Leadership Style of John Winston Howard - Essay Example

Leadership Style of John Winston Howard Introduction John Winston Howard was Australia’s Prime Minister from 1996 to 2007 (Errington & Onselen 2007). Due to his leadership strategies, Howard earned himself a long political mileage and became the second longest serving Prime Minister in Australia. After having served in the Federal Reserve for six years, Howard’s life as a politician was not a smooth one. He served in opposition for almost thirteen years before he was elected Prime Minister under Liberal-National Coalition Party. Howard took charge in a time when Australia was characterised by strong economic growth and therefore the issues of importance in Howard’s terms of service are: taxes, industrial associations and social affairs. This essay delves into Howard’s leadership style by looking at specific strategies he used during his political career. Statement Howard is renowned as one of the strongest Australia’s recent Prime Ministers and he is also well known for his conservative leadership style (Manne 2004). However, his actions of championing a small government that involves the Australian public are also a manifestation of his democratic style of leadership. Howard’s leadership style can be cited way back in the 1970s when he was appointed the Federal Reserve Treasurer. Right from the start, Howard was doubtful of change and development agendas though he kept his doubts clandestine. However, during his time as a Federal Reserve worker, the tough economic times forced him to question Keynesian economic strategies. This approach which was an accepted view among the Liberals happened at a time when Howard had plans of succeeding Fraser. When Fraser was in his third term of government, Howard was busy selling himself to the Australian public as a reformer. However, his suggestion that the financial system in use be deregulated was highly resisted by cabinet members. This occurrence is said to have made Howard smarter since he decided to use multiple leadership styles in accordance with the policy orientation. Howard constructed a confrontational style of leadership that challenges straightforward reports and explanations. At this point in time, Howard’s chief competitor was Andrew Peacock. So as to set himself apart from Peacock, he decided to support policy change more radically than the Hawke administration. This strategy won Howard the admiration of the media and the Australian public as well. Nonetheless, endorsing reform from opposition was a difficult task for Howard. In his first spell as the leader of opposition, Howard portrayed attractive results being ahead of the Hawke administration and the public outlook on the issue of deregulation (Ryan 2003). Dr John Hewson’s devised a strategy to retaliate against these reformist strategies that Howard and the Hawke government were endorsing. Hewson employed a noninterventionist strategy of leadership in social and fiscal issues. The downturn in early 1990s was a good opportunity to capture the public’s attention; however, Hewson’s strategy was so weak to capture the public eye. His conventional tolerance gained support from only a few people and his style which gave excess mandate to the public lacked the psychological attributes of strong stewardship that other leaders employed in case circumstances warranted the leader’s intervention. This became a good opportunity for Howard whose strategy was quite the reverse. Howard endeavoured to exploit the weakness of the electorate in terms of the reform agenda (Ryan 2003). Though Howard was conventional by nature, he was greatly aware of how conservatorship had helped Menzies thrive politically. Though Howard used a reformists approach to get to the highest office in Australia, he was highly cautious of the reform agenda worrying that its results would be detrimental to his political career. As a result, his supporters were not happy about his wariness though he tried to keep them in check by using strong leadership as his tactic. It was rather paradoxical of Howard to continue championing for change while he heavily invested in efforts to reap optimum benefits from the electoral fear for change. Howard executed this strategy by intensification of national security as a strategy of strong leadership. Though Howard was not a close ally of Fraser, he knew well that strong leadership and national security were the chief areas that accounted for Frasier’s success in prime ministerial elections (Manne 2004). The virtue of Howard being an autocratic leader is manifest in the role he played as a communicator when persuading and comforting Australians. He often used talkback radio to validate policies made by the government and this was a new element of politics in his time. For instance, his tenure during his first two terms was not compelling to most Australians; many people felt that Howard had not done what they expected about the market-tilted reforms. Howard was able to convince the public by claiming that his main goal in his tenure was to ensure that all Australians felt contented and happy. These remarks acted in favour of Howard and he won the 1996 elections. His government is claimed to be the most energetic government in the Commonwealth era. This would give the impression that Howard’s leadership style was different from that used by other leaders such as Menzies. Nonetheless, a more active administration is part of a response to the different environments that present-day leaders experience (Dereli 2010). By the time the general elections came to a close, Howard made sure that the tabloids and newspapers, the public service, both major political parties and state regimes were fully conversant with the creation and promotion of intricate economic and social policies to Australians. His active participation is seen further during the 2001 elections where he was grilled by members of the press with regard to his agenda for his third term. This question should have been a really tough one given that since identical questions were asked even in the 2004 elections. This continuous exhortation shows something about present-day leaders. Howard’s way of handling some of the contemporary aspects of politics, especially in the era of globalization in which most of his tenure falls in, and the round-the-clock demands of the media perplexed those critics who thought that social conservatism was the only leadership trait that marked his political career. It may be counter-instinctive to say that a conservative leader was so victorious in laying down his political strategies; however, the alarming support by the public state agencies is a clear manifestation that Howard was indeed successful in laying down his political agenda just like other modern Australian prime Ministers. Howard’s conventional nature is emphasized by the decisions he made as the head of government (Hancock 2007). He accurately followed the ingredients of his reform program that serve political and fiscal ends: reforming the issues pertaining privatization and the labour market. In these policies, Howard’s main focus was to destabilize social supplies of support for the Australian Labour Party. A decrease in government expenditure, conversely, caused the government headaches in Howard’s first term for no fiscal benefit. Howard’s political targets were about his triumph in party wrangles as well as in the government. It is therefore unclear if Howard actually had faith in the free market policies that he championed for even before his election as the Prime Minister. What is apparent, though, is that every strategy he employed was meant to enable conservative parties to be more aggressive in a dynamic society (Taylor 2009). During his first term in office, Howard had a very easy time as Prime Minister; he was, unlike other Prime Ministers of his time, able to evaluate his goals and the requirements of governance. Most of his allies had given up public duties and therefore Howard was busy reassuring Australians, evaluating his political career and national needs rather than rewarding his allies with political favours. His most crucial trait in his second term as opposition leader which was far much different from the first was his aptitude to reassure prime sections of the society that he would take their interests at heart when coming up with governmental policies. The decrease in the immigration intake, his claim that Australian history and patriotism was a source of pleasure, and his readiness to make a concession over crucial features of his economic program such as privatization and the goods and services tax all saw Howard walk a tough path between the demands of the scholars and the voters; Howard did not undermine the fact that voters were the ones who determined his fate in politics. His standpoints distanced away from as many voters as they attracted; however this is the same experience other politicians have had to overcome in their careers especially in this era when democracy is at its toll (Ryan 2003). In terms of policies, Howard was choosy in the accomplishment of his targets though they appeared minor as compared to his fundamentally conservative view of Australia’s government affairs. His political duty was to keep labour issues away from the Federal Reserve. Astoundingly, Howard used two tactics namely assurance and promotion of further reform to win himself four terms in office. He considered his relationship with the media and the community so crucial such that he even adopted pertinent policies he had previously denounced such as the policy of orthodoxy of Hawke and Keating (Robinson 2009). The reassuring style used by Howard was adequate enough to earn him victory in 1996 and 19998 elections and to some extent to help him reaffirm his position after the catastrophic elections that saw him lead Australia for a third term (Bratt 2007). That reaffirmation was dependent on how Howard would respond to the refuge seekers and the United States radical bombings. In theory, strong leaders are expected to react to a tough occurrence within and sometimes without their area of jurisdiction (Dereli 2010). Howard was in that sense a strong leader given the unbending way he reacted to politically crucial issues, his stance on social and cultural issues and the appropriateness of his political qualities regarding national security. Though his attribute as a leader who hardly compromises crucial issues and his standpoint on social issues had been manifested earlier in his political career; his quality of being dependable with regard to national security was not manifested until he was elected the Prime Minister of Australia. The time that the public perception of Howard went up was during the Tampa affair where he decided to go tough on refuge seekers consistent with public demands. Perceptions of strength were toughened by the antagonism with which Howard’s actions were interpreted within sections of the elite. In his first two terms, Howard earned a name when it came to doing things consistent with public demand (Bratt 2007). Whenever his policy failed, he became a stronger man. Getting back public approval was dependent on a policy turnaround regarding taxes and welfare issues. Howard’s command of his party and his antagonistic social agenda shaped up Howard’s leadership style for the last three terms that he spent in power. Though to some extent these actions harmonized with his style of leadership, they caused premature tribulations in his career as Prime Minister. Having won the control of the senate in 2005, Howard felt that it was the right time to evaluate his approach to fiscal reforms. He was compelled to compromise the senate at a time when his political accomplishment was optimum. This strong leadership that transcended the Senate and other political structures made Howard to approach the task of leadership as a burdensome affair. Having ascertained that he had pulled all forces together, Howard felt indebted to come up to the reformist persona he had built for over 20 years (Errington & Onselen 2007). This changed the public opinion about him and his political attributes with regard to national security became insignificant to the public eye. Consequently, Howard strategy failed to work in the 2007 general elections (Ovortrup 2008). Conclusion John Winston Howard had many attributes of a leader that are acknowledged in political headship. When he was in power, the public felt that strong leadership was an important aspect when electing their prime leader. Maybe that was the reason why Howard’s strong character made him so competitive in his political career despite the fact that he was a conservative leader. He was also a leader who enjoyed triumph and a leader who acclimatized himself to the period which he governed. Despite being conservative, he reigned for a long period in an era when reform was so crucial to leadership. In particular, Howard’s strategy of leadership is seen to be public oriented since his main goal was victory and probably nothing more. References Bratt, J 2007, Exit right: the unraveling of John Howard, Black Inc. Dereli, M 2010, Leadership styles, VDM Verlag. Errington, W & Onselen, PV 2007, John Winston Howard, Melbourne Univ. Publishing. Hancock, I 2007, The liberals: a history of the NSW division of the Liberal party of Australia, 1945-2000, Federal Press. Manne, R 2004, The Howard years, Black Inc. Ovortrup, M 2008, ‘Howard’s end: the Australian federal election of November 2007’, Electoral Studies, vol. 27, no. 3, pp. 555-57. Robinson, G 2009, ‘Australian political history: Keating to Kevin07’, Australian Journal of Political Science, vol. 44, no. 4, pp. 731-35. Ryan, S 2003, The Hawke government: a critical retrospective, Pluto Press Australia. Taylor, T 2009, ‘Howard’s end: a narrative memoir of political contrivance, neoconservative ideology and Australian history curriculum’, Curriculum Journal, vol. 20, no. 4, pp. 317-329. Read More