Deciphering Chinese school leadership : conceptualisation, context and complexities / Allan Walker and Haiyan Qian.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Leadership in China: traditional expectations and cultural underpinnings -- Conceptualisation -- School leadership in China 1998-2016: a review of non-empirical Chinese literature -- School leadership in China 1998-2016: a review of empirical Chinese literature -- School leadership in China 1998-2016: a review of English literature -- Context -- The quest for quality: education reforms since 1985 -- The quest for equity: the education of migrant children in Shanghai -- Reform disconnection in China -- Principal development policy in China (1989-2016) -- Complexities -- Implementing curriculum reform: leading teacher learning -- Leading with empathy -- Building and leading a learning culture -- Leading as state agents: narratives of shanghai principals -- Leading schools with migrant children in Shanghai -- Leadership for learning in Chinese schools -- Deciphering school leadership in China: emerging propositions and future directions.

"With existing educational leadership models and theories being predominantly western influenced, this book aims to provide more insight into school leadership in China. It pioneers building research- and practice-informed knowledge and unravels the complexities that characterize the scholarship, context and practices of school leadership. School leadership in China is presented through four sub-purposes: investigating how Chinese school leadership is conceptualized in the international and Chinese literature; exploring the shifting context within which Chinese school leaders enact their leadership, and examining key policies that have shaped the practice of leader development; extending the understandings about the complexities of work lives of Chinese school leaders; and further locating indigenous understandings of Chinese school leadership in the political and socio-cultural context of contemporary China, and the theoretical and conceptual context of international school leadership. This text will be particularly useful to international education researchers with focus on educational leadership, comparative education, education policy and education in China" -- Provided by publisher.