Human rights leadership in challenging times: an agenda for research and practice

Abstract

Leadership is as an integral part of organisational practice that relates to individual or collectivistic forms of decision-making and action that include strategic decision-making, such as how issues are communicated or ‘framed’, and how risk is managed. This article applies a systematic scoping review approach to understand the scope of scholarly literature on human rights leadership and assess its volume and focus. We find that there is little in the human rights practice literature that deals directly and explicitly with leadership. Further, the human rights practice literature gives little insight into how leadership can be supported and strengthened. In light of these gaps, we set out some research and practice directions that can inform a new agenda on human rights leadership. We draw on theories, concepts, frameworks and approaches from leadership work outside of human rights practice that might give shape to a new leadership agenda. In doing so, we propose several clusters of questions that might guide research on leadership as a crosscutting theme in human rights practice. The urgency for a new agenda on leadership is reflected, we suggest, in recent high-profile cases of leadership failures and the need for human rights leadership for confronting global challenges.