Educational Leadership: Theorising Professional Practice in Neoliberal Times (Critical Studies in Educational Leadership, Management and Administration)

"Educational Leadership brings together innovative perspectives on the crucial role of theory and theorising in educational leadership at a time when the multiple pressures of marketisation, competition and system fragmentation dominate the educational landscape. This original and highly thought-provoking edited collection is a much-needed counterbalance to the anti-theoretical trends that have underpinned recent education reforms. Contributors employ a range of theories in original and innovate ways in order to reveal the lived experiences of what it means to be an educational leader at a time of rapid modernisation, where the conceptual terrain of 'modern' has been appropriated by corporate and private interests, where notions of 'public' are not only hidden, but also derided, and where school leaders must meet the conflicting demands of competing accountabilities. Drawing on research projects conducted in the UK, Educational Leadership presents convincing evidence that the need to consider theory crosses national borders, and the authors discuss changes to professional identities and practices that researchers around the world will recognise. This detailed and insightful work will appeal to academics, researchers and postgraduate students in the fields of education and sociology, as well as those with an interest in organisational and political theory. The topical subject matter also makes the book of relevance to practitioners and policy-makers in education and the public services more generally."--Provided by publisher Cover -- Title -- Copyright -- Contents -- List of tables and figure -- Common series foreword -- Foreword -- Acknowledgements -- List of abbreviations -- List of contributors -- 1 Introduction: theory and theorising in educational leadership -- 2 Theory sex to leadership heteroglossia: using gender theories to surface discourses of headteacher compliance and transgression -- 3 Re-figuring the world of educational leadership: struggles with performance, disenfranchisement and critical consciousness -- 4 Theorising senior leader identity in schools in areas of economic hardship -- 5 Negotiating meaning in multiple communities of practice: reconciliation and dis-identification in the identity work of headteachers leaving Anglican primary schools -- 6 Leadership and the power of others: re-thinking educational leadership with Magical Marxism and Spinoza -- 7 Re-thinking governmentality: lessons from the academisation project in England -- 8 Creating expert publics: a governmentality approach to school governance under neoliberalism -- 9 Hannah Arendt, judgement and school leadership -- 10 Interpreting historical responses to racism by UK Black and South Asian headteachers through the lens of generational consciousness -- 11 Behind and beyond "moral purpose" in contemporary school leadership reform: the challenges for critical research? -- 12 Conclusion: educational leaders and leadership re-theorised for the present and beyond -- Index