In this review we examine the question of whether leadership preferences are universally endorsed or culturally contingent. A systematic search was conducted, using the search engines Psychinfo and ISI Web of Knowledge, and cross-cultural leadership literature published in a five year time span was selected. Though the question of universality of leadership theories has been popular in cross-cultural leadership literature, leadership preferences across cultures have been investigated in few

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... cles published during the years. In all, seven studies were selected for this review from the chosen five year time span. Our investigation of these studies revealed that four studies supported both the notion that leadership preferences are universally endorsed and the view that leadership ideals are culture-specific, whereas three studies more exclusively supported the culture-specific stand. None of the reviewed studies solely supported the universal position. Taken together, the reviewed studies therefore tend to give more support to the notion that leadership preferences are culturally contingent. Strengths and weaknesses of the reviewed studies are discussed and implications for practice and research are provided.