L. Helms – författare

This volume offers an account of German political institutions. Each of the individual chapters, written by leading German specialists, provides a balanced assessment of the institution under consideration as well as the political research in the given field. The extended introductory chapter by the editor gives an overview of how the institutional system of the Federal Republic has combined the conflicting tasks of political stability and adaptation.

Presidents, Prime Ministers and Chancellors focuses on the leadership performances of the political chief executives in the United States, Britain and Germany since the end of the Second World War. Drawing on a wide range of material, Ludger Helms provides a genuinely comparative perspective on the conditions and manifestations of executive leadership in three of the world's largest established democracies. The study looks at long-term trends in the historical development of leadership conceptions on either side of the Atlantic and examines the opportunities and limits for political leadership under different forms of democratic government. As executive leadership is understood here as an activity reaching well beyond the boundaries of the executive branch, the study is designed to mark a major contribution to the wider field of transatlantic comparative politics.