School Leadership in the Era of Neoliberalism

concept of leadership. This is so because the concept of leadership currently dominates
the language of organizations including schools. What instead happened is a deluge of
assumptions including but not limited to the beliefs that; leadership is static; it can be
taught objectively and effectively to a different group of people in various situations; it
can be learned quickly and easily, and the context is a secondary or tertiary importance.
These assumptions gave birth to the leadership development industrial complex,
an explosion of leadership training programs all over the world especially in the United
States. This growing industry promises to create transformative and high performing
leaders for a small fee. Despite this training explosion, it is the opinion of several scholars
that leadership failure is almost everywhere. They wonder whether the leadership devel‑
opment industry has improved the human condition. The elephant in the room is the neo‑
liberal context in which all the above is taking place. Neoliberalism is an ideology whose
proponents advocate the deregulation of the economy, liberalization of trade and industry
and the privatization of state‑owned enterprise. This ideology pushes individuals to see
themselves as self‑interested actors rather than people working for the social good. The
new managerialism becomes the dominant form of management in organizations whose
focus is on productivity, efficiency, surveillance, and accountability.
Educational institutions are not immune to the new managerialism whose introduc‑
tion deserves to be interrogated. Neoliberalism turns teachers and school principals into
technicians rather than professionals. The influence of managerialism on education pol‑
icies is efficiency in all matters which leaves no room for the pursuit of equity, excellence
and ethics and social justice (Codd, 1993). What vision of education should prospective
schools’ leaders develop while they are being forced to adopt a managerialist approach to
the leadership of school? Should school leaders develop both the ability to resist and build
coalitions with proponents of neoliberalism at all costs?
Neoliberalism has successfully coopted our education practitioners and students to
turn them into docile minds and docile bodies to the service of the market. The question
this phenomenon raises is whether faculty in education leadership preparation programs
are preparing their candidates for a meaningful and purposeful life. Perhaps public educa‑
tion should focus on society reproduction, but individual values cannot be ignored. Un‑
fortunately, the neoliberalism ideology and its proponents have taken it upon themselves
to prioritize these values less. Hence the ideological struggle continues between propo‑
nents and opponents of the impact of neoliberalism in organizations but more specifically
in schools.