ELLTA Conference 2014
Leadership and Learning in the Asian Century
Nov 17 - 19, 2014
Call for Papers

With the unprecedented and continuous rise of Asia in the 21st century, the global dynamics have changed altogether. The impact of this phenomenal rise of Asia and Asian tigers is felt globally, in all fields and domains of life. Japan, Singapore, Hong Kong, South Korea, Taiwan, China, Malaysia, India and others – these are the emerging lead players on the international field.

The phenomenon, of course, is intriguing, and invites a closer look at and a deeper analysis of the reasons explaining it, its implications and impact. It has also inspired other countries within and outside of Asia to reposition themselves to take maximum advantage of this huge opportunity that the ‘Asian Century’ presents – Australia’s recent White Paper (2012) is but one example; similarly, the recent ADB Report (2011) also focuses on ‘Realising the Asian Century’.

No doubt, we are at a turning point, and the world is witnessing a historic phase. However, the Asian Century, as ADB Report also indicates, is not preordained – there could be various pits and falls, and the opportunities are intertwined with risks for this very dynamic but diverse region.

Asia needs to continue to grow on the recent trajectory, however, not necessarily doing the same things that it has been doing; what has worked in past may not continue to lead to success in future also. Asian countries need to re-assess their strategies. Likewise, though the Asian Century offers immense potential and opportunities for all nations, it is important that the other countries are prepared to tap on this potential and make use of those opportunities.

With its thematic emphasis on, ‘Leadership and Learning in the Asian Century’, ELLTA Conference 2014 offers a unique opportunity and venue to achieve both these objectives. ELLTA, which stands for Exploring Leadership and Learning Theories in Asia, came into being as a reaction against the pre-dominant assumptions and the tendency to treat most of the theories as if universal. The past conferences of ELLTA, therefore, have been instrumental in challenging the hegemonic presence of the West-inspired theories and their basic assumptions, and promoting understandings of Asian perspectives on leadership and learning.

ELLTA Conference 2014 takes this agenda further. It invites perspectives and insights on ‘leadership’ and `learning’ in the ‘Asian Century` – analyzing not only the past and present, but also anticipating the future of leadership and learning in/ for Asia. For instance: What are the past and current examples of successful leadership in/ for Asia; what are the requirements for future leadership in/ for Asia; what are the past and current examples of learning in/ for Asia; what are the future learning spaces in/ for Asia; what do other nations need to learn about and from Asia to take benefit of the Asian Century, and so on and so forth.

The ELLTA Conference 2014 invites a wide range of individuals and organizations, working in diverse fields, e.g. Science and Technology, Business and Economics, Social Sciences, Philosophy, Development and Sustainable Development Studies, Education – to develop and share meaningful insights on what constitutes leadership and learning for the Asian Century, a century, which marks the rise of Asia.

Conference Sub-themes

Therefore, contributions are invited on, but not limited to, the following Sub-themes:

• The ‘Asian Century’– Key debates and dilemmas
• Drivers of the ‘Asian Century’ – technology, economy, local knowledge, Asian values?
• What counts as the competitive edge in the Asian Century
• Leadership in/ for Asian Century
• Future scenarios of Asian leadership
• Learning agenda for the Asian Century
• Future leanings in and for Asia
• Future learning spaces in/for Asia
• Future educational scenarios for/ in Asia
• Asia’s role in peace, prosperity and sustainability in the region
• The responsibility of Asian universities in propagating sustainable development
• Bottom billion and learning equity and accessibility in Asia
• Fusion of Asian local knowledge in higher education
• International Education – Its shape and future directions
• Face and form of regional dialogue and cooperation (priority areas)
• New models of leadership/ partnership
• Others.


Conference Venue

The venue of the ELLTA Conference 2014 is Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM), Penang, Malaysia. USM has been the host of the inaugurating ELLTA Conference 2011.

Conference Fee

( See the website : http://ellta.org/test/ellta2014/ )

Conference Submissions

Asia presents a rich array of diverse cultures and religions. Submitters should feel free to choose to focus on any particular part, region, culture or religion in Southeast Asia, the Middle East, Asia Pacific and Oceania or on Asia in general.

We also welcome academics and practitioners from various fields with an interest in Asian perspectives on leadership and learning in the Asian Century e.g. education, business and economics, social sciences, science and technology, philosophy, development studies, management, organizational learning, learning technologies, psychology, sociology, political science, etcetera.

The submissions should not be limited to examining leadership and learning in/ for formal or institutional settings only; contributions are welcome on examples from formal as well as informal settings, adult as well as child’s learning.

Alternate modes of academic and scholarly work are welcome, too; such as reflective studies, autobiographical studies, case studies, other empirical work, literature reviews, conceptual papers, etcetera.

In the contributions, we look for original work that has not been published or presented already at any other forum, or submitted elsewhere for any such consideration.

The Conference 2014 invites submissions against the following categories:
• Papers (submit abstracts)
• Symposia (submit proposal/ concept note)
• Workshops (submit proposal, inclusive of outline)

Specific Guidelines for Contributors

Abstract Submission for Papers Presentations/ Roundtable:

In relevance to the conference themes, submit an abstract of between 400 and 500 words. Abstracts should clearly specify the focus and thematic emphasis of the Paper presentation/ Roundtable session; identify the methodology employed, the sources of data from where the findings emerge (wherever applicable); highlight key findings presented in the paper as well their implications for theory, policy and practice.

Proposal/ Concept note for Symposia:

In relevance to the conference themes, submit a proposal or concept note (between 500 and 700 words) for a Symposium (90 minutes to 2 hour session), session, and limited to six presenters (including the session facilitator/ chair). Unlike an individual paper, a Symposium provides a unique opportunity to allow presentation of multiple perspectives and experiences on a particular topic.

Proposal and Outline for Workshop:

In relevance to the conference themes, submit a proposal, inclusive of outline, for Workshop (between 500 and 700 words), limited to an overall 90-minute session.

Full Paper Submission:

If you want your full paper to be considered for any of the Special Issues of journals that will be published, with collections of papers from the conference (see details of Conference Publications on the conference website), then, please prepare your paper in accordance with the specific journal's guidelines for authors available on their website, and put the journal’s name on the cover page of your paper. For papers that are submitted to the conference without any specific link to any of the Special Issues, please, prepare your paper in accordance with the APA formatting and style guide (word length 5000-7000). Please single-space the text throughout. Further details will be available on the website.


Important Points for Consideration
• Submission is a commitment to participate at the conference.
• If your submission is accepted by the review committee, you must submit the full paper by the identified deadline and REGISTER for the conference.
• For participation at the conference, each author needs to register separately.
• To encourage wider participation, an author/ presenter can appear as first author/ lead presenter for not more than two submissions.
• If your abstract is approved, you will be required to submit a full paper. This is a necessary condition for participation at the conference, and, especially, for conference publication process.
• The abstract can only be submitted through the online submission system (see website for details). Please, avoid creating duplicate accounts or submissions for effective consideration of your paper.
• The abstracts will be reviewed by the International Advisory Board Members through a double-blind review process.
• Please keep visiting conference website for updates and information, and more specific guidelines.

Conference Language

The official language of the conference is English; however, people presenting in any other language would need to arrange on their own for an interpreter/ translator.

Conference Programme – Some Key Features of ELLTA Conferences

ELLTA envisages conferences as spaces for meaningful interactions and networking (as a means to engage with the community of scholars). This is the most critical, significant and valued aspect of conferences, and adds a lot of value to the whole experience.
Keeping in view the high significance and usefulness that ELLTA attaches to such interactions, the schedule offers a variety of innovative sessions that are interactive and provide social spaces for talk, networking, socializing, discussing, debating, extending ideas, synthesizing, meeting up with people you want to meet, etcetera.
Best Paper Award

Like earlier, the conference 2014 is also likely to announce one or more ‘Best Paper Awards’ depending on the nature and scope of sponsorship; the details for which will be uploaded soon on the conference website.

Conference Publications

ELLTA 2014, like its previous offerings, will have a heavy emphasis on conference publications, including Special Issues for top class, international, refereed journals in the respective fields and edited books.
Based on past experience, we anticipate that the quality of the papers will, generally, be quite high and, thus, we will get the opportunity to publish many of the conference papers. As earlier, we do not intend to publish any conference proceedings from the ELLTA Conference 2014; such a publication may be a constraint when trying to publish the conference paper in other publications, such as journal special issues and edited books.

Details on the possible publications (negotiations with journals and publishers) will soon be uploaded on the conference website.

Please note that the abstracts of all papers presented at the conference will be printed as part of the conference programme book.

The journals and publishers associated for the last two offerings include, for instance:
• Leadership, Sage
• Globalizations, Taylor & Francis
• Asia Pacific Journal of Education, Taylor & Francis
• Asian Business & Management, Palgrave Macmillan
• The Learning Organization, Emerald
• International Journal of Learning and Change, Inderscience