The doctrine of New Public Management has
profoundly changed the way leadership is understood and conceptualized in the
public sector. At the same time, the criminal codes and rules on bribery have
hardly changed. In this article we analyze how the role of the public manager
is constructed in the Finnish case law and the decisions by prosecutors in
bribery cases. The focus is on mayors and other leaders of the municipalities.
We find in the data two contesting discourses on leadership. The traditional
criminal liability and legality discourse supports an identity construction of
a law abiding, rule implementing civil servant. At the same time, the courts
have imbibed the new managerial leader, whose job is to lead and represent the
municipality and even to show and accept hospitality in interaction with
cooperation partners. These two discourses seem to be contesting at the moment.
With the exception of traveling rules, we found that there are no clear rules
on normal hospitality, in contrast to corruption.