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"Born Leadership" for the Crawely Family

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You are a professor of criminal justice at a small liberal arts college in the rural south. For the past few years, you have conducted research on the characteristics of successful criminal-justice leaders, and you have recently become interested in the nature versus nurture debate, as it pertains to leadership. You have decided to conduct an analysis of a local family, the Crawleys. For three generations, various members of the family have served in a variety of leadership positions throughout the criminal-justice system in your community.

"Papa" Jack Crawley served as mayor of your city from 1946 to 1954 and as a district court judge from 1958 until his death in 1969. His son "Little" Jack joined the district attorney's (DA) office in 1961 and was elected DA in 1970, using his inheritance from his father to finance his campaign. He retired from that office in 1990 to accept an appointment as the head of a multicounty drug taskforce. His sister, Patricia, also joined the prosecutor's office in 1967, but she left to establish her own practice when her brother was elected district attorney. Her firm is now the largest in the county, and she recently announced her intention to run for a superior court judgeship.

Several members of the third generation of Crawleys have also joined the criminal-justice professions. Little Jack's daughter, Pam, worked as a prosecutor and was hired by Patricia's law firm in 2005. Patricia's son, Tony Meyers, joined the local police department in 2000. In 2007, he ran for the office of sheriff, though he did not win the election. He was recently promoted to the rank of sergeant within the police department.

Explained the term "born leader" with reference to the Crawley family.
Analyzed and explained by providing relevant examples whether or not effective leaders are people who have been shaped by events and circumstances that they encountered in their lives.
Indicated by providing supporting reasoning whether or not the Crawleys rose to positions of power and leadership due to innate personal qualities or because of skills of leadership acquired from experience in dealing with people.
Analyzed the success or failures of the Crawley family with reference to the social exchange theory and the types of influence tactics adopted by them.
Analyzed, in the context of the criminal justice field, whether the positions of judges, prosecutors, and police administrators will benefit from a charismatic leadership or benefit from skills gained through structured leadership training.

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Solution Summary

The concept of "born" leader is dealt with in brief. The question as to what creates leaders is discussed, especially if it is found in a single family.

Solution Preview

This concerns the "trait" theory of leadership which argues that certain people are genetically created with these abilities. This is one theory. Another that falls under the "trait" idea is that someone born into the Crawley family will be raised with such attitudes everywhere. This is also part of the view that certain people just "have" it.
This is also similar to the "Cognitive Resource" theory that states leaders have the "mentality" of being leaders regardless of circumstances. In this case, someone raised in that family will be surrounded by leaders every day. Hence, their children will already be trained, experienced leaders just because of that.

Social exchange theory in this context would be that children of the Crawley's would expect their own lives to feature some level of authority eventually. They thus will work hard with this expectation and will never be satisfied until they reach it. This offers another incentive to become ...

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