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Reclaiming Time, Reclaiming Space: Decolonial Feminist Leadership in the Creative Industries of Post‐Soviet Kazakhstan

Author

Listed:
  • Shumaila Yousafzai
  • Alua Nurbayeva
  • Rana Zayadin
  • Muzhar Javed

Abstract

Can leadership within the creative industries transcend market logics to become an act of cultural reclamation and collective sovereignty? This study introduces the concept of decolonial feminist leadership to explore how Kazakh women entrepreneurs engage in cultural reclamation and community revitalization through craft‐based enterprises. Drawing on 21 in‐depth interviews with women‐led ventures, this study develops a three‐layer process model: Rediscovering the Self Through Cultural Memory, Creating Relational Infrastructures of Care, and Embodying Rooted Enterprise. This model illustrates how temporal sovereignty, community‐based leadership, and distributed cultural stewardship subvert market‐driven expectations of growth and individualism. Employing a decolonial feminist lens, the findings reveal how these women transform entrepreneurship into a practice of collective memory preservation and economic sovereignty, crafting spaces of resistance within a rapidly modernizing economy. This study extends theories of leadership by foregrounding time as a site of political struggle and collective agency as a driver of cultural survival, offering pathways for rethinking leadership in marginalized contexts globally.

Suggested Citation

  • Shumaila Yousafzai & Alua Nurbayeva & Rana Zayadin & Muzhar Javed, 2026. "Reclaiming Time, Reclaiming Space: Decolonial Feminist Leadership in the Creative Industries of Post‐Soviet Kazakhstan," Gender, Work and Organization, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 33(4), pages 1359-1375, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:gender:v:33:y:2026:i:4:p:1359-1375
    DOI: 10.1111/gwao.70121
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