Cross-Cultural Leadership: Managing Across Borders and Cultures

Dear Colleagues,

This Special Issue will explore the evolving leader–follower dynamics and how these dynamics are practiced across cultures. Our key focus areas include how cultural norms influence leader–follower dynamics in globalized, digital, and AI-mediated environments, as well as their impact on follower attitudes, motivation, behavior, and well-being. This Special Issue will investigate the "dark side" of leadership, exploring how cultural scripts influence moral disengagement and the tolerance or resistance of destructive leader traits. Moving beyond static, nation-based comparisons, we seek to unpack the cognitive and relational mechanisms that define how authority is interpreted and accepted today. We welcome a broad range of methodological approaches, from systematic reviews and qualitative inquiries to statistical models, but place a high priority on longitudinal, experimental, and multi-level studies that capture the dyadic nature of these interactions, particularly within non-WEIRD contexts.

Background and rationale

Cross-cultural leadership research has traditionally focused on national differences in leadership preferences and effectiveness. Foundational work has shown that cultural values shape expectations regarding authority, legitimacy, and leader behavior across societies (Den Hartog & De Hoogh, 2024; Dorfman et al., 2012; House et al., 2004; Hofstede, 2001). However, driven by emerging disruptive technologies, geopolitical tensions, and shifting international labor markets, to name only a few, the landscape of professional work in modern organizations is being transformed, naturally reshaping the dynamics between individual roles and leadership structures. In such a complex setting, bringing individuals from diverse cultures into continuous contact and committing them to shared goals feels more like a leading art than a simple managerial task. This raises important questions about whether existing often static models, which treat culture as stable and nationally bounded, are sufficient for explaining how leadership is interpreted, accepted, and responded to today (Den Hartog & De Hoogh, 2024; Höddinghaus et al., 2024). Parallel to these shifts in the global landscape, leadership theory itself is also gradually moving away from the favorite static-style perspective that dominated the field for decades (see, e.g.,  Russell & Gregory Stone, 2002; Gregory Stone et al., 2004) toward a dynamic and synergetic process-based view centered on core basic behaviors (Zarei et al., 2022, 2024) or a social contract phenomenon that is co-created through the interplay between leader intent and follower interpretation (Gardner et al., 2024). In cross-cultural settings, this process becomes especially complex, as cognitive scripts for authority, legitimacy, and communication may diverge or even conflict. Followers, therefore, play a central role in shaping leadership through their acceptance, resistance, and sensemaking (Oc et al., 2023).

Despite these advances, an important integration gap remains. This gap also reflects broader theoretical fragmentation in leadership research. Meta-analytic work has shown substantial overlap across leadership styles, raising questions about conceptual distinctiveness and relative effects across contexts (Hoch et al., 2018). Cross-cultural settings provide a critical context for advancing this discussion by examining how leader traits, behavioral styles, and follower interpretations jointly shape leadership processes. Research that examines relative, conditional, and indirect effects of leadership across cultures is especially welcome. We recognize that leadership effects vary across borders, yet we still lack a granular understanding of the mechanisms through which cultural norms shape how leadership is interpreted, how influence is negotiated, and how followers respond behaviorally. Cross-cultural leadership research has often remained descriptive, documenting differences rather than unpacking the cognitive, relational, and moral processes that explain them. This leaves several critical domains under-theorized and insufficiently connected to cross-cultural frameworks.

Focus

This Special Issue will position the leader–follower nexus as the central site where cross-cultural leadership is enacted and understood. In particular, we will highlight three interrelated areas where deeper theoretical and empirical development is needed. Taken together, these three areas provide an integrated lens for examining how cross-cultural leadership operates as a process. They shift attention from static comparisons to how leadership is interpreted, negotiated, and translated into behavioral outcomes through agency, moral evaluation, and digitally mediated interaction.

• First, the agency response: Leadership not only produces performance outcomes—it shapes whether employees feel able to act, initiate, and redefine their roles. Proactive behaviors such as job crafting and voice depend on perceived autonomy, relational support, and psychological safety (Demerouti, 2026; Tims et al., 2022). In cross-cultural contexts, norms around hierarchy and power may either enable or suppress such agency. We still know little about how cultural expectations shape the courage to speak up, challenge ideas, or reshape one’s role under different leadership conditions.
• Second, the moral and dark boundary: Cultural environments may shape how power is exercised, justified, and tolerated. While research shows that destructive leadership varies by context, we have yet to fully understand how cultural scripts influence moral disengagement, the normalization of dominance, and follower tolerance of harmful behaviors (Hassan et al., 2023; Mackey, 2021). Meta-analytic and multi-level studies have also shown that the dark side of leadership prevails and may be perceived differently across cultures (Landay et al., 2019; Liu et al., 2012). This represents a critical gap in explaining how leadership is sustained or resisted across cultures.
• Third, the digital interface: Leadership is increasingly enacted in virtual borderlands where traditional social cues are weakened and interpretation becomes more fragile. Technology-mediated work alters how trust is built, how authority is perceived, and how legitimacy is maintained across cultures (Höddinghaus et al., 2024). Yet research has only begun to examine how culture and virtual interaction jointly shape leadership processes. Thus, work examining how emerging technologies, including AI-mediated decision environments and communication systems, shape how leadership is enacted and interpreted across cultural settings is imperative.

Taken together, these three areas offer an integrated lens for examining how cross-cultural leadership operates as a process. By unpacking these interconnected mechanisms, we seek to move the field beyond descriptive cross-national comparisons toward a more integrated theory of cross-cultural leadership grounded in interaction, interpretation, and response.

Methodological and Theoretical Expectations

To move the field toward a process-based understanding of cross-cultural leadership, we prioritize research designs that isolate mechanisms and capture the dynamic nature of leader–follower interactions. We are particularly interested in studies that test relative and conditional indirect effects to explain how leadership outcomes vary across contexts.

We welcome a diverse range of approaches, including the following:

• Longitudinal and multi-wave designs that trace the evolution of leadership interpretations and behavioral responses over time.
• Experimental and quasi-experimental research aimed at isolating causal mechanisms and establishing temporal precedence.
• Multi-level modeling that captures the cascading effects of leadership across individuals, teams, and cultural settings.
• Qualitative (e.g., case studies) and mixed-method inquiries that provide depth into sensemaking, legitimacy formation, and the lived experience of cultural interpretation.
• Systematic literature reviews, citation analyses, and meta-analytical reviews, with a special focus on the thematic issues of this Special Issue.
• Theoretical contributions that synthesize existing research to offer new frameworks for understanding the intersection of leadership traits, technology, and employee agency.

Core research themes

1. Leadership reciprocity and the negotiation of authority

This theme relates to the relational process through which leadership is established across cultural boundaries. We seek research that examines how leaders and followers respond to one another’s behavioral cues and how these interactions build or erode legitimacy. Our emphasis is on reciprocity: how cultural norms shape the interpretation of leader intent and how followers adjust their responses. We are particularly interested in work that examines how authority is contested, reinforced, or renegotiated when cultural scripts for hierarchy and communication do not align. This theme also opens space to examine how gendered expectations and role incongruence shape perceptions of authority and legitimacy across cultural contexts.

2. Employee agency: job crafting, voice and well-being

This theme relates to how leadership acts as a mechanism that enables or constrains employee agency. Job crafting refers to the proactive ways in which employees reshape tasks and roles to better align with their needs and strengths (Tims et al., 2022). We encourage research that explains how cultural norms around power, initiative, and deference influence the relationship between leadership and these proactive behaviors. A key question is why specific leadership behaviors encourage voice in some contexts but lead to silence or withdrawal in others. The same applies to the differing individual expectations and perceptions of well-being under various leadership behavior\styles across cultures, highlighted by socio-psychological theories of motivation (e.g., self-determination theory; Deci & Ryan, 2008).

3. Dark traits and moral disengagement

This area relates to how cultural environments shape the expression and consequences of Dark Triad traits. We seek research that examines how moral disengagement unfolds across contexts and how cultural norms influence reactions to dominance, manipulation, and abusive supervision (Hassan et al., 2023). Of particular interest are studies that explain when followers tolerate, resist, or normalize destructive leadership.

4. Leadership in virtual and technology-mediated contexts

As work increasingly shifts into digital environments, traditional cultural cues are disrupted, requiring a recalibration of how leadership is enacted and perceived. We invite research on how physical distance and mediated communication shape trust, authority, and legitimacy in multicultural teams (Höddinghaus et al., 2024). This includes examining how followers respond to remote monitoring, artificial intelligence (such as generative AI), digital control, distributed managerial decision-making systems, cloud based-BPMN systems, and the absence of shared physical context.

We request that, prior to submitting a manuscript, interested authors initially submit a proposed title and an abstract of 300–500 words summarizing their intended contribution. Please send it to the guest editors (mohammad.zarei@nla.no) or to the Administrative Sciences editorial office (admsci@mdpi.com). Abstracts will be reviewed on a rolling basis by the guest editors for the purposes of ensuring proper fit within the scope of this Special Issue. Full manuscripts will undergo double-blind peer-review.

References

Deci, E. L., & Ryan, R. M. (2008). Self-determination theory: A macrotheory of human motivation, development, and health. Canadian Psychology/Psychologie Canadienne, 49(3), 182.

Demerouti, E. (2026). Job crafting revisited: Current insights, emerging challenges, and future directions. Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior, 13.

Den Hartog, D. N., & De Hoogh, A. H. (2024). Cross-cultural leadership: What we know, what we need to know, and where we need to go. Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior, 11(1), 535-566.

Dorfman, P., Javidan, M., Hanges, P., Dastmalchian, A., & House, R. (2012). GLOBE: A twenty year journey into the intriguing world of culture and leadership. Journal of World Business, 47(4), 504-518.

Gardner, W. L., Karam, E. P., Noghani, F., Cogliser, C. C., Gullifor, D. P., Mhatre, K., ... & Dahunsi, D. (2024). ‘Let’s get real’… when we lead: A systematic review, critical assessment, and agenda for authentic leadership theory and research. Journal of Management & Organization, 1-27.

Gregory Stone, A., Russell, R. F., & Patterson, K. (2004). Transformational versus servant leadership: A difference in leader focus. Leadership & Organization Development Journal, 25(4), 349-361.

Hassan, S., Nasim, H., Shah, M., Ishaque, A., & Fiza, M. (2023). The bright and dark side of humble leadership for project success: A conservation of resources perspective. Cogent Business & Management, 10(2), 2249559.

Hoch, J. E., Bommer, W. H., Dulebohn, J. H., & Wu, D. (2018). Do ethical, authentic, and servant leadership explain variance above and beyond transformational leadership? A meta-analysis. Journal of Management, 44(2), 501-529.

Höddinghaus, M., Nohe, C., & Hertel, G. (2024). Leadership in virtual work settings: what we know, what we do not know, and what we need to do. European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology, 33(2), 188-212.

Hofstede, G. (2001). Culture's recent consequences: Using dimension scores in theory and research. International Journal of Cross Cultural Management, 1(1), 11-17.

House, R. J., Hanges, P. J., Javidan, M., Dorfman, P. W., & Gupta, V. (Eds.). (2004). Culture, leadership, and organizations: The GLOBE study of 62 societies. Sage publications.

Landay, K., Harms, P. D., & Credé, M. (2019). Shall we serve the dark lords? A meta-analytic review of psychopathy and leadership. Journal of Applied Psychology, 104(1), 183.

Liu, D., Liao, H., & Loi, R. (2012). The dark side of leadership: A three-level investigation of the cascading effect of abusive supervision on employee creativity. Academy of Management Journal, 55(5), 1187-1212.

Mackey, J. D. (2021). Why and how predators pick prey: Followers’ personality and performance as predictors of destructive leadership. Journal of Business Research, 130, 159-169.

Oc, B., Chintakananda, K., Bashshur, M. R., & Day, D. V. (2023). The study of followers in leadership research: A systematic and critical review. The Leadership Quarterly, 34(1), 101674.

Russell, R. F., & Gregory Stone, A. (2002). A review of servant leadership attributes: Developing a practical model. Leadership & Organization Development Journal, 23(3), 145-157.

Tims, M., Twemlow, M., & Fong, C. Y. M. (2022). A state-of-the-art overview of job-crafting research: current trends and future research directions. Career Development International, 27(1), 54-78.

Zarei, M., Supphellen, M., & Bagozzi, R. P. (2022). Servant leadership in marketing: a critical review and a model of creativity-effects. Journal of Business Research, 153, 172-184.

Zarei, M., Supphellen, M., & Bagozzi, R. P. (2024). Research streams, gaps and opportunities in servant leadership research. Leadership & Organization Development Journal, 45(2), 251-264.

Dr. Mohammad Zarei
Dr. Abdallah Issahaka
Guest Editors

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• cross-cultural leadership
• leadership theory
• leader–follower nexus
• leadership styles
• longitudinal studies
• experimental and quasi-experimental designs
• multi-level analysis