Ethical Leadership as an Imperative in Zambian Universities: A Theoretical Perspective

Currently, Zambian universities face challenges of ethical leadership. These challenges are multifaceted and mostly common. In their wake, there is no guidance on how to devise a fitting ethical leadership. The objective of this article is to theoretically answer to this need. To this effect, it interrogates the classical notions of ethics and leadership. It then comparatively explores major models of ethics, that is, the deontological, teleological and relationality-responsibility models. In this light, it makes an evaluation of ethical challenges in university leadership. Though particular university-situations vary, the assumption of this treatment is that there are certain enduring ethical qualities and principles that should cut across. These features should be present in ethical leadership in any university context. Thus, through a comparative analysis of literature on the major ethical models and a discussion on the implications of prevalent ethical challenges in universities, the article establishes and recommends the model that can be used to adequately shape leadership to meet common ethical exigencies. On this score, it also concludes that effective leadership of universities cannot be delinked from ethics; the two are sides of the same coin and are both indispensable for the success and sustainability of universities.