Samenvatting

This article highlights the special position of European heads of intelligence and security services. In the search for important characteristics of intelligence leadership through time, a comparison is made between five services from five different countries (Germany, France, the Netherlands, Greece and Spain). Using Anglo-American reference information and a leadership typology developed by intelligence expert Robarge, the consecutive heads of service in these European countries are profiled and categorized. This leads to a picture that has always been dominated by males, a strong military presence and many end-of-career heads. Their influence on the internal and external service development was often substantial, with alternate appointments of inside and outside reformers. The scale of openness usually constituted a struggle with both the inside and outside world. Nowadays, the heads are being confronted with new challenges and demands, which leads to the conclusion that a new form of ‘distributed’ or ‘interdependent’ leadership is required, in which old reflexes to appoint people with an operational, military or police background as heads of these services are no longer self-evident.