Review-Cultural Mythology and Global Leadership

Kessler, Eric H. and Diana J. Wong-Mingji (Eds), Cultural Mythology and Global Leadership
2009. Edward Elgar Pub. ISBN-10: 1847204031

Reviewed by Dr. George Simons at diversophy.com

My mouth watered when first I saw the publication of this title, as it promised a next step in the exploration of cultural phenomena from within a culture’s

view and vision of itself. It has been my perception that the intercultural field has suffered from a plethora of models and mental paradigms that impose alien structures on the cultures to be studied and understood, and that the next task facing us is to see how different cultures define themselves and how they tend to look upon and evaluate others from their own cultural perspective.

Myths are an important part of the construction of a culture. Their telling creates, reflects and confirms, as well as continually adapts the values of a culture to the moment in which they are being retold. One might call them the constructive-instructive tools of culture. They are too often left behind in the research, analysis and codification of what we call intercultural knowledge.

This book brings together twenty studies that attempt to relate the myths of the country or region to the indigenous concept of leadership and its development in contemporary theory and practice. The framework of each study is identical, i.e., first, an exposition of the cultural myths or larger-than-life stories that speak of each people and of their leaders. The mythic characters may be anything from gods who shaped the universe as seen by a specific culture to real characters that shaped its history and have achieved mythic proportions in the cultural memory.

Secondly, there is an overview of how leadership is perceived in each culture. This generally takes the form of seeing how some of the values in the mythology may be reflected or used in current leadership thinking or in the behaviors of select leaders in politics and commerce.

There follows a look at the global and practical implications of leadership philosophy and practice within the culture. These are illustrated by one or more “commentary boxes” offering quotations from noted leaders. Each chapter is abundantly footnoted and referenced citing everyone from Aristotle to Ziber. The contributors to this book are by-and-large business and management scholars who see the relevance of both ethnic and organizational culture to their work rather than interculturalists, though they have some familiarity with theories of Hofstede and Trompenaars and occasionally cite where these theories break-down.

That being said, there is great diversity in the approaches taken by the various authors to the selection of the mythological content and to their perceptions and recommendations for contemporary leadership. Some authors underline characteristics (and failings) in terms of mythical prototypes while others use these as a jumping off point to suggest or recommend the relevance and applicability of current management theory to the development of today’s leaders.

While the mythological summaries are of varying quality and depth, it was interesting to read these summaries in the context of leadership and the various opinions of how the myths were relevant to flesh and blood leaders of our times. On the other hand, the book as a whole tends to suffer from having an “undistributed middle,” that is, there is in most cases a lack of concrete evidence that the heroes of mythology provide models or types for the leaders of today. Rather, from an intercultural perspective, one is forced to ask more complex questions that seem beyond the perspective or at least the task of the various contributors, e.g., chicken-and-egg questions:

• How do myths and heroes create cultural values? vs How do cultures create and continue to shape their mythologies?
• To what degree is a leader (or anyone else for that matter) shaped by the heroes and myths in his or her cultural ambience? vs How do we make choices about our heroes in order to further the values we have chosen for ourselves or our group?
• How much is hero identification, where it exists, a matter of intrinsic instinct and calling? vs How much conscious choice and reshaping occurs when leaders are chosen for their political or commercial value?

Case in point. I was stunned that the editors, who are authors of the first chapter on the USA), chose “superheroes” as the mythic typology for understanding US leadership. There were were two cohorts of superheroes cited, those created around the startup World War II (1938-42), e.g., Superman and Wonder Woman, and those surrounding the height of the Cold War confrontations (early 1960’s), e.g., Incredible Hulk and the X-Men. I found no significant mention of the socio-cultural context of their genesis.

While the authors of this chapter do offer a table of advice about leadership behaviors taken from the strengths and weakness of each superhero, and, while archetypal US heroism may be reflected in these individualistic, usually loner-saviors of comic book and silver screen, they are not per se our prototypes, at least once we have outgrown our Halloween costumes. These are actually found in the frontier mentality and continue to be reflected in the Hollywood heroes and political posturing ad nauseam. The theme repeats itself beginning with the cowboy who drives the bad guys from town to the sci-fi world saviors, and currently, in videogames where the players can themselves play the role of the superheroes.

While in many cases the mythology cited has archetypal religious roots religion is taken most seriously by the authors of the section on India. Surprisingly, though the author’s of the US chapter mention that Superman echoes the Moses story, there is no mention of the role of religion in the most “born-again” of all countries where political and military leaders as well as commercial capitalists often ooze piety. Perhaps this is implicit in the choice of superheroes and myth, in that they represent the importance of reinventing oneself in this culture.

While there is too much in this volume to comment on in detail, it is appropriate at least to offer some examples of insights produced by its reading. I bullet a few of them here:

• Canada is nicely distinguished from the USA by its sense how the land and multicultural realities have shaped leadership.
• The chapter on Israel traces the impact of the transition from a socialistic to and individualistic culture and the consequences on leadership.
• The impact of external domination in Poland and Islamic ascendency in Iran are both illustrate how deeper, older cultural roots remain powerful forces even when they have been suppressed or superseded by other ideology.

We know that within the same culture, the wisdom found one proverb (take risks) may seem to be contradicted by that found in another (be careful). Yet these complement each other in the big picture. So too, the gods and heroes of myth do not provide a consistent story but a rich locus from which we may draw the values and behaviors needed for our times and our exercise of leadership. In this regard, this book seems more illustrative than instructive and invites a closer look at how we make our choices of leaders and how leaders make their choices.