The Shoemaker's Library
The Shoemaker's Library
Dumbledore vs Snape: Who is an Accountable Leader?
In this episode of The Shoemaker's library I have a debate with Seth Jacobus, director of the George F. Johnson Memorial Library, about the public administrator value of accountability using Albus Dumbledore and Severus Snape from the Harry Potter series. There will be spoilers from the book series.
Hello and welcome to the shoemaker's library. I'm your host. Can I throw them in? And today
Speaker 2:We have a special guest, Seth Jacobus director of the George F. Johnson Memorial library, who will be talking about public service values countability in the public administration. And we're going to be doing something fun with that. So it's not as dry as just public administration value accountability. So how are we going to do that stuff? Okay. Well thank you for having me, Kenny. And, uh, yeah, I wanted to talk about, uh, value of public service, uh, in today's political climate that we find ourselves in. Uh, we see at the local level and we also see at the federal level, uh, how important, uh, the public service value of accountability is as a public administrator. So I want to talk to you about that a little bit today, and, uh, but I want to do it with a twist, uh, in regards to, uh, Harry Potter and the definitely Hallows and, uh, the different public administration styles of Snape and Dumbledore. So, uh, I think you kind of have a question there that we're going to kind of debate the topic and, uh, yeah. Yeah. So sounds good. Yeah. So I have a few questions here that we're going to ask each other. Uh, I'm going to be looking at Dumbledore as Dumbledore is my favorite character in the Harry Potter, uh, universe. So I'm team Dumbledore where Seth here will be defending several Snape professor snake. So the first question they lead by example, they don't ask others subordinates to do things that they themselves wouldn't do. So how does Snape do that? Yeah, so obviously in the definitely Hallows, I think, um, you know, what are the main things obviously that he does, he gives up his life for others. So I thought that was really important. Um, you know, he's asking other people to risk their lives, but, uh, ultimately he does give up his own life, um, and what he does his headmaster there. So I thought that was really important. Uh, part of the, the book there. So well, Dumbledore does the same thing, in my opinion, he sacrifices his life for the greater good. He literally greater good was his saying from when he was a kid and in the end, he does sacrifice himself for a much better, greater, good than what he championed when he was younger. And so I feel he also doesn't ask others to do things that he wouldn't do himself. Okay. Yeah, that definitely is fair. And I think they're kind of, even on that, I would say on that scale. So the next question is they own up to their mistakes. Yeah. So I thought snake definitely. And definitely Hallows again, he, he gives up his life, uh, kind of for becoming a death eater. He has to actually be accountable in that way. And it kind of comes to a head again at his death for all of his kind of actions, but, um, yeah, he, he kinda, he does that. So I thought that was really, again, kind of the same thing. Um, he gives up his life for others, but, uh, he's owning up to his own mistakes by actually kind of succumbing to, for being a death eater, being a friend of Voldemort. So, and I feel Dumbledore tries to live up to his mistakes. Um, he is very secretive. He doesn't let people know of his mistakes very often. He confides in very few people, uh, but I feel the people he does confide in and who truly know him do know that he tries to make up for his mistakes and even the mistakes that he feels he can never recover from. He, he tries to fix, uh, they hold others accountable for their actions. So this was kind of hard with, uh, Snape, you know, um, he's not big on that. Uh, I didn't see a lot of parts, uh, you know, when I'm reading the book, but, uh, um, you know, when Harry does, uh, he does get, uh, his memories to Harry, uh, and then he takes them into pensive and he's kind of seeing some of the memories of, uh, obviously stapes memories. He does talk about, uh, you know, Dumbledore and how he's kind of, uh, you know, I think the point was that he's, um, raising Harry like a pig for slaughter. So he's kind of trying to hold, uh, Dumbledore accountable for his actions and what he's doing as a public administrator there. So I thought that was one interesting point. What did you have for double? So Dumbledore, I feel does hold others accountable for their actions. He's, uh, runs teachers very well. He tries to get them follow the course, even though sometimes they don't. And I feel that sometimes you don't see how he's interacting with others. Um, so from the surface, you think he's not paying attention, hiring these teachers that
Speaker 3:I don't know how to do their jobs or, but it's,
Speaker 2:But I feel in the last book you find that he does always know, and there was always a reason for it that may not be good for people looking in and seeing accountability. But in the end you kind of see that he held people accountable for their, yeah. I think that's a good point that, you know, as a public administrator, accountability, people don't always see what's going on behind the scenes, but somebody being accountable and they may question why is so and so doing that thing, but they're, you know, they have their own reason. You just might not know about it, so that that's, that's a good point. They learn from both their successes and failures. So yeah, I think, uh, becoming headmaster, uh, Snape is learning from the successes and failures, uh, by his, he agrees to, to kill the Dumbledore. Um, that to me was him, you know, learning from both his successes and his failures. He had to do that. His failures as a deaf leader has a, you know, success as a, as a teacher and taking on that role than being, uh, confident to Dumbledore and kind of a number two where he, he could, uh, be trusted with that responsibility, that kind of thought it was kind of a situation where it kind of thought that's where he was learning from both the successes and failures. I think this, you learn for Dumbledore specifically in the last book is you learn that he has a weakness to power and how he himself realizes that from growing up and his temptations with having too much power so that he put himself in a position that he wouldn't be tempted to use power incorrectly, a more accountable leader. Yeah, I think, yeah. I mean, you have these two great wizards and they have great power. It's a, what did they do with it? You know, is it for good? Is it for evil? And yeah, again, you know, at the end there, they're both trying to do the right thing. So, so I guess you have the question. The initial question is in Harry Potter, the definitely Hallows Snape and Dumbledore, both serve as headmasters at Hogwarts based on the value of accountability. Uh, what was more, who was more accountable as headmaster, Snape or Dumbledore. So I don't know, I guess we both have kind of conflicting ideas on this. Um, you know, for me, like I said, Snape, I think, uh, just in that one instance in that book, uh, he was, he was more accountable. Um, he had to put the burden more, I think on his shoulders then than Dumbledore did. Um, you know, Dumbledore is already going to die. You know, he has to sacrifice his life. He does too, but again, Snape has the sacrifice, his life. He might've lived a long prosperous life after that, but he has to, uh, again, be accountable for his actions as being a debater in front of mold. Morton, uh, ultimately is killed by him. And so he ends his life though. It's not a natural cause and grow cotton and eat by his name. Right. So I can see that as well. Um, so I can see why Snape is a good leader. That's the final book is where he seemed to shine in the parts that he did is finally where we get to see him right. In a leader role where Dumbledore is no longer available to really compare in that last one, um, other than in flashback scenes and, and in dreams. Right. Uh, so I agree that I think both our ideas of leaders, they both have their failings. They both could improve in some places, as we discussed as going down this list of things that go into the, a trade of being an accountable administrator. So I think it's good to say that it's kind of a draw. They both have, they both a good, I can agree with that. They're both, they both have their values and their, their failings. So thank you for coming and having that little debate. And I hope you enjoyed, thank you for listening to the shoemaker's library.
Speaker 1:[inaudible].