Summary

Ethical leaders in organizations are important for putting formal ethics programs into practice as they are role models of appropriate behaviors. The four empirical studies included in this dissertation examined the antecedents and outcomes of ethical leader behavior. In the studies ethical leadership is measured through the eyes of employees.

One of the main findings is that ethical leadership may be seen and measured as seven separate distinguishable behaviors or combined into an overall construct. Another important finding is that ethical leadership is positively related to several employees’ attitudes and behaviors. The results showed that the context can inhibit or enhance the strength of the impact of the ethical leader on employees.