dictatorship.
Juan Montalvo was born on April 13, 1832, in the provincial town of
Ambato. His grandfather was a Spanish retail merchant, and his father, Marcos, followed the same trade. His mother, Josefa Fiallos, owned some land. Two elder brothers of Juan moved to Quito and came to occupy high positions in education and government.
Montalvo studied in Quito (1846-1854) but dropped out of the university without earning a degree. The connections of his brothers with Gen. José María Urbina, a Liberal who dominated
Ecuadorian politics in the 1850s, resulted in Montalvo's appointment to a minor diplomatic post in Rome (1857). The following year he was promoted to secretary of the Ecuadorian legation in Paris. He returned to Ecuador in 1860. By then the Liberals had been ousted by the Conservatives, led by Gabriel García Moreno, and Montalvo was excluded from public employment.
In January 1866 Montalvo published in Quito the first number of a
pamphlet series against García Moreno - then out of power - under the title of El cosmopolita. Three years later, on the dictator's return to the presidency, Montalvo fled to Colombia, settling in Ipiales.
Montalvo spent his years in exile, in the words of one of his biographers, "in
exasperating moral and economic conditions." He received economic support from another exiled Liberal, living then in Panama, Eloy Alfaro. During this period Montalvo's writing consisted mostly of vitriolic and defamatory attacks on García Moreno. When the latter decided to stay as president for a third term, Montalvo wrote La dictadura perpetua, which Alfaro published in Panama (1874). The pamphlet circulated in Ecuador. Though it did not produce the hoped-for revolution, on Aug. 6, 1875, a Colombian former mercenary, backed up by a small group of young drifters who had read La dictadura, hacked García Moreno to death with a machete. Although the assassin had acted for personal reasons, on hearing of the President's death, Montalvo exclaimed jubilantly: "My pen killed him!"
Montalvo returned to Quito in May 1876 and started to publish El regenerador, a pamphlet series in which he attacked President Antonio Borrero's government. By September he was in Guayaquil, backing a Liberal military revolt led by Gen. Urbina and Gen. Ignacio Veintemilla. The latter, a fellow exile of 1869, soon sent Montalvo to Panama for his opposition to the general's
dictatorial ambitions. He was allowed to return after 4 months, thanks to his attacks against Borrero, which also assured his appointment as deputy to the constitutional convention of 1878. But in June he turned his guns on President Veintemilla, deploring that a great man like García Moreno should have such a despicable successor. Before long, Montalvo was back in Ipiales, where he wrote his Catilinarias. This attack on Veintemilla is Montalvo's outstanding polemical work.
In 1881 Montalvo returned to Paris. He stayed there for the remainder of his life, except for a trip in 1883 to Spain, where he was very well received by distinguished figures of Spanish letters and politics. This last period was marked by the publication of his best works: Siete tratados and Capítulos que se le olvidaron a Cervantes. He died on Jan. 17, 1889.
Montalvo's fame rested on the stylistic qualities of his writing - much in
vogue until the beginning of the 20th century - and on their political content, for which he was hailed by liberals all over Hispanic America. His name is still venerated in Ecuador, even though his writing has much declined in its appeal because of changes in stylistic preferences and in political outlook.



Adolf Hitler
(1889-1945)






Founder and leader of the Nazi Party, Head of State and Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces, Adolf Hitler was born in Braunau am Inn, Austria, on 20 April 1889.
In Vienna he acquired his first education in politics by studying the demagogic techniques of popular Christian-social Mayor, Karl Lueger, and picked up the stereotyped, obsessive anti-Semitism with its brutal, violent sexual connotations and concern for "purity of blood" who stayed with him until the end of his career. In May 1913 Hitler left Vienna for Munich and, when war broke out in August 1914, he joined the Sixteenth Bavarian Infantry Regiment. Hitler proved an able, courageous soldier, receiving the Iron Cross (First Class) for bravery.
In November 1921 Hitler was recognized as Fuhrer of a movement which had 3,000 members.
Hitler resigned on 24 February 1920, the exclusion of Jews from the Volk community, the myth of Aryan supremacy and extreme nationalism were combined with "socialist" ideas of profits and nationalization. In November 1923 Hitler was convinced that the Weimar Republic was on the verge of collapse and attempted to overthrow the Bavarian government in Munich. He led the coup attempt to an ignominious end. Hitler was arrested and tried on 26 February 1924. Sentenced to five years imprisonment in Landsberg fortress, Hitler was released after only nine months during which dictated Mein Kampf (My Struggle) to his loyal follower, Rudolf Hess. Subsequently the "bible" of the Nazi Party, this crude, half-baked mish-mash of primitive Social Darwinism, racial myth, anti-Semitism and the fantasy Lebensraum had sold over five million copies in 1939 and has been translated into eleven languages.
The failure of the coup de Beer-Hall and his period of incarceration Hitler became incompetent adventurer into a shrewd political tactician, Although the Nazi Party won only twelve seats in the 1928 elections, the onset of the Great Depression and its devastating effects on the middle classes helped Hitler to conquer all strata of German society who felt their economic existence was threatened. Besides the farmers, artisans, shopkeepers, small businessmen, former staff, students and intellectuals outcast, the Nazis in 1929 began to win the big industrialists, nationalist conservatives and army circles.

With the backing of the newspaper magnate, Alfred Hugenberg, Hitler received a tremendous nationwide exposure and the effects of the global economic crisis hit Germany, producing mass unemployment, social dissolution, fear and indignation. With demagogic virtuosity, Hitler played on national resentments, feelings of rebellion and desire for strong leadership using all the most modern techniques of mass persuasion to present himself as Germany's redeemer and messianic savior.
In the elections of 1930 Hitler officially acquired German citizenship and decided to run for the Presidency, receiving 13,418,011 votes in the second round of elections on 10 April 1931. In the Reichstag elections of July 1932 the Nazis emerged as the largest political party in Germany, obtaining nearly fourteen million votes (37.3 percent) and 230 seats. Once in the saddle, Hitler moved with great speed to beat the game to their rivals, virtually expel Conservatives any real participation in government in July 1933, the suppression of free trade unions, eliminating the communists, Social Democrats and Jews from any role in politics and radical opponents to concentration camps.

With the support of the nationalists, Hitler gained a majority in the last "democratic" elections held in Germany on 5 March 1933 and with cynical skill he used the full range of persuasion, propaganda, terror and intimidation to ensureits continuance in power.

The destruction of the radical leaders that Ernst Röhm SA in the blood purge of June 1934 confirmed Hitler as undisputed dictator of the Third Reich and the beginning of August, when he joined the position of Führer and chancellor of the death of von Hindenburg, who had all the powers of the state in his hands. Over the next four years of Hitler enjoyed a dazzling string of domestic and international successes, outwitting rival political leaders abroad just as he had defeated his opposition at home. In 1935 he abandoned the Versailles Treaty and began to build the army to recruit five times its permitted number.
Hitler's saber-rattling tactics beaten the British and French into the humiliating Munich agreement of 1938 and the eventual dismantlement of the Czechoslovakian State in March 1939. The concentration camps, the Nuremberg racial laws against Jews, persecution of churches and political dissidents were forgotten by many Germans in the euphoria of Hitler's territorial expansion and bloodless victories. The next designated target for Hitler's ambitions was Poland (her independence guaranteed by Britain and France) and, to avoid a war on two fronts, the Nazi dictator signed a pact of friendship and non-aggression with Soviet Russia. On 1 September 1939 the German armies invaded Poland and henceforth his main energies were devoted to the making of a war that was unleashed to dominate Europe and secure "German living space".
The first phase of World War II was dominated by German Blitzkrieg tactics: sudden shock attacks against airports, communications, military installations, using the mobile armor and infantry quickly to follow up the first wave of bombers and air craft combat.
The war against Russia would be a crusade against Bolshivek, a war of annihilation in which the fate of European Jews finally sealed. In late January of 1939 Hitler had prophesied that "if the international financial Jewry within and outside Europe should succeed once more in dragging the nations at war, the result will not Bolshevization the world and victory thus of the Jews, that the annihilation of the Jewish race in Europe.
As the war widened - the United States in late 1941 had entered the struggle against the Axis powers - Hitler identified the totality of Germany's enemies with "international Jewry".
The invasion of Soviet Russia was the seal on Hitler's idea of territorial conquest in the East, which was closely linked with annihilating the 'biological roots of Bolshevism and therefore the liquidation of all Jews under occupation German.
Underestimating the depth of military reserves for the Russians, who could call, the caliber of his generals and resilience, fighting spirit of the Russian people (whom he dismissed as inferior peasants), Hitler prematurely proclaimed in October 1941 that the Soviet Union had been "shot down and never again arise." Actually, it had overlooked the pitiless Russian winter to which his troops were condemned and which forced the Wehrmacht to abandon the highly mobile war, which previously submitted as spectacular successes. The disaster before Moscow in December 1941 led to Hitler now assumed personal control of all military operations. Since the winter of 1941, the writing was on the wall, but Hitler refused to accept military defeat, believing he will be relentless.
His health deteriorated under the impact of drugs. Hitler's downsizing, symbolized by his public appearances increasingly rare and self-enforced isolation in the "Wolf's Lair" headquarters located in the East Prussian forests, coincided with the visible signs of Germany's defeat became evident that comes in mid-1942.

The defeat of Rommel at El Alamein and the subsequent loss of North Africa to the Anglo-American forces were overshadowed by the disaster at Stalingrad where General von Paulus's Sixth Army was cut off and surrendered to the Russians in January 1943 . In July 1943 the Allies captured Sicily and Mussolini's regime collapsed in Italy. The total mobilization of the German war economy to raise the fighting spirit of the German people were powerless to change the fact that the Third Reich lacked the resources as a struggle against the world alliance which Hitler himself had provoked.

As the Red Army came to Berlin and the Anglo-Americans reached the Elbe, on 19 March 1945 Hitler ordered the destruction of what remained of German industry, communications and transportation systems. He decided that, if not survive, Germany too should be destroyed. The same ruthless nihilism and passion for the destruction that has led to the extermination of six million Jews in death camps, the biological treatment "of the sub-human Slavs and other subject peoples in the New Order finally turned against their own people.
On 29 April 1945, he married his mistress Eva Braun. The next day, Hitler committed suicide, shot himself in the mouth with a pistol. His body was taken to the garden of the Reich Chancellery by aides, covered with macabre act of petrol and burned along with Eva Braun.

With his death was nothing left of the "Great Germanic Reich" of the tyrannical power structure and ideological system which had devastated Europe during the twelve years of his totalitarian regime.
Ideological Statement.
The teaching of history should convey only facts and be free from political motives, personal opinions, biases, propaganda, and other common tactics of distortion. Every claim that is made about history should also be accompanied by documentation proving its basis. Only responsible scholarship and teaching should be permitted. Those who intend to support particular political interests and agendas should have their biased historical interpretations criticized for lacking proof.



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