Photo courtesy of Morehouse College

April 27, 2010 | Walter Earl Fluker, executive director of the Leadership Center at Morehouse College, says many leaders today “have difficulty balancing different moral perspectives.” Ethical leaders, however, know and remember their own stories, but always within the context of larger narratives. Though they know who they are, they know they don’t have the whole truth.

Drawing on the work of Howard Thurman and Martin Luther King, Jr., Fluker says that in a global community it is important for religious leadership to be both reflective and active in compassionately negotiating various ethical viewpoints.

In addition to directing the Leadership Center, Fluker, an ordained Baptist minister, is the Coca-Cola professor of leadership studies at Morehouse and editor of the Howard Thurman Papers Project. He founded VisionQuest Association Inc., a nonprofit organization that provides leadership training and development. He has taught at institutions such as Harvard, Vanderbilt and the University of Cape Town, South Africa.

In 2009, Fluker published the first volume of “The Papers of Howard Washington Thurman: My People Need Me” and “Ethical Leadership: The Quest for Character, Civility and Community.”

Fluker spoke with Faith & Leadership about the need for ethical leadership and the continuing influence of Thurman and King.

Q. You have written a book on “ethical leadership.” What do you mean by that term?

In the normative sense, ethics is the critical reflection upon morality and systems. In the 21st century we’re going to need leaders who understand and employ ethical perspectives in decision making. As we make decisions that impact groups, organizations and, most importantly, nations, it will be important for leaders to negotiate different ethical perspectives.

Most ethical leaders tend to be identified with a particular cultural narrative, and I take narrative very seriously. Ethical leaders are leaders who remember, retell and rebuild their story. I’m from Mississippi by way of Chicago, within the context of larger narratives. So I’m never claiming that I have the whole truth, or that I’m morally superior, but I can name a place called home in terms of my own ethical reflection.

The best way to understand Martin Luther King Jr., beyond all of his intellectual degrees, is to understand that he was a Southern black preacher. King identified with a Southern church tradition, but he was able to articulate more than one moral tradition in his public presentations.

Now, we seem to have difficulty balancing different moral perspectives in terms of social transformation. I’m seeing more and more a tendency toward a monolithic view of faith. We have difficulty listening to the stories of others with integrity and empathy.

Q. We tend to assume that all leadership is ethical, but perhaps that is not true.

I think most leadership is moral. People have certain moral assumptions that grow out of their particular communities of discourse and practice. Even Nixon would have claimed some kind of moral sense of self. He would claim that he was morally right. So, most leadership has that kind of claim. But the ethical dimension that I’m speaking to gives us an opportunity to engage not only our own story, which produces a moral perspective, but with the stories of others.

How do we then prepare leaders? What are the critical resources and methodologies at our disposal to prepare leaders to think ethically? How do we help leaders stand at this intersection where worlds collide, where very vulnerable life worlds are at stake? We have deteriorating institutions everywhere. And how do they withstand the vast systems dominated by power, by technology, by communication? I see it play out with devastating effects certainly within black communities, Hispanic communities, especially among the youth. I see it certainly in places like Africa, India, China, but certainly where vulnerable populations are at stake. I think it would be everywhere, but for historically marginalized communities, this is a huge question. How do you prepare, train a new generation of leaders who are able to situate themselves consciously at these intersections and negotiate the traffic there?

Q. The subtitle of your book addresses three components of ethical leadership: character, civility and community. Tell us about that.

I wanted to identify the psychological, social and spiritual dimensions [of ethical leadership]. The model I created is interactive. I associate character with the psychological. How do leaders remember, retell and relive their story? Leaders who ask those questions get a handle on the cognitive, affective dimensions of character. I was born in Mississippi; I was raised in Illinois. That’s important. We are constantly reliving our stories. I try to understand character for American citizens within the context of the larger American drama. For African Americans you cannot ignore the racialized drama narrative. Character is there.

Civility is the social phenomenon of character in public space. With character I talk about three attending virtues in the Aristotelian sense: integrity, empathy and hope. In public space I’m more concerned with values. They’re really social practices. In public space civility becomes very important because ultimately at stake is how we live together. It’s the question of democracy.

King says you create rules, laws and regulations, and he calls those enforceable obligations. What keeps society together are the unenforceable obligations, which means that I’ve got to find a way to morally recognize you, offer respect to you. Even though I vehemently disagree, that does not give me the right to injure you, maim you or kill you.