How Does Paternalistic Leadership Enhance Civil Servants’ Public Service Motivation? The Mediating Mechanism of Trust in Leader

The field of public leadership studies has witnessed limited research on paternalistic leadership (PL) and its impact on civil servants. The present study draws upon a questionnaire survey of 2,064 Chinese civil servants to explore the impact of administrative leaders’ PL styles on civil servants’ public service motivation (PSM) and the mediating mechanism that underlies its effects. When PL is exercised in a benevolent or moral style, it intensifies subordinates’ PSM. But authoritarian behavior, whether used separately, or in combination with another style (as in benevolent-authoritarian, moral-authoritarian or benevolent-moral-authoritarian leadership), showed an insignificant effect on PSM. In addition, trust in leader mediates the relationship between benevolent, moral and AL styles and subordinates’ PSM. Our findings suggest that even in an authoritarian-oriented society such as China, the authoritarian variant of PL is increasingly losing its influence, and moral and benevolent leadership have become more important in modern organizations, and should be the primary leadership strategies employed by government leaders.