School Leaders as Political Strategists: William Boyd's Contributions to our Understanding of the Politics of Leadership

Abstract

William Boyd's contributions to the education field's understanding of the political nature of school leadership are formidable. In this article, I describe the growth and development, over a roughly 30-year time span, of his key insight that successful school leaders should have the capabilities of a political strategist and that the actualization of this capacity is related to school leaders’ political and policy context. The perennial question of “who governs education” was central to Boyd's work and his various answers are important touchstones for today's educational leaders.

Notes

It was most likely raining also. According to the record located at http://weather.org/weatherorg_records_and_averages.htm, from April 3 to 7, the average temperature was 38 degrees and there was approximately a quarter inch of rain each day.

The authors used Parson's (1960) theory that describes the four functions a social system must perform if it is to continue (i.e., goal attainment, adaptation, integration, and pattern maintenance) as a heuristic to help elucidate the contexts of the practice of public administration. However, they noted that they are not necessarily taking a functional perspective to social systems or organizations.