This study stems from research on the "Standing Conferences of Rectors and Vice-Chancellors of the European Universities" (1948-), an experimental initiative for co-operation among European universities, emphasising the reformative ideal that appeared in international circles in the years following the Second World War. These conceptions…

In order to explore education at the first two Pan-Pacific Women's Conferences, this article builds on Campbell and Sherington's account of education in Oceania and on empirical research undertaken by Selleck and others, along with relevant primary source material. It traces elements of empire as they played out in inter-war women's…

This paper argues that the "Times Higher" provides a powerful tool for understanding the changing character of UK higher education (HE) and can usefully be seen as representative, and in some ways constitutive, of that changing character. Drawing on an analysis of a sample of stories from the "Times Higher," it documents the…

Despite the "practice" turn in the broader management literature, very little work in educational administration has engaged in a theoretical discussion about what constitutes leadership practice. Theoretically informed by the French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu, this paper contributes to the long-established critical tradition in the educational…

Managers and personnel within tertiary institutions colonised by neo-liberal ministrations and buffeted by the winds of a "change culture" formed within the philosophical shifts of the last century can be considered in terms of "immigrants" or "refugees" within this new territory. The case story of this article is set in a college of education…

In the hit BBC TV drama "Life on Mars" Sam Tyler had an accident and woke up in 1973. Is he mad, in a coma or actually back in time? As the drama unfolds he experiences a world without performance audits but also one without the safeguards for arrest, detention and the interviewing of suspects mandated by the Police and Criminal Evidence Act…

In the 1960s, as part of the black freedom struggle in the United States, African-American educators increasingly achieved the position of school principal in the nation's big cities, helping to transform that office into a more dynamic force for school reform. This article presents the accomplishments and the struggles of one such principal,…

In September 1931, the Communist Party Central Committee, the highest political authority in the Soviet Union, declared that "single person rule" ("edinonachalie") should prevail in the administration of schools. The history of approximately 100,000 school directors in the 1930s was shaped by a rapid expansion in numbers as well as fundamental…

The purpose of this article is to argue for a social activist stance in educational leadership that fundamentally addresses social change and human emancipation. This call for social activism is framed within neoliberal, neoconservative, and authoritarian populist discourses in the USA, which to social justice educators and leaders had devastating…

The nature, quality and preparation of school leaders are once more at the centre of policy and practice decisions about education. But it is important to understand that school leadership, as both a historical and cultural construction, is intimately related to changing socio-political realities. In the case of Singapore, the historical evolution…

At the turn of the twentieth century, middle-class educated gentlewomen in Ireland had established positions of authority and leadership in the relatively new professions of education and nursing. Acting in the roles of lady principals and lady superintendents, respectively, in education and nursing, many of these women had themselves participated…

This paper reviews briefly the relationship between the South African government and higher education. This relationship, which has shaped the landscape of higher education, is looked at on the premise that public institutions depend to a large extent on government for funding and other resources, and as such there has been constant influence and…

This article explores the contrasting career routes and experiences of women leaders from differing socio-historical-political backgrounds in China, especially those in the city of Shanghai. In doing so, it seeks to examine why particular career patterns and routes to positions of leadership have emerged and how the women themselves understand and…

This article considers the usefulness of current models of leadership in change situations for an analysis of a historical case study of educational leadership. It uses the life of Sir George White (1842-1912) and his leadership in the field of education in Norwich and at the national level in the UK to examine the nature of effective leadership…

This article discusses a phenomenon that gained prominence in the 1990s, namely the entry of retired senior Israeli army officers as managers into the educational system. This development will be analyzed through an exposure of the socio-educational mechanisms contributing to this process and an examination of the motivations underlying it. These…