Concealed Gun-Carry on Campus: Critical Perspectives on Leadership-Followership, Resistance, and the Implications of Gender

This case is a nonfictional account of collective opposition to West Virginia House Bill 2519 (HB2519), which would have permitted, among other things, concealed carry of firearms in West Virginia college classrooms. The case captures a moment of resistance that became a movement led by a core group of mostly women faculty who opposed the legislation. For instructive purposes, key elements of the case are highlighted. These include the impetus behind the movement, the responses to the proposed legislation by internal and external stakeholders, organized resistance to the legislation, and a provocative discourse around gender. The case includes excerpts from the authors’ interviews with key faculty, publicly-released statements from university leadership, and an op-ed from a popular media personality that enliven the narrative and draw attention to the ways in which traditional conceptualizations of leadership and followership, notions of gender, and resistance as leadership can be both challenged and reinforced.

Unlike traditional leadership case studies, this case does not frame a leadership problem to be solved. Instead, in keeping with critical leadership pedagogy, it illustrates multi-faceted and multi-leveled leadership processes for learners’ contemplation and critique.