Ethical leadership,social learning theory, school and parenting

One of the classes that I actually enjoyed during my school career was organizational behavior.  Basically, it involved applying psychology to the organization – be it corporation, non-profit, government organization etc.  I wrote a research paper on ethical leadership and received a perfect grade (whatever that means).  Ethical leadership is the theory that leaders can improve organizational effectiveness by modeling ethical behavior.  This is consistent with social learning theory, which states that people learn and have their behavior inspired by role models.  Thus, effective leaders model openness, two-way communication, honesty, altruism, and empathy for employees.  Since people are motivated to be ethical by positive role models, punishment and harsh negative consequences are not effective ways to improve an organization.  These coercive tactics can only lead to resentment and passive aggressive behavior.

What stuck in my mind taking this class was the degree to which we focus our efforts towards creating a psychologically positive environment for employees, but do the exact opposite for children.  If two-way communication, honesty, and empathy for employees are so important to a healthy organization and society, then why is there so little focus towards improving ethical leadership in parenting?  It is still socially acceptable to hit children, and their preferences are rarely consulted in school or at home.  It is nearly impossible to have positive two-way communication between children and authority figures in public schools.  With a 30-1 teacher-child ratio in classrooms, teachers are too busy managing classroom behavior to establish any understanding for the concerns of all students. 

The reason for this disparity in the treatment of employees vs children has to do with livestock management.  Publicly funded schools must advocate ethical treatment of employees to ensure a productive tax-base.  Children cannot contribute to the tax-base, so the government doesn’t care about their ethical treatment.  In fact, the ethical treatment of children will destroy any possibility for a docile, obedient population.  Thus, if the government were to advocate true ethical leadership in parenting, it would be acting in total self-destruction.