The education system in England, along with the leadership and management of its schools, has changed dramatically over the past fifteen years, heavily influenced by key features of the private school sector. However, in this article, it is argued that the strong policy focus on autonomy and diversity was in fact an accentuation of the historical tradition of the English system: secondary heads and their staff having much more autonomy and schools being more diverse than is generally the case elsewhere. In order to contextualise any analysis of the current politicised, centralised school system in England, it is important to first understand how the marketized and semi-privatised arrangements came about. This article questions whether, despite being constantly subjected to policy change and reorganisation, any improvements in either academic outcomes or equity issues could be claimed. It then asks how socially just current educational provision could claim to be, with its distorting accountability measures and emphasis on the individual school rather than the system as a whole. It highlights key implications for system design, encompassing both processes and structures, surrounding the leadership and management of schools across England.

This article revisits a major paper published a decade ago by the political scientist Christopher Pollitt about the highly activist approach to the reform of public services taken in England in recent years. In education, the pace has accelerated since that paper appeared.The weaknesses of the current structures and processes resulting from this reforming zeal are enumerated. A particular focus is placed on the technocratic and market-oriented features of the current context, and their significance in the light of the moral, social, and cultural issues that lie at the heart of schooling. It is argued that analysts of educational governance pay insufficient attention to the distinctive characteristics of the British constitution and their impact on changes in structure and process within education, leading not just to a democratic deficit but also to a paucity of pluralism.

What impact have the unprecedented and rapid changes to the structure of education in England had on school governors and policy makers? And what effect has the intensifying media and regulatory focus had on the volunteers who take on the job? Jacqueline Baxter takes the 2014 ‘Trojan Horse’ scandal, in which it was alleged that governors at 25 Birmingham schools were involved in the “Islamisation” of secular state schools, as a focus point to examine the pressures and challenges in the current system. Informed by her twenty years’ experience as a school governor, she considers both media analysis and policy as well as the implications for the future of a democratic system of education in England.

This paper asks whether schools and colleges should be regarded as institutions as well as organizations, and if so what are the implications. Different conceptions of ‘institution’ are examined including an attempt to distinguish ‘institution’ from ‘organization’. It is suggested that institutions are committed to a set of values beyond the transmission of knowledge and skills, as well as to breadth in education and the importance of continuity and a degree of stability. Positive and negative connotations of the idea of institution are briefly reviewed. The discussion is placed in a wider context of the debate about the public realm and its boundaries. Institutional theory is drawn on regarding the interplay between schools and colleges and their environments. Finally there is a brief discussion of the conception of ‘civic institution’, and its implications concerning the ownership of publicly-funded schools and colleges.

This concluding article attempts to review some dominant themes from the preceding contributions and relate them to my own preoccupations and perspectives. It focuses on the themes of agency, reform and the field. It points to the risk of polarising the debate about the relative influence of agency and structure but acknowledges and exemplifies the impact of the radical organisational reforms of recent years, particularly in England, on schools and their leaders. The educational world has changed beyond recognition since Baron and Taylor's edited book was published. I argue that, in spite of the severe challenges this has posed for the field of educational administration, and whatever the variations in its title and scope in different contexts, it has become the important and distinctive field of study and application that they intended it to be.

In 1975, the fourth Annual Conference of the British Educational Administration Society (BEAS, now BELMAS) had as its theme 'Autonomy and Accountability in Educational Administration'. In their concluding comments, the editors of the published Proceedings wrote: 'Our concern has been with accountability and autonomy, not as alternatives, but as significant and meaningful concepts which need to be better understood in relation to each other, having regard to specific organisational settings.' This is the same connection that the then newly installed coalition government made 35 years later in their 2010 schools White Paper, a major policy document. The emphasis on this theme had persisted and indeed grown sharply during the intervening period. This trajectory is outlined in the article but its main purpose is to analyse the forces underlying what has become a preoccupation in English schools policy, making some reference to international evidence and practice. It is argued that the last six words of the quotation above from the 1975 editors' conclusion, 'having regard to specific organisational settings', were particularly significant and are highly relevant to an explanation of the staying power of these concepts.

This article is based on a synthesis study of school leadership development conducted for the National College of School Leadership (NCSL) in England. It first outlines a perspective on leadership focusing on the concepts of wisdom, deliberation and higher order capacities. Then it describes and assesses two distinct models of leadership learning, emphasising the importance of 'basic' management knowledge, skills and processes. There is a discussion of approaches to the choice of methods for leadership development, taking account of evidence about the preferences of participants. Several developing conditions for which school leaders need to be equipped are identified and discussed. Among the conclusions proposed for policy, practice and research are the need for a closer alignment of leadership development with career development and a better understanding of the attributes and skills that underlie the higher order capacities.