Perry, Aaron. “Ethics, Theology, and Leadership: A Review of the Current State of Ethical Leadership and Why Theology Can Make a Contribution.” Paper presented at the Wesley Ministry Conference and Symposium, Tyndale University College & Seminary, Toronto, Ontario, April 25, 2017. (MPEG-3, 28:47 min.) 1 00:00:01.120 --> 00:00:03.100 Thanks so much James. Well, thank you so much for sticking 2 00:00:03.130 --> 00:00:07.690 around today and hopefully it ll be worth your while in at least. 3 00:00:07.720 --> 00:00:09.060 If not what you learn, then the people 4 00:00:09.090 --> 00:00:13.780 you've been with as well, those the few who have persevered right to the end. 5 00:00:13.800 --> 00:00:15.460 So today I want to come at this with 6 00:00:15.490 --> 00:00:20.500 having a real kind of a trial log, a seeing of how ethics and theology and 7 00:00:20.530 --> 00:00:25.140 ethical leadership which we're going to unpack all kind of focus together and part 8 00:00:25.170 --> 00:00:28.460 me for doing some very rudimentary work as we go along. 9 00:00:28.490 --> 00:00:34.700 But I want us to have a shared vocabulary as we're going along. 10 00:00:34.720 --> 00:00:36.580 Because ethical leadership, as we're going 11 00:00:36.610 --> 00:00:39.860 to see ethical doesn't just act as the adjective for leadership. 12 00:00:39.880 --> 00:00:43.000 At times, it all acts as a noun when we get into a theory of it. 13 00:00:43.030 --> 00:00:45.320 And I wanted you to see how that came to 14 00:00:45.350 --> 00:00:48.460 be and as a result, why theology can help in that. 15 00:00:48.490 --> 00:00:50.500 So like I said, rudimentary very simply, 16 00:00:50.530 --> 00:00:55.360 ethics can be a principled or preferred behavioral choice can be considered as a 17 00:00:55.390 --> 00:01:00.900 set of moral principles or a system to inquire into these choices behaviors, the 18 00:01:00.930 --> 00:01:03.780 good itself or a general consideration of value. 19 00:01:03.800 --> 00:01:06.340 Generally speaking, you can think of ethics in one of two ways. 20 00:01:06.370 --> 00:01:09.360 One is deontology, which is the ethic or 21 00:01:09.390 --> 00:01:12.540 the right thing to do is based in a rule or in teleology. 22 00:01:12.570 --> 00:01:15.120 The right thing to do is based on what you 23 00:01:15.150 --> 00:01:19.210 want to produce or the outcome that you want to see come to be. 24 00:01:19.240 --> 00:01:20.410 So rudimentary. 25 00:01:20.440 --> 00:01:23.340 We have ethics in our mind, the good, 26 00:01:23.370 --> 00:01:27.380 the good, what's good and valuable or what's right and looking at this in terms 27 00:01:27.410 --> 00:01:30.900 of either rules to follow or in terms of ends to achieve. 28 00:01:30.930 --> 00:01:34.060 So then very simply, what is leadership? 29 00:01:34.090 --> 00:01:39.360 A couple of images I pulled off Google, if you look it up is this leadership? 30 00:01:39.880 --> 00:01:42.980 Is this leadership? 31 00:01:43.010 --> 00:01:46.020 Is this leadership? 32 00:01:46.050 --> 00:01:47.850 Is this leadership? 33 00:01:47.880 --> 00:01:53.460 The one bright person in all the dull bulbs? 34 00:01:53.480 --> 00:01:55.020 We have a number of definitions of 35 00:01:55.050 --> 00:01:59.420 leadership and you can see at the bottom there are many definitions of leadership 36 00:01:59.450 --> 00:02:02.620 as there are persons who have attempted to define the concept. 37 00:02:02.650 --> 00:02:06.780 That's kind of a maximum now in leadership studies about 30 years old. 38 00:02:06.800 --> 00:02:09.020 But we have a number of definitions that come at it. 39 00:02:09.050 --> 00:02:11.940 Leadership is about personality or is about persuasion. 40 00:02:11.970 --> 00:02:14.890 We have leadership as a position itself, 41 00:02:14.920 --> 00:02:19.380 leadership as a kind of structural implementation where organizations might 42 00:02:19.410 --> 00:02:22.890 get structured accidentally or intentionally. 43 00:02:22.920 --> 00:02:24.500 And you can think about leadership that way. 44 00:02:24.520 --> 00:02:28.340 You can think about leadership practically as simply obtaining followers or getting 45 00:02:28.370 --> 00:02:33.780 people to do what you want them to do or a combination of all of the above. 46 00:02:33.800 --> 00:02:35.440 Let me give you three definitions and you 47 00:02:35.470 --> 00:02:40.540 can kind of see how there's a progression to them and a connection to them as well. 48 00:02:40.570 --> 00:02:45.100 So number one you've got from Peter Northhouse, this is from a classic 49 00:02:45.130 --> 00:02:47.780 leadership textbook leadership is the process. 50 00:02:47.810 --> 00:02:51.980 So notice it's not in personality, it's in process things that are done whereby an 51 00:02:52.010 --> 00:02:56.060 individual influences a group of individuals to achieve a common goal. 52 00:02:56.080 --> 00:02:58.540 So you might see the repetition of the word individual. 53 00:02:58.560 --> 00:03:00.610 This is a focus on leadership as something 54 00:03:00.640 --> 00:03:03.700 one person does with a bunch of other one persons. 55 00:03:03.730 --> 00:03:08.300 It's kind of not considering maybe group oriented leadership. 56 00:03:08.330 --> 00:03:12.840 From Gary Yukel leadership is the process of influencing others to and here these 57 00:03:12.870 --> 00:03:19.220 are my italics understand and agree about what needs to be done and notice this how 58 00:03:19.250 --> 00:03:23.610 it can be done effectively, and the process of facilitating individual and 59 00:03:23.640 --> 00:03:26.980 collective efforts to accomplish the shared objectives. 60 00:03:27.000 --> 00:03:30.420 So you're starting to see this initial definition start to get broadened out. 61 00:03:30.450 --> 00:03:33.420 And we're seeing an inclusion of groups. 62 00:03:33.450 --> 00:03:35.860 You're seeing an inclusion of people 63 00:03:35.890 --> 00:03:41.340 agreeing what needs to be done, not just simply acting together, but 64 00:03:41.360 --> 00:03:43.300 agreeing that this is what we should do together. 65 00:03:43.330 --> 00:03:50.540 And you're seeing this aspect of it being done or an item being done effectively. 66 00:03:50.570 --> 00:03:57.060 Mendoka and Kanungo defining leadership as a set of role behaviors performed by an 67 00:03:57.090 --> 00:04:02.600 individual when there is a need to influence and coordinate the activities of 68 00:04:02.600 --> 00:04:06.020 a group or organizational members toward the achievement of a common goal. 69 00:04:06.040 --> 00:04:09.610 Again, we're seeing a shift from this is not just about influencing individuals, 70 00:04:09.640 --> 00:04:14.610 this is about influencing perhaps a group or an organization. 71 00:04:14.640 --> 00:04:17.780 Notice again the italics mind when there is a need. 72 00:04:17.800 --> 00:04:19.460 Think back to our definition of ethics 73 00:04:19.480 --> 00:04:23.020 where there might be a determination of what is right or what is good. 74 00:04:23.040 --> 00:04:27.580 And here you're starting to see this creep into a definition of leadership. 75 00:04:27.600 --> 00:04:31.280 And of course, this is a book actually on ethical leadership, so you can see why 76 00:04:31.300 --> 00:04:34.780 they're skewing the definition in this way. 77 00:04:34.800 --> 00:04:38.620 Really three big ideas that you want to get then from for leadership. 78 00:04:38.650 --> 00:04:45.420 Are you're dealing with an interaction of relationships and processes and goals and 79 00:04:45.450 --> 00:04:49.380 all those things kind of intertwining together in whatever way you want to 80 00:04:49.410 --> 00:04:53.220 emphasize it or whatever aspect of those three things you want to focus on. 81 00:04:53.240 --> 00:04:55.180 All those are kind of interplaying in what 82 00:04:55.210 --> 00:04:58.260 leadership is from three different definitions. 83 00:04:58.280 --> 00:05:01.060 So what's the connection between leadership and ethics? 84 00:05:01.080 --> 00:05:01.300 Or. 85 00:05:01.320 --> 00:05:03.260 What does Athens have to do with Bay Street? 86 00:05:03.280 --> 00:05:07.740 The principal's office, trump Tower and 24 Sussex Drive. 87 00:05:07.770 --> 00:05:09.900 How do we put these things together? 88 00:05:09.920 --> 00:05:13.260 One way that they're put together is that leadership and ethics are connected by the 89 00:05:13.280 --> 00:05:18.700 community or the follower, or to use Levinacian language, the other. 90 00:05:18.720 --> 00:05:20.560 So two leadership scholars, Knights and 91 00:05:20.590 --> 00:05:27.100 O'Leary, write the other's very existence makes us morally responsible, a 92 00:05:27.130 --> 00:05:31.260 responsibility which is limitless and undeniable. 93 00:05:31.280 --> 00:05:33.060 This can be a production of righteous or 94 00:05:33.090 --> 00:05:37.260 virtuous, community or utilitarianism for the benefit of the community. 95 00:05:37.290 --> 00:05:41.700 So the other creates an ethical standard simply by being who they are. 96 00:05:41.730 --> 00:05:47.320 And you can treat it in how well you want them to be treated or what effect you want 97 00:05:47.350 --> 00:05:52.740 their community to experience or who you want the community to become 98 00:05:52.770 --> 00:05:58.100 the other themselves creates the ethical impetus, the ethical foundation for the 99 00:05:58.130 --> 00:06:01.620 leader to do something, to do what would be the right thing. 100 00:06:01.640 --> 00:06:03.780 It creates the rationale for what the right thing is. 101 00:06:03.800 --> 00:06:05.420 Another way to look at leadership and 102 00:06:05.440 --> 00:06:08.940 ethics is that leadership and ethics are connected in the person of the leader. 103 00:06:08.960 --> 00:06:12.020 Two ways you can look at number one, you can say there should be integrity. 104 00:06:12.040 --> 00:06:13.180 That leadership. 105 00:06:13.200 --> 00:06:15.080 Ethics is about the leader doing what the 106 00:06:15.100 --> 00:06:18.300 leader says they will do, and there's a kind of integrity. 107 00:06:18.330 --> 00:06:20.500 Or you can also look at it in an egoistic 108 00:06:20.530 --> 00:06:24.980 way, that the connection between leadership and ethics is between the 109 00:06:25.010 --> 00:06:31.460 leader doing what they think is right or what is right for themselves. 110 00:06:31.480 --> 00:06:36.180 Another way to consider the connection between leadership and ethics our 111 00:06:36.210 --> 00:06:40.220 leadership and ethics are a combination of person and practices. 112 00:06:40.250 --> 00:06:44.140 Or you can think about it as a moral person and a moral manager. 113 00:06:44.170 --> 00:06:45.220 There's a connection. 114 00:06:45.250 --> 00:06:52.060 Good leadership is both moral leadership and technically efficient leadership. 115 00:06:52.080 --> 00:06:54.340 So good leadership is not just doing the right thing. 116 00:06:54.360 --> 00:06:56.940 It's about getting the right things done 117 00:06:56.970 --> 00:07:01.660 and those things being put together both philosophical and pragmatic. 118 00:07:01.690 --> 00:07:06.860 Definition from Joanne Cula some critical questions you might bring to 119 00:07:06.890 --> 00:07:11.420 those connections then are which community? 120 00:07:11.450 --> 00:07:16.420 If leadership is good to achieve certain ends for one community, they might not be 121 00:07:16.440 --> 00:07:19.100 the same actions that would achieve good ends for another community. 122 00:07:19.130 --> 00:07:21.820 In which community are you going to benefit? 123 00:07:21.850 --> 00:07:24.940 If we're going to have good leadership in 124 00:07:24.970 --> 00:07:29.420 political realms, some policies are going to favor certain people instead of others. 125 00:07:29.450 --> 00:07:35.580 Which community creates the definition of what's good leadership or whose virtue? 126 00:07:35.600 --> 00:07:37.340 There's a huge study called the Globe 127 00:07:37.360 --> 00:07:41.220 Study that considers different leadership behaviors across all kinds of cultures. 128 00:07:41.250 --> 00:07:45.900 And there's a lot of connection that different cultures will affirm. 129 00:07:45.920 --> 00:07:51.260 Altruism and leadership, integrity and communication, different practices. 130 00:07:51.290 --> 00:07:53.820 But not all cultures consider a virtuous 131 00:07:53.850 --> 00:07:59.100 person the same, or not all cultures value certain things as equal virtues, right? 132 00:07:59.120 --> 00:08:00.980 Those are different. So who is virtue? 133 00:08:01.000 --> 00:08:02.600 If we're going to have virtue be a ground 134 00:08:02.600 --> 00:08:04.940 of leadership, which virtue are we talking about? 135 00:08:04.970 --> 00:08:07.660 Or the foundation and coherence of integrity? 136 00:08:07.690 --> 00:08:11.380 Is a leader who promises to do bad things a good leader? 137 00:08:11.410 --> 00:08:12.900 In some ways, yes. 138 00:08:12.920 --> 00:08:13.960 They're doing what they said they would 139 00:08:13.980 --> 00:08:17.140 do, in some ways, no, because they are simply doing bad things. 140 00:08:17.160 --> 00:08:18.260 So can that break down? 141 00:08:18.290 --> 00:08:21.640 Can we ground it in the individual? 142 00:08:23.000 --> 00:08:28.500 In some ways, all these questions are roiling underneath the surface for 143 00:08:28.520 --> 00:08:32.380 leadership studies, and you kind of get what I call this phenomenon of skipping 144 00:08:32.410 --> 00:08:36.700 the problem because we've got problems to solve and things to get done. 145 00:08:36.730 --> 00:08:42.640 So in light of these kind of underlying turmoil, you have Brown, Trevino and 146 00:08:42.670 --> 00:08:49.260 Harrison who just kind of forge ahead and create an ethical leadership scale. 147 00:08:49.280 --> 00:08:51.220 All right, that's what they call it, the ethical leadership scale. 148 00:08:51.250 --> 00:08:56.420 This is the first line of their article on ethical leadership. 149 00:08:56.440 --> 00:08:59.300 Recent ethical scandals in business have 150 00:08:59.320 --> 00:09:03.940 raised important questions about the role of leadership in shaping ethical conduct. 151 00:09:03.970 --> 00:09:08.140 So they skip right to what should we do? 152 00:09:08.170 --> 00:09:13.140 Not what is it kind of avoiding all the underlying problem but what should we do? 153 00:09:13.170 --> 00:09:15.540 And they go on to say we propose to study 154 00:09:15.560 --> 00:09:19.060 ethical leadership from a descriptive perspective so that we can better 155 00:09:19.080 --> 00:09:23.360 understand what characterizes ethical leadership and how it relates, listen to 156 00:09:23.390 --> 00:09:28.300 this, how it relates to other variables in its nominological framework. 157 00:09:28.320 --> 00:09:30.940 So in other words, how does what we have 158 00:09:30.970 --> 00:09:35.340 will describe as ethical leadership impact other outcomes? 159 00:09:35.370 --> 00:09:39.660 What will what we are going to define as ethical leadership do? 160 00:09:39.690 --> 00:09:42.940 What impact will it have? 161 00:09:42.970 --> 00:09:45.540 So they offered a definition of ethical leadership. 162 00:09:45.560 --> 00:09:50.660 They built a scale to measure it and used it to demonstrate the scale's utility to 163 00:09:50.690 --> 00:09:56.120 predict certain outcomes, which is a very leadership studies thing to do, build a 164 00:09:56.150 --> 00:09:59.380 scale, find out what these sets of behaviors do. 165 00:09:59.410 --> 00:10:03.140 Let's forget about the problem of does this actually make sense? 166 00:10:03.160 --> 00:10:06.880 That's not against ethical leadership or that's not against leadership studies in 167 00:10:06.880 --> 00:10:09.980 general as I hope would be the problem or I hope would be clear. 168 00:10:10.010 --> 00:10:12.820 It simply goes to the very drive which is 169 00:10:12.850 --> 00:10:16.020 we've got problems to solve and things to get done. 170 00:10:16.040 --> 00:10:19.440 I think people in this room can probably say, you know what, I got to points and 171 00:10:19.440 --> 00:10:23.340 thinking about certain subjects and I just decided I couldn't think about it anymore. 172 00:10:23.370 --> 00:10:26.540 I actually had to do something. 173 00:10:26.560 --> 00:10:27.740 I had to stop aiming. 174 00:10:27.770 --> 00:10:31.460 I had just had to fire right, ready, fire. Aim. 175 00:10:31.490 --> 00:10:33.500 That's essentially what they did. 176 00:10:33.530 --> 00:10:35.700 Here's what they found out and this is 177 00:10:35.720 --> 00:10:37.420 what they started calling ethical leadership. 178 00:10:37.440 --> 00:10:40.340 So when I describe as ethical not being 179 00:10:40.370 --> 00:10:44.740 the adjective anymore, but being part of the noun of this construct of ethical 180 00:10:44.760 --> 00:10:46.120 leadership, this is where it's coming from. 181 00:10:46.150 --> 00:10:49.240 A 2005 article ethical leadership is the 182 00:10:49.270 --> 00:10:55.220 demonstration of normatively appropriate conduct through personal actions and 183 00:10:55.250 --> 00:10:59.620 interpersonal relationships and the promotion of such conduct to followers 184 00:10:59.650 --> 00:11:04.460 through two way communication, reinforcement and decision making. 185 00:11:04.490 --> 00:11:06.860 So what were these conducts that they discerned? 186 00:11:06.890 --> 00:11:09.100 Ethical leaders listen to employees. 187 00:11:09.130 --> 00:11:12.500 They discuss ethics and values with employees. 188 00:11:12.530 --> 00:11:15.020 They ask what is the right action? 189 00:11:15.050 --> 00:11:16.500 They make fair decisions. 190 00:11:16.530 --> 00:11:17.900 They're trustworthy. 191 00:11:17.930 --> 00:11:20.140 They act in the best interests of followers. 192 00:11:20.170 --> 00:11:23.380 They tie success not simply to outcome but to process. 193 00:11:23.410 --> 00:11:25.380 They discipline violations. 194 00:11:25.410 --> 00:11:27.860 They are an ethical model or an exemplar 195 00:11:27.890 --> 00:11:30.460 and they are consistent in their personal life. 196 00:11:30.490 --> 00:11:32.740 Now, all of this was built from survey 197 00:11:32.770 --> 00:11:37.900 work that went out to employees who would describe their their leaders as ethical. 198 00:11:37.920 --> 00:11:39.420 So these are all the things that are 199 00:11:39.450 --> 00:11:46.220 emerging from grounded research to build this definition. 200 00:11:46.250 --> 00:11:49.540 But of course the problem simply persists. 201 00:11:49.570 --> 00:11:51.420 The research endeavor focused on the 202 00:11:51.450 --> 00:11:54.540 outcomes of one description of ethical leadership. 203 00:11:54.570 --> 00:11:56.080 This is Joanne Siola. 204 00:11:56.110 --> 00:12:00.320 Again, she says the name ethical leadership is somewhat misleading and that 205 00:12:00.350 --> 00:12:04.460 the instrument used in these studies only measures people's attributions of ethical 206 00:12:04.490 --> 00:12:07.180 leaders, ethical leadership to their leaders. 207 00:12:07.210 --> 00:12:10.420 It simply assumes that we all kind of know what is ethical. 208 00:12:10.440 --> 00:12:14.040 Again, the fact that the majority of people attribute ethical qualities to a 209 00:12:14.070 --> 00:12:19.300 leader is not sufficient to say that the leader is ethical. 210 00:12:19.330 --> 00:12:23.480 So we might want to some people that are critical of 211 00:12:23.510 --> 00:12:27.860 leadership studies might follow Gary Yuko, who is a leadership scholar, and simply 212 00:12:27.890 --> 00:12:32.980 ask bigger questions of leadership ethics themselves, which is namely one, is 213 00:12:33.010 --> 00:12:36.540 leadership itself ethical in the face of risk? 214 00:12:36.570 --> 00:12:42.620 Is it a good thing, is it valuable, is it defensible to try to persuade people to 215 00:12:42.650 --> 00:12:46.780 follow you into a risky venture, into doing something dangerous? 216 00:12:46.810 --> 00:12:48.620 Is that an ethical thing to do? 217 00:12:48.650 --> 00:12:51.660 Is that a morally appropriate thing to do? 218 00:12:51.690 --> 00:12:54.940 Is it ethical to have people change their beliefs? 219 00:12:54.960 --> 00:12:58.780 Certainly an aspect of leadership, as we saw in the definitions, is to have people 220 00:12:58.810 --> 00:13:03.380 agree on what needs to be done, presumably at least moving from a position of at 221 00:13:03.410 --> 00:13:06.300 least neutrality and perhaps even opposition. 222 00:13:06.330 --> 00:13:10.700 Is it appropriate, is it ethical that people change their beliefs? 223 00:13:10.730 --> 00:13:12.740 Or C? Is it appropriate? 224 00:13:12.770 --> 00:13:15.780 Is leadership appropriate or ethical when 225 00:13:15.810 --> 00:13:21.060 it benefits some, but not all, or does not benefit all equally? 226 00:13:21.080 --> 00:13:23.300 Right? These are kind of underlying questions 227 00:13:23.330 --> 00:13:27.060 that just keep popping up underneath the surface. 228 00:13:27.080 --> 00:13:29.620 So I hope we're kind of seeing what the direction has been. 229 00:13:29.650 --> 00:13:33.380 It's this process of asking 230 00:13:33.410 --> 00:13:38.980 what is leadership and how does it involve what is good and right and moral? 231 00:13:39.010 --> 00:13:43.420 Or how does it produce what's good and right and moral? 232 00:13:43.450 --> 00:13:45.660 And then seeing leadership scholars forge 233 00:13:45.690 --> 00:13:48.260 past this to create an ethical leadership scale. 234 00:13:48.290 --> 00:13:53.820 And there's articles I can cite for you that show how that definition from Brown, 235 00:13:53.850 --> 00:13:57.140 Trevino and Harrison has become the accepted definition. 236 00:13:57.170 --> 00:14:01.300 That article just gets cited over and over and over again as leadership studies are 237 00:14:01.330 --> 00:14:04.180 using studying ethical leadership in that way. 238 00:14:04.210 --> 00:14:06.580 And yet these problems are still 239 00:14:06.610 --> 00:14:13.460 persisting even back to the whole question of, well, is leadership itself ethical? 240 00:14:13.490 --> 00:14:15.780 And giving three examples here. 241 00:14:15.810 --> 00:14:19.820 So let me shift into the final part of it, which is okay for theology. 242 00:14:19.850 --> 00:14:21.860 Why theology? 243 00:14:21.890 --> 00:14:24.140 Theology can be used in the context of 244 00:14:24.170 --> 00:14:28.060 ethics, and theology was used to serve the whole of life. 245 00:14:28.080 --> 00:14:31.180 Ethics was not an aspect of life. 246 00:14:31.210 --> 00:14:36.300 So Stan Harrows wants to say that the bifurcation or the split between 247 00:14:36.330 --> 00:14:39.900 ethics and theology should not have happened. 248 00:14:39.930 --> 00:14:42.140 This rupture should not have come to be. 249 00:14:42.170 --> 00:14:46.300 I've been reading Dietrich Bonhoeffer lately, and I saw this example. 250 00:14:46.330 --> 00:14:51.100 I thought, well, this is the example of theology and ethics being merged together. 251 00:14:51.130 --> 00:14:53.460 So he has in life together this quote the 252 00:14:53.480 --> 00:14:56.740 community of Christians springs solely from the Biblical and Reformation message 253 00:14:56.770 --> 00:14:59.220 of justification of man through grace alone. 254 00:14:59.240 --> 00:15:01.860 This alone is the basis of longing of Christian for one another. 255 00:15:01.880 --> 00:15:05.700 Now, you might agree or disagree with Bonhoeffer on that, but that's an example 256 00:15:05.730 --> 00:15:11.540 of theology and ethics just being merged together, the right springs 257 00:15:11.570 --> 00:15:16.260 deeply connected with exactly what it is God is doing. 258 00:15:16.290 --> 00:15:20.140 Stanhar was, of course, bemoans the fact that we actually have a field called 259 00:15:20.170 --> 00:15:24.020 ethics and certainly the bad idea of Christian ethics. 260 00:15:24.040 --> 00:15:27.480 So how do these get split apart if they're originally meant to be brought if they're 261 00:15:27.510 --> 00:15:31.580 originally meant to be together, theology and ethics, how do they get split apart? 262 00:15:31.610 --> 00:15:34.420 From Oliver O'Donovan, he points to this one's. 263 00:15:34.450 --> 00:15:36.220 From Stan Harlow. 264 00:15:36.250 --> 00:15:38.580 He points to penitentials. 265 00:15:38.610 --> 00:15:43.540 So how do we get the proper application of correction to a confession? 266 00:15:43.570 --> 00:15:48.540 If a person comes to confession and there needs to be 267 00:15:48.570 --> 00:15:54.060 reparatory pastoral care, then these penitentials develop and they start to be 268 00:15:54.080 --> 00:16:00.020 kind of rules to flow from good theology but not theology themselves. 269 00:16:00.050 --> 00:16:02.620 O'Donovan points to the Council of Trent, 270 00:16:02.640 --> 00:16:05.660 which emphasized connecting theology and law in the care of souls. 271 00:16:05.680 --> 00:16:07.420 In other words, you want to have pastors 272 00:16:07.450 --> 00:16:12.540 who can make good recommendation or good pastoral care. 273 00:16:12.570 --> 00:16:15.420 Harawas points out the Reformation splits 274 00:16:15.450 --> 00:16:20.620 faith and works because you can't work for your salvation, of course. 275 00:16:20.650 --> 00:16:22.620 And ethics becomes about works. 276 00:16:22.650 --> 00:16:29.820 It's something that's affirmed it's good, but it's separate from theology itself. 277 00:16:29.850 --> 00:16:34.020 Moving to the Enlightenment period and post Enlightenment period, you have a loss 278 00:16:34.050 --> 00:16:38.600 of church dominance, and people are still asking ethical questions about what should 279 00:16:38.630 --> 00:16:43.660 I do, but without church context of baptism, confession, doctrine, et cetera. 280 00:16:43.690 --> 00:16:52.560 And of course, into that postcontian world, you have Schliermacher, who 281 00:16:53.000 --> 00:16:57.420 perhaps unfairly, but at times is certainly writing in a way that he's 282 00:16:57.450 --> 00:17:01.260 defending theology by saying it's useful at making good citizens. 283 00:17:01.280 --> 00:17:02.720 So it's not about Christians now. 284 00:17:02.750 --> 00:17:04.530 It's about making good citizens. 285 00:17:04.560 --> 00:17:08.380 We're defending theology by saying they can still produce good people. 286 00:17:08.410 --> 00:17:15.220 So you have ethics outside the church, so you have ethics at service of the church. 287 00:17:15.250 --> 00:17:20.500 Then you have ethics being used to produce good citizens. 288 00:17:20.530 --> 00:17:24.290 And this, all of it, is splitting apart theology from ethics. 289 00:17:24.320 --> 00:17:30.330 So finally you have Emmanuel Kant saying, I discover that what I can only do sorry. 290 00:17:30.360 --> 00:17:35.980 I discover that what I do can only be unconditionally good to the 291 00:17:36.010 --> 00:17:40.980 extent that I can will what I have done as a universal law. 292 00:17:41.010 --> 00:17:46.080 I discover that what I can do can only be unconditionally good to the 293 00:17:46.110 --> 00:17:49.500 extent that I can will what I have done as a universal law. 294 00:17:49.530 --> 00:17:56.460 And now we finally have the ethical statement that still is often reigning. 295 00:17:56.490 --> 00:18:01.420 And in addition to treat people as ends and not only as means, there are never as 296 00:18:01.450 --> 00:18:05.420 means the final bifurcation of ethics and theology. 297 00:18:05.450 --> 00:18:10.660 And so you can do ethics what is right without doing theology. 298 00:18:10.690 --> 00:18:15.000 Recall back the definitions of ethical leadership that we had above, and all of 299 00:18:15.030 --> 00:18:18.330 those definitions were done atheologically. 300 00:18:18.360 --> 00:18:20.050 And perhaps atheistically. 301 00:18:20.080 --> 00:18:24.700 And some sociologists in here are going to say, well, of course you can't do theology 302 00:18:24.730 --> 00:18:27.530 at the same time as doing sociological research. 303 00:18:27.560 --> 00:18:30.250 And yet I would just give you John 304 00:18:30.280 --> 00:18:35.940 Milbank's theology and Social theory and say, have fun reading this. 305 00:18:35.970 --> 00:18:41.360 There's always theology all the way down from a Christian worldview, even if we 306 00:18:41.390 --> 00:18:44.380 wouldn't posit God as a cause of something. 307 00:18:44.410 --> 00:18:48.860 So here's my thesis for the rest of the presentation. 308 00:18:48.890 --> 00:18:50.770 How can Christian theology help? 309 00:18:50.800 --> 00:18:55.330 Christian theology provides a context for leadership and therefore leadership ethics 310 00:18:55.360 --> 00:18:58.980 within theological anthropology and eschatology. 311 00:18:59.010 --> 00:19:04.200 So essentially, what I would am trying to do, and this is what you've just heard is 312 00:19:04.230 --> 00:19:07.740 all the groundwork that then leads into a much larger project. 313 00:19:07.760 --> 00:19:09.320 We're not going to talk a whole lot about 314 00:19:09.320 --> 00:19:12.860 the project today, just give you the glimpses of it, is that I still think that 315 00:19:12.890 --> 00:19:18.900 we can do leadership ethics, but we can do so in a theologically informed way. 316 00:19:18.930 --> 00:19:21.770 And actually theology undergirds that 317 00:19:21.800 --> 00:19:27.090 entire project by a theological anthropology and eschatology. 318 00:19:27.120 --> 00:19:32.380 And here's where's how I think that can be done. 319 00:19:32.410 --> 00:19:34.220 Oliver O'Donovan is an Anglican 320 00:19:34.250 --> 00:19:38.980 theologian, moral theologian, spent time at actually he was in Toronto. 321 00:19:39.010 --> 00:19:43.860 He used to teach at Wycliffe and Oxford as well. 322 00:19:43.890 --> 00:19:48.280 And most recently, I believe at 323 00:19:48.800 --> 00:19:53.700 somewhere else, maybe Scotland, I can't remember, but he's since retired. 324 00:19:53.730 --> 00:19:56.530 But what O'Donovan says is that Christian 325 00:19:56.560 --> 00:20:01.700 ethics is located between dogmatics or church teaching and statistics, by which 326 00:20:01.730 --> 00:20:05.180 he means sociology or post positivist mindset. 327 00:20:05.210 --> 00:20:10.900 He said that Christian ethics is located right between because people, not just 328 00:20:10.930 --> 00:20:14.740 Christians, have always asked, what should I do? 329 00:20:14.760 --> 00:20:16.330 And if Christians are to help them answer 330 00:20:16.360 --> 00:20:19.460 this question, then there must be Christian ethics. 331 00:20:19.490 --> 00:20:21.810 So the option is not for Christians simply 332 00:20:21.840 --> 00:20:25.520 to keep ethics within the church, it's to say, are we going to have any sense of 333 00:20:25.520 --> 00:20:29.620 helping people ask this question from our point of view, or are we just going to let 334 00:20:29.650 --> 00:20:36.090 them stumble along and try to come up with new answers to old questions all the time? 335 00:20:36.120 --> 00:20:37.940 And O'Donovan thinks that this is a good 336 00:20:37.960 --> 00:20:41.560 thing to do, whereas you might have Stan Harawas, who says they need to become a 337 00:20:41.590 --> 00:20:45.810 Christian first, and then we can help them do theology rightly and have ethics 338 00:20:45.840 --> 00:20:49.770 grounded in baptism and other such Christian actions. 339 00:20:49.800 --> 00:20:54.900 O'Donovan will say there's no preexisting rationale for Christian ethics. 340 00:20:54.930 --> 00:20:57.140 There are simply two basic or primary 341 00:20:57.170 --> 00:21:00.770 ethical questions what was I put on earth to do? 342 00:21:00.800 --> 00:21:04.010 And what does it mean that I was put on earth to do it? 343 00:21:04.040 --> 00:21:08.530 So O'Donovan wants to get a space for doing Christian ethics. 344 00:21:08.560 --> 00:21:12.700 In the experience of people asking this question, what should I do? 345 00:21:12.730 --> 00:21:14.700 And then asking the natural follow up 346 00:21:14.730 --> 00:21:18.860 question, what does it mean that I should do this right? 347 00:21:18.880 --> 00:21:20.980 What's the meta question that I should ask? 348 00:21:21.010 --> 00:21:23.180 If there really is a purchase on my 349 00:21:23.210 --> 00:21:27.940 action, then what does it mean that there is a purchase to do it? 350 00:21:27.970 --> 00:21:32.570 What's the theological foundation or rationale? 351 00:21:32.600 --> 00:21:35.140 So let me start with the first part, 352 00:21:35.170 --> 00:21:38.740 creation as a context of what it means to be a leader. 353 00:21:38.770 --> 00:21:40.770 O'Donovan writes that God has created a 354 00:21:40.800 --> 00:21:46.980 morally ordered world, including moral subjects who can be virtuous beings. 355 00:21:47.000 --> 00:21:48.770 There are new situations that present new 356 00:21:48.800 --> 00:21:53.700 opportunities for action, yet part of the unfolding of the same order. 357 00:21:53.730 --> 00:21:58.560 As a result, right action is not grounded in utility or by the values of the 358 00:21:58.590 --> 00:22:02.460 community, but by the moral order of the creation. 359 00:22:02.490 --> 00:22:05.180 Thus the creation is vested with different 360 00:22:05.210 --> 00:22:10.050 kinds of authority, which is what provide the ground of action. 361 00:22:10.080 --> 00:22:14.460 So all of this is really taking O'donovan's book Resurrection, Moral Order 362 00:22:14.480 --> 00:22:17.460 and trying to put it together into one slide, which is a challenge. 363 00:22:17.490 --> 00:22:19.800 But essentially O'Donovan wants to say we 364 00:22:19.830 --> 00:22:24.740 can do Christian ethics because we live in a morally ordered world. 365 00:22:24.770 --> 00:22:26.780 The world itself has been morally 366 00:22:26.810 --> 00:22:31.140 structured and created by God, who is a moral being. 367 00:22:31.170 --> 00:22:35.500 And while we might present be presented with new situations, we're part not of a 368 00:22:35.530 --> 00:22:41.460 chaotic unfolding, but part of an unfolding or a revealing of the moral 369 00:22:41.490 --> 00:22:44.940 world whenever we define and find good action. 370 00:22:44.970 --> 00:22:49.760 And O'Donovan says that good action or right action can be grounded on different 371 00:22:49.760 --> 00:22:52.050 kinds of authority that are vested in the world. 372 00:22:52.080 --> 00:22:57.050 And he gives these as examples age or wisdom, strength or community. 373 00:22:57.080 --> 00:23:01.700 And authority becomes that which is the hard edge against we take an action. 374 00:23:01.730 --> 00:23:03.900 So for instance, 375 00:23:03.930 --> 00:23:09.480 if my child was to put her dishes in the sink after supper without being 376 00:23:09.480 --> 00:23:11.420 told what to do, and I say Why did you do that? 377 00:23:11.450 --> 00:23:14.420 It could simply be because daddy wants me to. 378 00:23:14.450 --> 00:23:19.290 That's an aspect of community. 379 00:23:19.320 --> 00:23:21.320 My authority as parent grounds that 380 00:23:21.320 --> 00:23:24.380 action, that she doesn't need another better reason for doing that, except that 381 00:23:24.410 --> 00:23:27.330 it was just me that expected her to do that. 382 00:23:27.360 --> 00:23:29.500 And that can get played out in different ways. 383 00:23:29.530 --> 00:23:31.700 O'Donovan especially uses it in political 384 00:23:31.730 --> 00:23:38.980 authority where through duly different people of different 385 00:23:39.010 --> 00:23:43.840 political, the authorized person politically can give 386 00:23:43.840 --> 00:23:45.570 a ground for another person to take an action. 387 00:23:45.600 --> 00:23:47.860 So whenever a judge says to a bailiff, 388 00:23:47.880 --> 00:23:51.700 take that person into custody, the bailiff is doing a right action because of the 389 00:23:51.730 --> 00:23:56.140 authority of the judge hope that gives the kind of the example there. 390 00:23:56.170 --> 00:23:58.680 So that was why creation create the 391 00:23:58.710 --> 00:24:04.900 context of what it means to be a leader, that there's a moral world to act in. 392 00:24:04.930 --> 00:24:10.460 And here's why acting as human beings can be part of that. 393 00:24:10.490 --> 00:24:13.180 Human beings are part of a morally ordered world. 394 00:24:13.200 --> 00:24:15.050 Part of the moral ordering of the world is 395 00:24:15.080 --> 00:24:17.360 authority and authority is a ground for taking right action. 396 00:24:17.390 --> 00:24:21.700 So we just looked at that human beings are rooted in the authority of the world, both 397 00:24:21.730 --> 00:24:26.500 exercising authority and being acted upon properly under authority. 398 00:24:26.530 --> 00:24:29.220 So this might be one that you could unpack 399 00:24:29.250 --> 00:24:34.640 as the call of human beings made in the image 400 00:24:34.670 --> 00:24:41.420 of God to see the prototype of Eden extended into the rest of the world. 401 00:24:41.440 --> 00:24:42.140 So G. K. 402 00:24:42.170 --> 00:24:48.050 Beal has a great book on this, the Temple of God and the Church's Mission, which 403 00:24:48.080 --> 00:24:54.360 looks at the Garden of Eden not as the archetype of all of creation, which we so 404 00:24:54.390 --> 00:24:57.860 often read it in an AUGUSTINIAN mindset, but as the prototype. 405 00:24:57.890 --> 00:25:00.020 In other words, the example that humans 406 00:25:00.050 --> 00:25:02.570 were given to extend into the rest of the world. 407 00:25:02.600 --> 00:25:05.330 Here's the order that I have for you now 408 00:25:05.360 --> 00:25:09.540 take and move this into the rest of the world and do with this. 409 00:25:09.570 --> 00:25:12.570 They're authorized to do that. 410 00:25:12.600 --> 00:25:14.220 Human beings are leading beings. 411 00:25:14.250 --> 00:25:18.660 As a result, if you want to look at it from that mindset, they have right action 412 00:25:18.690 --> 00:25:23.330 to take that moves the mission of God out from Eden. 413 00:25:23.360 --> 00:25:27.900 Ethical leadership as a result, would include acting fittingly in the moral 414 00:25:27.930 --> 00:25:32.660 world with and under appropriate authority. 415 00:25:32.680 --> 00:25:36.120 So with this in mind, if somebody was to ask me what ethical leadership was, I 416 00:25:36.150 --> 00:25:40.290 would draw it back into a creation narrative 417 00:25:40.320 --> 00:25:43.940 that there's a morally ordered world, there's a place of human beings in this 418 00:25:43.970 --> 00:25:47.620 world and as a result and there's a story for them to be part of. 419 00:25:47.650 --> 00:25:49.960 And as a result 420 00:25:50.680 --> 00:25:56.420 they can do what is good and right as a leader by initiating new actions based on 421 00:25:56.450 --> 00:26:00.260 who they've been made to be and what the world is like. 422 00:26:00.280 --> 00:26:01.940 All that of course, in a theological 423 00:26:01.970 --> 00:26:07.570 mindset, but grounded in actual questions of people asking what should I do? 424 00:26:07.600 --> 00:26:12.720 Second part of this eschatology of ethical leadership, the order of the world is not 425 00:26:12.750 --> 00:26:16.140 simply a moral order, but an ordered narrative. 426 00:26:16.170 --> 00:26:18.180 A narrative with a purpose. 427 00:26:18.210 --> 00:26:21.290 In other words, it's not just a static moral universe. 428 00:26:21.320 --> 00:26:24.780 It's one that is dynamic and moving in a certain direction. 429 00:26:24.800 --> 00:26:26.420 O'Donovan writes the narrative of 430 00:26:26.450 --> 00:26:30.500 scripture extends into a bounded future of the world. 431 00:26:30.530 --> 00:26:32.360 There's not simply a chaos or an 432 00:26:32.360 --> 00:26:35.960 undetermined story that our world is headed to, but our eschatology should be 433 00:26:35.990 --> 00:26:41.420 one that regardless of where we might see it going, that if there is a God, that 434 00:26:41.450 --> 00:26:46.570 there is one who is drawing it to this conclusion based on God's desire. 435 00:26:46.600 --> 00:26:48.660 The story of the world is not chaotic or 436 00:26:48.690 --> 00:26:52.260 free floating, but aimed, intended and purposed. 437 00:26:52.290 --> 00:26:56.620 The story of the world is moving in a certain direction which is eschatology. 438 00:26:56.650 --> 00:26:59.220 Thus, ethical leadership does not involve 439 00:26:59.250 --> 00:27:04.220 acting properly as human beings or does not just involve acting properly as human 440 00:27:04.250 --> 00:27:07.660 beings, but moving in the proper direction of the world's. 441 00:27:07.690 --> 00:27:09.540 Story and end. 442 00:27:09.570 --> 00:27:11.660 So if you think back to Cua's definition 443 00:27:11.690 --> 00:27:16.620 of moral manager there's ethical leadership has a moral management 444 00:27:16.650 --> 00:27:21.220 component and an effective an effective action component. 445 00:27:21.250 --> 00:27:29.050 This kind of has a dual component as well acting ethically based in who human beings 446 00:27:29.080 --> 00:27:33.940 are supposed to be and acting ethically in where God is drawing this world. 447 00:27:33.970 --> 00:27:39.680 So as a pioneering act or a new act, we're moving into that which is future to 448 00:27:39.710 --> 00:27:42.860 us, but it's part of the bounded future that God intends. 449 00:27:42.890 --> 00:27:45.180 So creation theology that human beings 450 00:27:45.210 --> 00:27:53.280 have a place in a morally ordered world as leading beings and the world 451 00:27:53.600 --> 00:27:56.700 has a destination, has a story that's unfolding. 452 00:27:56.730 --> 00:28:02.290 Both of those form a foundation for why we can have ethical leadership. 453 00:28:02.320 --> 00:28:05.570 And that's the thesis that I'm trying to 454 00:28:05.600 --> 00:28:11.050 move towards in the broader project out of that space of 455 00:28:11.080 --> 00:28:15.180 ethical leadership kind of breaking down when we just deal with it as a definition. 456 00:28:15.210 --> 00:28:23.180 So I can pull up that last slide again, I apologize that it skipped off. 457 00:28:23.210 --> 00:28:27.900 So that would be my redefinition of ethical leadership is that involves human 458 00:28:27.920 --> 00:28:31.620 beings moving in the proper direction of the world story and end, but as human 459 00:28:31.650 --> 00:28:37.050 beings were meant to be and who we are created to be as well. 460 00:28:37.080 --> 00:28:38.420 Thank you. 461 00:28:38.450 --> 00:28:40.360 Thank you. 462 00:28:44.280 --> 00:28:46.680 In the rich. Lots of chew on there.