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Transnational and Local Conditions and Expectations on School Leaders

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International Handbook of Leadership for Learning

Part of the book series: Springer International Handbooks of Education ((SIHE,volume 25))

Abstract

The argument in this chapter is that school leaders need room to manoeuvre in order to be able to think and act as leaders for learning. Their latitude to manoeuvre is in many ways framed by the structures in which they strive to lead and by the external and internal expectations, both of the school and of school leadership.

The Danish educational system provides the background for analyzing structures in contemporary Neo-Liberal Public Management (NLPM) with its decentralization of finance, administration and influence in polycentric states. It lends itself to the analysis of dominant discourses and social technologies in NLPM. Some key features are a back-to-basics trend and a mix of decentralization and re-centralization, employing both hard and soft governance. It is argued that many of the current social technologies and trends are evident at the transnational level as well. On the basis of a number of initiatives, it becomes apparent that there are developing isomorphic forms of influence.

A number of perspectives have been chosen to illustrate and discuss the broad and diverse range of expectations of school leaders. These include official expectations from government and local authorities, from ideas advanced by the OECD and from leadership theories. The chapter finishes with a presentation and discussion of findings from a successful international school principal research project which examined how school leaders are able to manoeuvre their way through diverse and often conflicting expectations and mandates.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    From the Danish part (with John B. Krejsler and Klaus Kasper Kofod) of the ‘The International Successful Principal Project’ (ISSPP) with Christopher Day, University of Nottingham (England), Ken Leithwood, OISE/Utoronto (Canada), Stephen Jacobson, University of Buffalo, (USA), Jorunn Møller, University of Oslo, (Norway), Olof Johansson, University of Umea (Sweden), David Gurr, The University of Melbourne and Bill Mulford, The University of Tasmania (Australia).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Danish School of Education, Aarhus University, Copenhagen, Denmark

    Lejf Moos

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  1. Lejf Moos
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Correspondence to Lejf Moos .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. , School of Education, University of Glasgow, Eldon Street 11, Glasgow, G3 6NH, United Kingdom

    Tony Townsend

  2. , Faculty of Education, University of Cambridge, Hills Road 184, Cambridge, CB2 8PQ, United Kingdom

    John MacBeath

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Moos, L. (2011). Transnational and Local Conditions and Expectations on School Leaders. In: Townsend, T., MacBeath, J. (eds) International Handbook of Leadership for Learning. Springer International Handbooks of Education, vol 25. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-1350-5_5

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