Leadership Styles and International Agenda-Setting: Understanding Small-State and Middle-Power Leadership on the Responsibility to Protect

Abstract Small states and middle powers suffer from a “power deficit” that leaves them with limited means and opportunities to exercise coercive power in international relations. Nevertheless, a growing number of studies has documented the success of these states in influencing international affairs. This study examines how different leadership styles matter for small-state and middle-power agenda-setting in international affairs. Drawing on recent advances in management theory and foreign policy analysis, we construct a typology of foreign policy leadership styles. Rather than viewing leadership as the personal style or characteristic of an individual leader, we understand leadership as positional, relational, and processual styles. We apply our typology to Canadian, Swedish, and Danish diplomatic activities to promote and influence the Responsibility to Protect agenda in the UN. We find all three leadership styles, but a dominance of processual leadership, especially enabling leadership, which supports the creation of emergent fora in which ideas and concepts can develop among different kinds of actors and the transmission of insights from these fora back into a more formalized context.