"This book grows out of a collaboration between the Jepson School of Leadership Studies at the University of Richmond and the Fred W. Smith National Library for the Study of George Washington at Mount Vernon, Virginia. ... The collaboration seeks to advance our understanding of both leadership and of George Washington through applying leadership theory to better understand Washington.... [They] planned a conference on Burns's theories and their application shortly after Professor Burns's death in July 2014. That conference was held at the Fred W. Smith Library in April 2015."--page xv.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Foreword / Joseph J. Ellis -- Acknowledgement / George R. Goethals and Douglas Bradburn -- Introduction / George R. Goethals -- Part I. James MacGregor Burns and the essentials of leadership -- 1. Discovering leadership in the early republic / Patrick Spero -- 2. Leadership without leaders, followers, or causality: tribute and tribulation for the intellectual legacy of James MacGregor Burns / Richard A. Couto -- 3. Real, intended change: business movements? / Gill Robinson Hickman -- 4. Transforming motives and mentors: the heroic leadership of James MacGregor Burns / George R. Goethals and Scott T. Allison -- 5. Dangerous liaisons: adultery and the ethics of presidential leadership / Joanne B. Ciulla -- Part II. James MacGregor Burns and American leadership -- 6. "A people unused to restraint must be led, they will not be drove:" the rebels and their leaders in the American Revolution / Douglas Bradburn -- 7. James MacGregor Burns and the American presidency / Thomas E. Cronin -- 8. Transactional leadership in a transformative election: an essay in honor of James MacGregor Burns / Edward J. Larson -- 9. James MacGregor Burns's Roosevelt: the lion and the fox and the election of 1940 / Susan Dunn -- 10. Theory and practice: James MacGregor Burns / Georgia Sorenson -- Epilogue / Jim Burns, Thomas E. Cronin

For decades, the writings of James MacGregor Burns have defined the central issues in our understanding of leadership. Their impact is illustrated here through ten chapters exploring Burns's research on presidential leadership and related issues of moral and effective leadership, the nature of social change and transformation, and the subtleties of the relationships between leaders and followers. Exploring history through the dynamics of leadership, this extraordinary volume outlines the dynamics of social change and transformation and illustrates how leaders shape followers' motivations. The transactional and transforming leadership of various US presidents is considered within broader questions of personal ethics, conflict and compromise, and historical contingency. The presidencies of Thomas Jefferson, Franklin Roosevelt and Lyndon Johnson in particular transformed American society and American politics. The chapters in this book explore the several ways they fought for enduring human values using power resources that aroused and satisfied deep human motives and tested the limits of leadership effectiveness and morality. Students of leadership, the US Presidency, the American Founding, and history in general will find this book enlightening. Scholars and leaders in business, psychology and philosophy will also find much of value given James MacGregor Burns's insightful analysis across a wide field of disciplines.