Political leadership style is one of the most important traits of local governance. This used to show the character of local political societies as rules-in-use of socio-political processes and dynamics. In this framework, the ‘New Political Culture’ (NPC) is a new leadership style against the classical ‘Class Politics’ showing different policy preferences and different interaction patterns with civil society. Socio-economic and cultural change, as well as institutional factors, are driving the growing and spread of the NPC among local political actors. Using surveys from the Fiscal Austerity and Urban Innovation Project, this article tries to show the presence of the NPC among mayors in European, North American and Latin American countries. The comparison among them could show the importance of socio-economic, cultural and institutional factors explaining the spread of the NPC.