Attainment and enactment of leadership among women in the United Arab Emirates: proposing relevant theoretical foundations

Abstract

Scholarly research on women and leadership within the Arab Middle East (AME) region is still in its infancy, despite significant developments in the regional socio-economic context. This conceptual paper presents a review of the Western and Arab Middle East literature, focusing on key aspects such as gender role expectations, gender stereotypes, and leadership evaluation prejudice as they relate to women and leadership. We also highlight the influence of contextual variables identified in the AME literature, such as traditional and contemporary socio-cultural norms. While this literature provides rich information on the issues of women's leadership in the region, it falls behind the Western literature in terms of established theoretical foundations. We suggest that the context-based application of relevant theoretical perspectives to research on women's leadership in the AME region, can generate potential adaptations of existing theory, or highlight the influences of new variables.