This Time from Africa: Developing a Relational Approach to Values-Driven Leadership

Abstract

The importance of relationality in ethical leadership has been the focus of recent attention in business ethics scholarship. However, this relational component has not been sufficiently theorized from different philosophical perspectives, allowing specific Western philosophical conceptions to dominate the leadership development literature. This paper offers a theoretical analysis of the relational ontology that informs various conceptualizations of selfhood from both African and Western philosophical traditions and unpacks its implications for values-driven leadership. We aim to broaden Western conceptions of leadership development by drawing on twentieth century European philosophy's insights on relationality, but more importantly, to show how African philosophical traditions precede this literature in its insistence on a relational ontology of the self. To illustrate our theoretical argument, we reflect on an executive education course called values-driven leadership into action, which ran in South Africa, Kenya, and Egypt in 2016, 2017, and 2018. We highlight an African-inspired employment of relationality through its use of the ME-WE-WORLD framework, articulating its theoretical assumptions with embodied experiential learning.

Multilevel perspectives on leadership in the African context

“…Recently, we also observed research relating Ubuntu to ethical leadership (e.g. Lutz, 2009;Pérezts et al, 2020;West, 2014). Although such scholarly efforts that link this indigenous leadership style to established Western leadership approaches are commendable, we believe more work needs to be done to sufficiently operationalize Ubuntu as a leadership concept and examine its contribution to employee and organizational outcomes in African countries above and beyond those of the Western leadership styles.…”

Understanding the human in stakeholder theory: a phenomenological approach to affect-based learning

“…As such, it helps us to reveal ourselves as stakeholders in the first place, and articulate what is at stake in SHT for the persons involved, thereby guiding how they are moved towards action. Affect is the channel, the gateway to such identification in an experiential way that forces me to confront my personal level of implication in the network of stakeholders in which I am embedded, that the course refers to as the ‘ME-WE-WORLD’ framework (Pérezts, Russon and Painter, 2019). Indeed, I am personally happy/angry (ME), but this is always relational (WE) since I am happy/angry in regards to others in the situation (who contribute to the fairness/unfairness of it for example).…”

“…From a philosophical perspective, the VDLA course also establishes bridges between several relational ontologies through affect: 20th century post-humanist traditions in Western thought are brought into conversation with Africa’s Ubuntu tradition (Pérezts et al, 2019). Both philosophies establish a close connection between emotions, values, deeper affective ties and the ability to relate ethically to others.…”

“…This unpacks the affectivity that is required for persons to experience and enact their own values, enabling them to become ‘stakeholders’ in the first place. Henry’s phenomenological account of affectivity allows us to get to grips with individual lived experience in and of itself, accounting for the enthusiasm inspired by shared experiences within a cooperative context (Pérezts et al, 2019). This ontology of the ‘unmeasurable’ as applied by Henry, which offers a more radical take within the tradition of phenomenology (Bevan and Werhane, 2010), ultimately understands stakeholders in terms of the singularity of actors and their lives, defining a new anthropological perspective.…”

Application of Ecosophical Perspective to Advance to the SDGs: Theoretical Approach on Values for Sustainability in a 4S Hotel Company

“…Different cultures around the world-opposed to the Western world-have in common a thinking based on sustainability, and share a holistic vision and harmonious relationship with other beings with whom we share the planet [82,83]. Different authors have previously studied this reality: in Buddhism, where the universe is in the center [84] in opposition to Western cultures; in the Andean cosmovision of "Buen Vivir" [38,76,[85][86][87][88][89][90]; and in different African cultures [91] where the "Me-We-World" framework exists [92]. Additionally in Catholicism, inspired by the Encyclical of Pope Francis "Laudato Si: On Care for Our Common Home" [93], a sustainability approach is proposed that is "attentive to the Poor" [94] the need for a "cosmocentric vision" [95] that allows a "societal shift away from profit, production, and power ( .…”