Work

Charisma, Harmony, Unity Building, and Respect: Lessons from the Leadership of Sukarno, Indonesia

Year: 2025

Type: article

Abstract: The leadership of Sukarno, the first President of post-colonialized Indonesia, stands at the center of this paper. It is commonly accepted that Sukarno played an important role in liberating Indonesia from Dutch colonialism. He was distinguished statesman and respected leader, a “magical verbalizer” and a modern millenarian figure in the Indonesian political cultural context. My purpose in this paper, then, is to analyze Sukarno’s major elements of leadership in order to learn from his biography how educational leaders could manage their educational institution more effectively, particularly in traditional developing nations. A biographical analysis of Sukarno’s leadership reveals four major elements in his leadership: charisma, harmony, and an open-minded view of reality, unity building, guided democracy, and respect. Practical implications for leadership development programs in education are suggested at the end of the paper.

Source: Education Sciences

DOI: 10.3390/educsci15121648

Author: Izhar Oplatka

Institution: Tel Aviv University

Language: English

Topic: School Leadership and Teacher Performance

Subfield: Education

Field: Social Sciences

Domain: Social Sciences

SDG: Quality education

Open Access status: gold

Estimated APC paid: $2,172