Paternalistic leadership and subordinate responses: Establishing a leadership model in Chinese organizations
Open accessAbstract
Paternalistic leadership (PL) is the prevalent leadership style in Chinese business organizations. With an approach similar to patriarchy, PL entails an evident and powerful authority that shows consideration for subordinates with moral leadership. Although PL is widespread in Chinese business organizations, very few studies have focused on this leadership style and those that have were simply conceptual analyses and not empirical studies. We sampled 543 subordinates from local businesses in Taiwan to investigate PL, Western transformational leadership, and subordinate responses to these two leadership styles. Our hypotheses were as follows: (1) PL has a significant and unique effect on subordinate responses compared to Western transformational leadership; (2) there exists an interaction between the three elements of PL (benevolence, morality, and authoritarianism) and subordinate responses; and (3) the authority orientation of a subordinate's traditionality has a moderating effect upon the relation between PL and subordinate responses. Statistical analyses generally supported these hypotheses. Directions for follow‐up studies are offered and implications for leadership theory and practice are discussed.
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The analysis highlights a distinct relationship between paternalistic leadership and trust in the leader, lending support to the argument that paternalistic and transformational leadership are empirically distinct.
“However, despite these overlaps, our analysis highlights a distinct relationship between paternalistic leadership and trust in the leader, thus lending support to the argument that these two leadership styles are empirically distinct (see Cheng et al., 2004; Hiller et al., 2019).”
From A meta-analysis of the role of trust in the leadership- performance relationship (2021) · cites this paper as Cheng et al., 2004
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- Authors
- Cheng, B., Chou, L., Wu, T., Huang, M., & Farh, J.
- Affiliations
- National Taiwan University (TW)
- National Taiwan University of Science and Technology (TW)
- Yuan Ze University (TW)
- Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HK)
- Venue
- Asian Journal of Social Psychology
- Publisher
- Wiley
- Published
- 2004-03-11
- Volume
- 7
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 89-117
- ISSN
- 1367-2223 (ISSN-L)
- 1467-839X
- OpenAlex
- W2124029786
- Cited by
- 946
- References
- 0
- Citations by year
- 2026: 62 · 2025: 80 · 2024: 69 · 2023: 78 · 2022: 82 · 2021: 75 · 2020: 68 · 2019: 67 · 2018: 52 · 2017: 54 · 2016: 26 · 2015: 32 · 2014: 39 · 2013: 37 · 2012: 41
- FWCI
- 19.49
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- green
- papers.ssrn.com
- Locations
- Asian Journal Of Social Psychology (publishedVersion)
- SSRN Electronic Journal (submittedVersion)
- Rare & Special e-Zone (The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology) (submittedVersion)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Anthropology › Global and Cross-Cultural Management
- Social Sciences › Business, Management and Accounting › Organizational Behavior and Human Resource Management › Job Satisfaction and Organizational Behavior
- Social Sciences › Business, Management and Accounting › Strategy and Management › Leadership and Management in Organizations
- Keywords
- paternalistic leadership, transformational leadership, benevolence, moral leadership, authoritarianism, traditionality, Chinese organizations, leadership styles
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