Is an airline captain the boss

[scottyp123]

I was watching Easyjet inside the cockpit earlier and I was impressed by how authoritarian the captains seemed to be, one had a problem with the database and she spoke to the "office" like she was in charge of the company and called the shots and it reminded me a while back when we were sat on the tarmac at JFK, the captain wouldn't budge until a suspect bit of damage had been checked out by the ground crew that he admitted was more than likely just a paint chip.

It got me thinking does a captain have the absolute final say on whether a flight leaves or not or if it needs to divert or land immediately without any sort of punishment or sanction? I would like to think it does, obviously if he or she says we can't leave because of a hangover then that needs dealing with but if the captain sites a safety aspect then it should be a decision taken by them alone and not the company bosses or the airport. Is there legal jurisdiction that says the captain is the ultimate boss in these circumstances?

[scottyp123]

Its as I thought then and how it should be, so if for eg the captain had an issue or problem with the plane and maintenance said they had fixed it or nothing was wrong, then, if the captain still wasn't happy I take it he still has the authority to cancel the flight without threats from operations of losing his job and not be sued at a later date for the lost revenue from the flight even if it did turn out to be safe in the end.