Sanford School of Public Policy
Duke University
The United States – Southern Africa Center for Leadership and Public Values
The United States – Southern Africa Center for Leadership and Public Values is a binational partnership between the Sanford School of Public Policy at Duke University and the Graduate School of Business at the University of Cape Town.
The Center will:
- Enhance the capacity of highly promising emerging leaders, primarily in Southern Africa but also in historically disadvantaged communities in the United States, to contribute to the empowerment of their communities and the transformation of their countries;
- Strengthen civil society with particular regard to mutual learning and collaborative initiatives between independent sector leaders in the United States and Southern Africa; and
- Make a substantive contribution to the public discussion and understanding of the role of ethics and values in public life in both Southern Africa and the United States.
Programs
Louisiana Effective Leadership Program (LaELP)
Hurricanes Katrina and Rita unmasked many longstanding and deeply vexing flaws in the economic, social, and political landscapes it devastated, none more so than those of Louisiana. In many respects, Louisiana’s full recovery will depend on its ability to address the leadership deficit – specifically the want of a sustained commitment to the development of leaders committed to applying moral values to decision-making in the nonprofit, private and public sectors.
In response to this challenge, the Center for Leadership and Public Values at Duke University in partnership with the College of Business at Southern University (Baton Rouge) has built a program which each year recruits, trains and provides reinforcing support for successive 20-25 member classes of Fellows (45 in the 2008/09 and 2009/10 classes). These are women and men who are nominated by senior leaders in the business, non-profit and public sectors across the State and are offered Fellowships based on careful and competitive review of their applications. Fellows selected are predominantly but not exclusively African-American, mid-career leaders who are on fast tracks to senior positions in their fields. They must demonstrate a sincere interest in understanding and applying universal moral values to their lives and work and who are committed to advancing social justice.
The program – an intensive one-year, in-service experience – enhances the capacity of Fellows to serve others, strengthen their organizations, meet the needs of their constituencies, identify best practices of public accountability and, above all, contribute to the common good, with particular emphasis on empowering low-income, historically disadvantaged communities. Central to the program’s design is training in those “ways of being” that characterize effective, rather than merely efficient, leadership – doing the right things, not just doing things right.
Adapted from the Duke Center’s highly successful Emerging Leaders Program (2002-2008), which trained 135 Southern African and American rising leaders, the program focuses on five key leadership themes: The Role of Culture and Context; Ethics and Accountability; The Necessity for Personal Renewal; Effective and Ethical Communications and Public Policy Advocacy; and The Critical Role of Networking. The instructional curriculum is rigorous and includes: pre-course readings on servant leadership history and theory; a 6.5 day opening retreat, a 2.5 day mid-year retreat and a 4.5 day “reunion” retreat; planning public advocacy projects; taking successive leadership self-assessments; tying the results of those assessments into year-long personal executive coaching provided by the program; and development of a functioning alumni association to reinforce learning in years after the program.
The program’s faculty is led by its founder Ambassador James A. Joseph, a native of Opelousas, Louisiana and a graduate of Southern and Yale Universities. His professional career includes senior leadership positions in all three sectors. He has served as a Vice President at Cummins Engine Company and President of the Cummins Foundation, as CEO of the national Council on Foundations, as Under Secretary of the Interior (in the Carter Administration) and as American Ambassador to South Africa (1996-2000). Ambassador Joseph founded the Center for Leadership and Public Values at Duke (and its counterpart at the University of Cape Town) and serves presently as Professor of the Practice of Public Policy Studies. He chairs the Louisiana Disaster Recovery Foundation established by Governor Kathleen Blanco.
Louisiana Effective Leadership (LaELP) Program Description (pdf)
Selected Comments from Four Classes of ELP Fellows (pdf)
Open Letter to Nominators (pdf)
Nomination Form, Louisiana Effective Leadership Program
2010/11
DUE November 30, 2009
(
doc or 
pdf)
Application Form (for Nominees), Louisiana Effective
Leadership Program 2010/11
DUE January
22, 2010
( doc or pdf)
Application materials
Emerging Leaders Program (currently on hiatus)
Annually, the Center will recruit emerging leaders in the public, private and nonprofit sectors from both Southern Africa and the United States for special training. The key elements of the program are focused and concentrated week-long retreats and Fellow-Mentor relationships. The retreats will explore such themes as ethics and accountability in public life; whether there is an African paradigm of leadership, and what it has to teach those working to transform their communities; and strategies for personal renewal. The mentoring component will pair Fellows with established leaders, who will serve as personal advisers. As emerging leaders work through problems and explore the moral basis for public action, the experienced mentors will provide honest, constructive feedback to ensure reflective learning and ongoing renewal.
Emerging Leaders Program Brochure (pdf)
Emerging Leaders Fellows Publications
Wit and Wisdom: Unleashing the Philanthropic Imagination (5.6MB pdf file)
by Mark D. Constantine
Civil Society Forum
Civil society leaders (including foundation executives) from the United States and Southern Africa will come together to share insights on key issues facing the sector in Southern Africa, to develop initiatives to strengthen non-governmental leadership and governance, and to promote sector sustainability. Working committees, co-chaired by distinguished non-governmental leaders from the United Sates and Southern Africa, will form partnerships in key areas of mutual interest: philanthropy and corporate public involvement, youth service and voluntarism, health, faith-based organizations, and reconstruction and development. The Forum will gather annually in plenary sessions to report on the progress of specific projects and to discuss areas of further cooperation. [Monograph]
Ethics in Public Life Initiatives
The Sanford School at Duke and the Graduate School of Business at the University of Cape Town will collaborate on a series of initiatives to contribute to scholarship and the conversation about public values. Initiatives may include research, seminars or conferences for policymakers and opinion leaders, articles, occasional papers, monographs, special interviews and panels for television and radio, and presentations to key audiences.
Ambassador James A. Joseph Speeches / Notes
For more information, please contact Khuwailah "Cookie" Beyah at 919-613-7321 or email clpv@duke.edu.
Mailing address:
Center for Leadership and Public Values
Duke University
Box 90310
Durham, NC 27708
Shipping Address (for overnight deliveries):
Center for Leadership and Public Values
201 Science Drive, Room 116
Durham, NC 27708
Ambassador James A. Joseph