Abstract

COLLADO-CAMPANA, Francisco; JIMENEZ-DIAZ, José Francisco  and  ENTRENA-DURAN, Francisco. Political Leadership in Representative Democracies: An Analysis from a Structural/Constructivist Perspective. Rev. mex. cienc. polít. soc [online]. 2016, vol.61, n.228, pp.57-90. ISSN 0185-1918.

In this article we set forth an approach concerning the processes of political leadership within the polyarchies or representative democracies. Scholars such as Bryman, Burns, Kouzes, Linz, or Posner define the political leadership as a relationship of exchange between a leader and his followers by way of the vision that the former conveys as a motivational factor. Based on this notion and in connection with Pierre Bourdieu's structural-constructivist approach we argue the pertinence of studying political leadership by integrating its subjective and objective dimensions. Hence, political leadership is considered, on the one hand, as a socio-culturally constructed phenomenon, stressing especially the notions of frame, habitus, field, and symbolic capital; while proposing on the other hand a diachronic study of political leadership aimed at understanding the real process of symbolic capital accumulation by political leaders.

Keywords : Bourdieu; political leadership; constructivism; habitus; field; symbolic capital.

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