Principled ‘Bastard’ Leadership?

Abstract

In an earlier article on leadership (EMA Vol. 29 Iss. 3 2001), I argued that more recent government and Ofsted policy and pronouncements were suggesting a view of leadership that might more aptly be described as ‘Bastard Leadership’, a view challenged empirically by Gold et al.in this edition of EMA. In this reply to their paper ‘ PrincipledPrincipals’ I argue that the data presented still have to be interpreted and that the data used raise four areas of question. In this paper I maintain that ‘bastard leadership’ is a subtle capturing of the leadership discourse. Propounding second order values as evidence of principled leadership in fact offers no defence against ‘bastard leadership’.