ABSTRACT
Leadership is a delicate dance between people who play various formal and informal parts that are determined by fluctuating types and degrees of power and influence. Over the past few years, some leadership scholars have become concerned about the fact that research in leadership studies has been dominated by positivist research. Much of the empirical research in leadership studies tends to conform to the latest fashion. The unacknowledged underlying normative assumptions behind research in leadership studies are striking but not surprising. The most ethically distinctive aspect of being a leader is that leaders receive praise or blame for the good and bad things that happen under their watch-even when they know nothing about them or have nothing to do with them. In business ethics, corporate responsibility also raises problems about collective responsibility. Blaming and punishing a corporation for doing wrong is not enough for most stakeholders.
