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Although the subject of leadership is a hot topic, it has never attracted much attention in the public sector. Searching for Leadership is the first book to examine the evolving role and leadership of the highest-ranking public servant in Ottawa or in any of Canada's Provinces and Territories, the Secretary to Cabinet, or the Clerk. Arguing that the leadership role of the Secretary to Cabinet must be appreciated and understood in light of modern management practices and the centralization of administrative practices, the contributors to this volume present a mixture of approaches to the position: literature reviews, structural approaches, and biographical case studies of influential Secretaries to the Cabinet. Analyzing the role of Secretaries to the Cabinet in Ottawa as well as in Alberta, Saskatchewan, Quebec, and Ontario, the contributors detail the roles, key functions and impact of these highly influential public servants, highlighting the ways in which the leadership skills of Secretaries to the Cabinet have changed and responded to change. An important contribution to understanding Canadian governance and public management, Searching for Leadership is essential reading for scholars and students in political science, history, public administration and management, as well as public servants.

Historians have known of the letters of “Anthony Rivers,” recounting religious, political, and military affairs from the court in London in 1601–3, and of certain dispatches from Rome forwarded to Robert Cecil by Thomas Phelippes, “the Decipherer,” in 1602. In this article, Patrick Martin and John Finnis show that the letters and dispatches were integral to a coordinated effort by William Sterrell, secretary to the Earl of Worcester and long-time double agent, and Father Robert Persons, prefect in Rome of the Jesuit mission to England, to frustrate the climactic third appeal to the pope by the disaffected secular priests known as the Appellants. Sterell assisted Persons by authoring the “Rivers” letters, which kept Persons and others informed of the government's actions and policies, as well as by promptly forwarding to him for refutation the Appellants' publications as they appeared, and notably by forwarding to the queen and Cecil the dispatches from Rome—which we show were written by Persons himself. This coordinated effort had some success.

Christianson discusses politics, patronage and conceptions of governance in Early Stuart England. The Duke of Buckingham and his supporters in the Parliament of 1628 are examined.

An informal foreign office was established during the reign of Elizabeth I between 1558-1603. The office maintained close ties with the monarch through its participationin the Privy Council and was tasked with handling most of the monarchy's foreign relations. The office also developed most of the foreign diplomacy practices still in use in the UK. A brief overview of the early beginnings of the informal Elizabethan foreign office is presented.

“Almost all political establishments have been the creatures of chance rather than of wisdom,” wrote James Burgh in the first volume of hisPolitical Disquisitions. “Therefore it is impossible to say what would be the effect of a perfect commonwealth,” since there was in history “no example of such a phenomenon.” Here in these common radical Whig sentiments was a provocative challenge that seemed to the Americans of 1776 to be somehow providentially directed at them. Their response was a spinetingling exhilaration. “How few of the human race,” rejoiced John Adams, “have ever enjoyed an opportunity of making an election

“Almost all political establishments have been the creatures of chance rather than of wisdom,” wrote James Burgh in the first volume of his Political Disquisitions. “Therefore it is impossible to say what would be the effect of a perfect commonwealth,” since there was in history “no example of such a phenomenon.” Here in these common radical Whig sentiments was a provocative challenge that seemed to the Americans of 1776 to be somehow providentially directed at them. Their response was a spinetingling exhilaration. “How few of the human race,” rejoiced John Adams, “have ever enjoyed an opportunity of making an election