A systematic review of ethical leadership studies in educational research from 1990 to 2022

Abstract

The purpose of this review was to provide an overview of the scholarly publications on ethical leadership in educational research, drawing on a database of 151 articles published between 1990 and 2022. Descriptive statistics and content analysis methods were used to identify trends in the ethical leadership literature in terms of volume and growth trajectory of ethical leadership research, geographic and journal distribution, types of articles, authorship trends, citation impact, research methods, key themes and findings associated with empirical ethical leadership research in education. The results revealed that 28% of the articles were conceptual, while the rest was empirical 72%. Within the subset of empirical articles, 61% of the studies adopted qualitative methods, followed by quantitative studies (31%), and mixed methods articles (8%). The analysis found that the ethical leadership research adapting qualitative methodology focused on four major themes: the practices of school ethical leadership; the dilemmas/challenges of ethical leadership; the leadership development of ethical educational leaders; and overlapping issues. The analysis also identified the antecedents, mediators, moderators, and outcomes associated with quantitative ethical leadership research in educational research. Recommendations were provided to strengthen future ethical leadership research.