Inside de- and re-centralisation: the formation of governance in Swedish local education authorities during education reform

Abstract

ABSTRACT This article concerns the professional work of Swedish heads of local educational authority [LEA] school administrations) with a particular focus on their relationships with local politicians since the 1990s. In recent decades, Sweden has undergone foundational educational reforms, radically de-centralising - and then re-centralising - the school system. Thus, Sweden represents an interesting case for understanding both de-centralisation and re-centralisation processes. We cover seven empirical studies of superintendents to understand how municipal governance and the role of superintendents have changed over time in response to these large-scale reforms. We show that the de-centralisation reforms of the 1990s destabilised municipal administrative structures and superintendents' roles and duties with regard to politicians. However, during the 2000s, the municipal administrative structures and the role and duties of superintendents stabilised significantly. In the mid-2010s, reforms institutionalised superintendents' roles and bound them more closely to the state administration.