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The purpose of this study is to investigate the relationship between ethical leadership and the quality of the manager-subordinate relationship, as well as the moderating effect of female employees’ psychological empowerment on this relationship.

This is quantitative research in which an online questionnaire was distributed to female subordinates from multinational enterprises in Malaysia (n = 120). A partial least square is used for analysis in this research.

The findings confirm a strong positive correlation between all the seven ethical leadership dimensions and the quality of manager-subordinate relationship (leader member exchange). However, the moderating effect of psychological empowerment was found to be insignificant for two of the seven dimensions of ethical leadership.

This study contributes to highlighting new perspectives of women empowerment. Moreover, it also uncovers psychological factor that influences manager-subordinate relationship using cognitive evaluation theory. The seven dimensions of ethical leadership have not been tested in the past studies (only identified, not tested separately).