Caring and Power in Female Leadership: A Philosophical Approach
Can philosophical understandings of power and care illuminate roadblocks that disrupt the potential of women in leadership? This book examines leadership challenges by drawing upon debates that pulse through the history of philosophy and into present-day philosophical conversations and larger social concerns. Its in-depth engagement with Nietzsche’s power theory, and its historically grounded discussion of debates in feminist ethics around sexual dualism and care, offer essential lessons for contemporary leadership studies. The book provides compelling examples from literature, film, and art history, as well as short case studies of contemporary lives, that productively demonstrate tensions between concepts and embodiments of caring and power. Its analysis of related notions of ressentiment, desire, disobedience, and resistance creates novel dimensions for addressing barriers that undermine successful female leadership, such as the “glass cliff.” As such, the book reveals how philosophical investigations add to understandings in leadership, business ethics, and organization studies.
This book is part of a series. View the full series, "“Schwung”; Critical Curating and Aesthetic Management for Art, Business and Politics", here.
Janet L. Borgerson works at the intersections of philosophy, business, and culture, with particular concerns for issues of identity, agency, and materiality. Her research draws on her background in art history, film studies, and poetry. She serves on the Advisory Board of the Race in the Marketplace Forum. She earned a BA in Philosophy from University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, and an MA and Ph.D. in Philosophy from University of Wisconsin, Madison, completing postdoctoral work at Brown University, USA. Her research has appeared in a broad range of journals, such as Business and Society Review, Feminist Theory, Gender, Work, and Organization, and Philosophy Today. She is the co-author of From Chinese Brand Culture to Global Brands: Insights from Aesthetics, Fashion, and History (2013) and Designed for Hi-Fi Living: The Vinyl LP in Midcentury America (2017).
"Janet L. Borgerson's Caring and Power in Female Leadership: A Philosophical Approach is an example of such a unique and seemingly disparate intermingling of intellectual fields. Perhaps this approach is to be expected of Borgerson, who has published in philosophy, business, and contemporary culture. As the name implies, Caring and Power in Female Leadership is one of the first book-length works to address the tensions between power and care ethics: "A philosophical investigation of care and power in the context of female leadership opens up spaces of understanding, learning, and potential action" (6). Borgerson accomplishes this by engaging contemporary (mis)perceptions of women in leadership positions and extending her analysis to both historical (Angelina de Montegiove), and fictional ("Bone" from Dorothy Allison's Bastard Out of Carolina) women leaders. The result is a wide-ranging treatment of care ethics and issues of power that is sure to inspire further development in future works of care theory."
Maurice Hamington, Hypatia: A Journal of Feminist Philosophy, 2019
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