ABSTRACT

In this chapter we explore the meaning of IL in the form of an adjective-noun. We also address the oxymoronic nature of leadership, for example, destructive leadership. The chapter begins by considering IL separately, i.e. first the adjective “irresponsible” is explored and then “leadership”. Then we move on to explore the adjective-noun “irresponsible leadership”. We consider the issues of logic, understanding, and reasoning. Linguistically, and from a normative perspective, we then argue that it is worth paying some attention to carefully selected dictionary/thesaurus sources. The chapter draws attention to the debates about defining leadership and reconnects the definitional issues to stakeholder, stockholder, and agency theories, therefore making links between the meaning of IL and the previously mentioned concepts, which together form the core fields of IL, i.e. CSI, SI, UL, and DTL.