Leadership and Ethics in Higher Education 157He/She must cultivate thinking clearly and carefully and exercise
leadership and make decisions with discretion, always bearing in mind
the best interests of the institution as expressed in the resolutions of
Council and Senate. It is to be expected that the Vice Chancellor or
President must also understand the academic project either through
his/her own knowledge activities, but in any event must have a passion
for and understanding of the academic activities that the researchers and
teachers are engaged in. The academic leader must also keep abreast of
developments in higher education management.
Notwithstanding all that, the leader of an academic institution
presides over an institution whose very nature is unpredictability. In
South Africa currently higher education institutions face the challenge of
a messy and unstructured campaign for transformation. The problem is
that by their nature higher education institutions are both conservative
and transformative. They are conservative in that they are built on
traditions and conventions that may appear archaic but without which
they may cease to deserve the name “university”. They also base new or
acquired knowledge on achievements of the past critically examined.
There is also a sense in which higher education institutions do not
flourish in environments of instability and uncertainty. Students on the
other hand are in a real sense a transient community even though they
have a valid right to create out of the institution in their generation
something that reflects their own ideals and perspectives, mindful
always in such cases that change is an ever present constant. The task of
a leader is to keep that balance. Perhaps we should accept that the
university is never going to be the most ideal place where revolutions
are to be launched from.
Yet, students are not and cannot be the sole barometer of the culture
that must shape the institution for ever, as that shape alters and changes
with each generation of students that occupies campus. Higher education
institutions must also needs be citadels of transformative values. Higher