ABSTRACT
This chapter considers the question ‘Can we have egalitarian leadership?’ whilst aiming to reflect upon and stimulate thinking about ‘diversity’ and to present a social justice perspective in relation to this. Such a view suggests that diversity is about power imbalances, privilege and oppression (Allen, Balfour, Bell & Marmot, 2014; Cutts, 2013; Smail, 1995; Winter, Guo, Wilk & Hanley, 2016). I suggest that diversity fundamentally relates to equality. Drawing on my recent work in education, I reflect on the idea of relating to each other as moral equals and the need to think about equality not only as about tangible differences in resources, but also as about our relationships (Mangan & Winter, 2017; Winter, 2017). Following this, I discuss what we might mean by ‘leadership’ and, using case examples, I try to provoke and stimulate thinking about power and privilege issues with leadership in psychology. Specifically, I suggest that leaders, by virtue simply of their role, have a greater degree of a particular type of power than those they are ‘leading’, and that this perhaps raises concerns from a diversity perspective. I then reflect upon the various ways we might mitigate this power imbalance in leadership relationships (as we do in our therapeutic work). This might for example involve engaging in explicit meta-communication and dialogue in these interpersonal relationships, to communicate our respect for the other as our equal human being. I do not aim to provide answers, and I also do not expect that all readers will agree with my ideas on things that might be problematic in relation to leadership. Nevertheless, I hope to stimulate deeper thinking about some commonly held ideas and assumptions held in psychology (and society), and to encourage critical thinking about what we mean by ‘social justice’.
