This webinar will kick-off the launching of a new 4 volume international handbook series, entitled The Bloomsbury Handbooks of Crises and Transformative Leadership in Higher Education, to be published in Spring 2024. The volume titles in the series include:

• The Bloomsbury Handbook of Values and Ethical Change in Transformative Leadership in Higher Education
• The Bloomsbury Handbook on Context and Transformative Leadership in Higher Education
• The Bloomsbury Handbook on Diversity, Crises and Transformative Leadership in Higher Education
• The Bloomsbury Handbook of Ethics of Care in Transformative Leadership in Higher Education

Global crises, unrelenting change, and disruptions (such as pandemics, financial crises, environmental crises, technological innovations, geopolitical events, and others) have induced both challenges and opportunities for institutions of higher education globally, while threatening the sustainability of many. In its intersections with the rise of protectionism, cultural chauvinism, authoritarianism and demagoguery, the COVID-19 pandemic exacerbated–or at least rendered more visible–a global climate in which culture wars infiltrated campuses, as well as the very discourse of higher learning. Proliferating scepticism about the value of science and expertise more broadly appears to signal a weakening of trust in the role of universities as transformative agents of positive social and human development. As a result of the complex contextual situatedness of these institutions, responses to these crises, disruptions, and uncertainties have often taken quite different approaches.

It is the lessons and reflections on the why and how to lead HEIs through these multiple, intersecting and ongoing crises and change that informs the development of the chapters within this handbook series. With over 120-chapter authors from six continents, these volumes will deepen the readers understanding of the multiple and intersecting crises and change issues, within diverse local and global geopolitical, social, economic and cultural contexts that leaders in higher education institutions (HEIs) needed to handle. In creating new policies, programs and pedagogical approaches, leaders in higher education have had to work critically, creatively and collaboratively to identify opportunities and overcome obstacles related to values, ethics, learning, engagement, inclusion, diversity, research, technology, accountability, partnership development, and sustainability, amongst others. Through their leadership and transformative change initiatives, many leaders and senior administrative teams have found or created new opportunities and are now looking at the valuable lessons learned from their experiences under extreme conditions, and how these might inform the post-pandemic, post-change or post-crisis directions for their university.