Ethical Failure and Leadership: Treatment and Selection

Abstract

Leadership introduces distinctive risks of ethical failure. These risks are often associated with the heightened responsibilities of leadership and the necessary inequality that leading a group often involves. But people who are prone to ethical failure are also prone to self-selection into leadership positions. In order to understand and prevent ethical failure in leadership, it is not enough to take steps to address and prevent ethical failure among existing leaders. Rather, avoiding ethical failure may also require rethinking the ways that leaders are selected.