Understanding the Experiences of Vietnamese Women Leaders: Advancing an Existential Philosophical and Psychological Perspective

The purpose of this article is to demonstrate the value(s) of existential philosophy and psychology for understanding women’s lives in a cross-cultural context. It focuses on Vietnamese women and the formation of their self-identity in the process of becoming a leader. Theoretically, we draw on the existential philosophy of Martin Heidegger’s fundamental ontology that emphasizes being, temporality and context (thrownness), Simone de Beauvoir’s account of gender and other pertinent existentialists. To illustrate the value of an existential perspective, we offer an empirical example of a Vietnamese woman’s life-story (who was chosen because she is a leader), interpreting her self-identity as it unfolds over the life span. This approach has the potential to capture an individuals’ diverse and complex modes of being, how they take part in shaping their reality through their situatedness in the world. The value of existentialism lies in its view of self-identity as a process of becoming, as opposed to a fixed and stable entity, providing the means for theorizing the possibilities for female agency, which addresses one of the limitations of the existing research on women’s leadership in Vietnam. Our analysis of the participant’s life-story offers a case illustration of her encounters with the conditions of existence, which serve as important events, milestones, and turning points that promote a critical reflection on the role that culture, choice, and meaning plays in her life and leadership.