Challenging the model of the self-managing school, this book calls into question the process of school devolution. It investigates the phenomenon of the self-managing school, why it is happening now, what is the truth Behind This Notion And The Problems Which Lie Behind The Ideals.

The New Right and the self-managing school, Jack Demaine; paradigm shifts and site-based management in the United States - toward a paradigm of social empowerment, Gary L. Anderson and Alexandra Dixon; reinventing square wheels - planning for schools to ignore realities, Marie Brennan; the evaluative state and self-management in education - cause for reflection?, David Hartley; pushing crisis and stress down the line - the self-managing school, Peter Watkins; teaching cultures and school-based management - towards a collaborative reconstruction, Andrew C. Sparkes and Martin Bloomer; managerialism and market forces in vocational education - Balkanizing education in the Banana Republic, Peter Kell; self-managing schools, choice and equity, Geoffrey Walford.