Diversity and Leadership in a Changing World Alice H. Eagly Northwestern University Jean Lau Chin Adelphi University Scholars of leadership have infrequently addressed the diversity of leaders and followers in terms of culture, gender, race and ethnicity, or sexual orientation. This omission has weakened the ability of research and theory to address some of the most provocative aspects of con- temporary leadership, including (a) the limited access of individuals from diverse identity groups to leadership roles (b) the shaping of leaders��� behavior by their dual identities as leaders and members of gender, racial, ethnic, or other identity groups and (c) the potential of individuals from groups formerly excluded from leadership roles to provide excellent leadership because of their differences from traditional leaders. In addressing such issues, we argue that the joining of the two bodies of theory and research���one pertaining to leadership and the other to diversity���enriches both domains of knowledge and pro- vides guidelines for optimizing leadership in contemporary organizations and nations. Keywords: diversity, ethnicity, gender, leadership, sexual orientation Dship uring the 2008 presidential race, public attention to the importance of gender and race for leader- escalated dramatically in the United States. When a White woman and a biracial man born to a White American mother and a Black Kenyan father emerged as the Democratic front-runners, and a White woman was selected as the Republican vice-presidential nominee, ques- tions about how gender and race might affect the election and presidential leadership preoccupied journalists and dominated many conversations. Never before had Ameri- cans��� public discussions about leadership been so intensely focused on the confluence of gender and race. To shed light on these issues, people might reasonably have been ex- pected to turn to scholars of leadership. Given abundant theories and empirical research pertaining to leadership, it seems that its theorists and researchers might have become major contributors to the nation���s conversations about these candidates. Instead of shaping discussions about these issues, psy- chologists and other researchers specializing in leadership remained relatively silent. This silence was foreshadowed by the complete lack of attention to issues of diversity in the special issue on leadership that appeared in the January 2007 American Psychologist. This omission also emerged in a different mode in a recently published scholarly hand- book on leadership (Antonakis, Cianciolo, & Sternberg, 2004), in which two among the book���s 14 chapters did address these concerns. One chapter pertained to culture (Den Hartog & Dickson, 2004), and another to gender (Eagly & Carli, 2004). Consideration of diversity was thereby segregated from the remainder of the volume and given scant, if any, attention in the chapters on leadership theories and key topics such as leader effectiveness and development. We and the other authors of this 2010 special issue on diversity and leadership are striving to reduce this troubling intellectual segregation. When organizational and political leaders in the United States were homogeneously White men, mainly from elite backgrounds, their gender, race, and ethnicity were unremarkable. However, much is changing in the United States and globally. Although White men still pre- dominate as leaders, the increasing representation of women and of racial and ethnic minorities is unmistakable in the United States. For example, among chief executives of all U.S. organizations in the public and private sectors, 23% are women, 4% are African American, 4% are Asian, and 5% are Hispanic (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2009). Among the members of the 111th Congress, 17% are women, 8% are African American, 1% are Asian, and 6% are Hispanic (Infoplease, 2009). Although all of these groups have remained underrepresented in these and other leadership roles relative to their numbers in the U.S. pop- ulation, members of these groups occupy considerably more of these leadership roles than in any earlier historical period (Zweigenhaft & Domhoff, 2006). Simultaneously, the growing diversity among followers challenges all lead- ers to take into account the perspectives of people repre- senting backgrounds, beliefs, and mores different from their own. Despite the growing diversity among leaders, the still- present underrepresentation of women and of racial and ethnic minorities in leadership roles demands an explana- tion. Could this underrepresentation represent the lack of qualifications of members of these groups? Or could it represent discriminatory barriers whereby White men have preferential access to leadership roles compared with equally qualified women and racial/ethnic minorities? These questions have long been researched, often by econ- omists and sociologists. These researchers have asked whether observable human capital variables (e.g., educa- Alice H. Eagly, Department of Psychology, Northwestern University Jean Lau Chin, Derner Institute for Advanced Psychological Studies, Adelphi University. Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Alice H. Eagly, Department of Psychology, Northwestern University, 2029 Sheridan Road, Evanston, IL 60208. E-mail: eagly@northwestern.edu 216 April 2010 ��� American Psychologist �� 2010 American Psychological Association 0003-066X/10/$12.00 Vol. 65, No. 3, 216���224 DOI: 10.1037/a0018957

tion, training, job experience) and structural factors (e.g., occupational segregation) account for the lesser workplace advancement and lower wages among women and minor- ities. The nearly unanimous conclusions are that such vari- ables account for only a portion of the gender and race gaps in wages and promotions and that discrimination is a con- tributing factor (e.g., Arrow, 1998 Blau & Kahn, 2006 Grodsky & Pager, 2001 Maume, 1999). Adopting a different approach to detecting discrimi- nation, other social scientists, including psychologists, have contributed experiments that equate job applicants in all respects other than the attribute (race or gender) that is suspected to trigger discrimination. Although many of these experiments involve presenting resumes to students and other participant groups, other experiments are far more naturalistic audit studies in which job applications or actual applicants are presented to employers (see Pager, 2007 Riach & Rich, 2002). Experiments of these varying types reveal discrimination harmful to women, although not in female-dominated jobs such as secretary, where this bias reverses to disadvantage men (see meta-analysis by Davison & Burke, 2000). Experimental studies have shown that discrimination is particularly potent against mothers (Correll, Benard, & Paik, 2007 Heilman & Okimoto, 2008) and African Americans (e.g., Bertrand & Mullain- athan, 2004). Psychology of Discrimination Against Leaders From Diverse Groups Why would people engage in discrimination that makes it difficult for individuals from certain groups to serve in positions of leadership? Employment discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, and national origin be- came illegal with the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (1988). Under many conditions, discrimination against workers with caregiving responsibilities is also unlawful (U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commis- sion, 2007). Most important, job discrimination violates the consensual American value of equality of opportunity. De- spite these considerations, discrimination remains com- monplace in large part because it continues to proceed in covert, subtle, and unintentional forms even when its more blatant expressions are restrained (e.g., Dovidio & Gaert- ner, 2004). People can unknowingly discriminate by means of ���mindless��� processes that operate beyond their con- scious attentional focus, all the while thinking that they are merely choosing the best person for the job or otherwise acting in an unbiased manner (Bargh, 2007 Fazio, 2001 Lane, Kang, & Banaji, 2007). How does this type of discrimination come about? Our beliefs about the attributes of social groups often bias our judgments of individual group members (von Hippel, Seka- quaptewa, & Vargas, 1995). The potential for prejudice is present when social perceivers hold a stereotype about a social group that is incongruent with the attributes that they believe are required for success in leadership roles. Regard- less of whether an individual from such a social group actually fits the group���s stereotype, people���s subjective construals of the individual may lead them to believe that she or he does not ���have what it takes��� for success in a leadership role. This result constitutes prejudice���that is, a less favorable attitude toward persons who are stereotypi- cally mismatched with the requirements of a leader role than toward those who are matched (Eagly & Diekman, 2005 Heilman, 2001). This less favorable attitude often results in discriminatory behaviors. To understand who is at risk for this type of inequi- table treatment in relation to leadership roles, it is first necessary to understand how people think about leaders. Although ideas about leadership are influenced by situa- tions and organizational cultures (Lord, Brown, Harvey, & Hall, 2001), people generally believe that leaders are am- bitious, confident, self-sufficient, and dominant, that is, well endowed with agentic and competent qualities (Pow- ell, Butterfield, & Parent, 2002 V. E. Schein, 2001). For example, the role of business executive is thought to re- quire attributes such as being action-oriented, decisive, and competitive (e.g., Martell, Parker, Emrich, & Crawford, 1998). Management theorists have regarded behaviors such as competing with peers, imposing wishes on subordinates, and behaving assertively as prototypical of the managerial role (Miner, 1993). Despite the inclusion of some expec- tations about considerate and supportive qualities, most managerial roles are strongly infused with cultural mascu- linity, especially as these roles are construed by men (e.g., Atwater, Brett, Waldman, DiMare, & Hayden, 2004 V. E. Schein, 2001). And how do people think about the members of groups that have had limited access to leadership roles���in particular, women and members of minority groups based on race, ethnicity, and sexual orientation? In hegemonic American culture, such individuals are regarded as unlike leaders in some important respects. People perceive women Alice H. Eagly 217 April 2010 ��� American Psychologist