New Labour and the logic of practice in educational reform

Abstract

The paper draws on data and theorising from the Knowledge Production in Educational Leadership (KPEL) Project where we have investigated New Labour's education policy and investment in headteachers as school leaders in England. New Labour took up office in May 1997 with a modernisation agenda and the leadership of schools is central to this strategy. There have been a number of changes to the status and work of headteachers and a national training programme run by a new National College for School Leadership has been established. The KPEL project gathered data by interviewing policymakers and headteachers and this paper reports on the policy process. Specifically, the project used Bourdieu's thinking tools to identify a logic of practice and how ministers, civil servants, advisors (including some headteachers) and private consultants developed policy. Through this we intend to show how Bourdieu's thinking tools can be used to describe, understand and explain headteacher leadership as a social practice at a time of centralised interventions and reforms.