Unpacking Authentic Leadership in and for education for Social Justice Conference paper presented to the Annual Confernece of the American Association for Adult and Continuing Education (AAAC) in Memphis Tennessee.

Educational leadership has been influenced by business models of managerialism and bureaucracy. However, I argue that authentic leadership in and for education for social justice has to distance itself from inappropriate models and align itself with social movements for emancipation. We can see these in critical pedagogy, women’s studies and learning for liberation.

These social movements have interrogated the traditional, hierarchal models of leadership, which were highly gendered and classed: powerful, White men in the main as leaders, and women and other powerless groups as obedient followers/citizens.

With the social changes of the 20th Century, business models have capitalised on democracy, forging a leadership model that relies on the management of human and other resources, following the profit/pragmatic principles of the marketplace This is anathema to human development and emancipation, the ultimate goal of education.

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