11
ETHICAL LEADERSHIP
IN HIGHER EDUCATION
IN THE ERA OF COMPLEXITY
Narend Baijnath11.1 Introduction
We continue in our time to experience tremendous flux in higher
education and in society generally, attributable in part to an ever-
widening income and inequality gap in large parts of the world,
diminishing opportunities, continued economic uncertainty, and
unpredictability about the future. A corollary is social, political and
economic volatility manifested in conflicts and protest action as
disaffected groups and marginal communities in man societies in the
developed and developing world challenge orthodoxy in ever more
confrontational ways. This is particularly true for South Africa, which
has experienced protracted upheaval in higher education since 2015 over
student fees, access and affordability, and the orthodoxy of teaching,
learning and curricular content. Leaders of higher education institutions
have been drawn into engagement with student leaders and protesters in
unprecedented ways, with volatility, latent anger, disruption of the
academic programme, destruction of infrastructure, and daily
confrontation being the corollaries to the protest movement.