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Relationalism in educational leadership research
- 1. Relationalism An overview of relation based approaches in educational leadership research. Scott Eacott
- 2. Presentation Overview My argument A brief history of organisational theory Four forms of relational approaches Adjectival approaches Co-determinist approaches Conflationary approaches Relational approaches Underlying generative assumptions Implications for research Enduring issues Explanatory and empirical contribution The relational approach 18 MAY 2020
- 3. A relational turn Relational language has become commonplace in educational leadership literatures yet what is meant by relations is far from homogenous.
- 4. A brief history of org theory Tracing major themes in the history of organisational theory in Anglophone educational administration and leadership research.
- 9. Time Approaches Normative / Adjectival 1900 Scientific Structures Taylor People Human relations 1910 1930 1950 The Theory Movement
- 10. Time Approaches Normative / Adjectival 1900 Scientific Structures Taylor People Human relations 1910 1930 1950 The Theory Movement 1970 Greenfield Humanists
- 11. Time Approaches Normative / Adjectival 1900 Scientific Structures Taylor People Human relations 1910 1930 1950 The Theory Movement 1970 Greenfield Humanists 1980 Social critical approaches Social critical approaches
- 12. Time Approaches Normative / Adjectival 1900 Scientific Structures Taylor People Human relations 1910 1930 1950 The Theory Movement 1970 Greenfield Humanists 1980 Social critical approaches Social critical approaches 1990 Leadership
- 13. Time Approaches Normative / Adjectival 1900 Scientific Structures Taylor People Human relations 1910 1930 1950 The Theory Movement 1970 Greenfield Humanists 1980 Social critical approaches Social critical approaches 1990 Leadership 2000 2020 Data, measurement, standards
- 14. Time Approaches Normative / Adjectival 1900 Scientific Structures Taylor People Human relations 1910 1930 1950 The Theory Movement 1970 Greenfield Humanists 1980 Social critical approaches Social critical approaches 1990 Leadership 2000 2020 Data, measurement, standards Subjective
- 15. Time Approaches Normative / Adjectival 1900 Scientific Structures Taylor People Human relations 1910 1930 1950 The Theory Movement 1970 Greenfield Humanists 1980 Social critical approaches Social critical approaches 1990 Leadership 2000 2020 Data, measurement, standards Subjective Critical theory, feminist, post- structuralist
- 17. Adjectival approaches Relations / relationships are an external knowable reality. ONTOLOGICAL ASSUMPTIONS Concerned with advocacy for a particular version of how relations / relationships ought to be. DESCRIPTION Knowledge claims can be justified through empirical evidence and/or claims to an aspirational goal. EPISTEMOLOGICAL ASSUMPTIONS Relations / relationships are good. Organisations can be better and I/we have a path to achieve that. NORMATIVE / ETHICAL ASSUMPTIONS Relationships can be positive and I/we have a superior version. THEORY OF THE SUBJECT
- 18. Co-determinist approaches Relations / relationships are an external knowable reality. ONTOLOGICAL ASSUMPTIONS Assumes organisational outcomes to be the product of the relationships between two to more entities/variables. DESCRIPTION Objective knowledge claims justified through empirical verifiability. EPISTEMOLOGICAL ASSUMPTIONS Improvements can be achieved through objective knowledge of what works. NORMATIVE / ETHICAL ASSUMPTIONS Relationships are real and outcomes are a mix of individual agency and structural arrangements. THEORY OF THE SUBJECT
- 19. Conflationary approaches Not all relations can be broken into smaller parts. ONTOLOGICAL ASSUMPTIONS Grants a single identity to two or more concepts / constructs that had previously been thoughts of as separate. DESCRIPTION Knowledge claims may take many forms (dependent on level of conflation). EPISTEMOLOGICAL ASSUMPTIONS The social world is complex and breaking it down to its smallest constituent parts is not consistent with how it is experienced. NORMATIVE / ETHICAL ASSUMPTIONS Relations can take many forms. THEORY OF THE SUBJECT
- 20. Relational approaches Relations have a reality of their own, not simply derived from something else (e.g., interaction) nor psychic or merely in the minds of the observer. ONTOLOGICAL ASSUMPTIONS At its broadest, the relational program is concerned with the constitution and emergence of organising activity through relations. DESCRIPTION Knowledge claims are generated through relations with the social. EPISTEMOLOGICAL ASSUMPTIONS Less concern for right/wrong and instead with describing unfolding activity and why it took place in spatio-temporal conditions. NORMATIVE / ETHICAL ASSUMPTIONS Relations among auctors as constitutive of and emergent from organising activity. THEORY OF THE SUBJECT
- 21. Implications for research The assumptions shape how one seeks to explain the social world. EXPLANATORY FRAMING The assumptions shape the questions we ask and solutions we find/offer. EMPIRICAL QUESTIONS The assumptions shape how we seek to translate our research. ENGAGEMENT / IMPACT
- 22. The Adjectival Organisations are not performing to the desirable levels. tween two to more entities/variables. THE PROBLEMS THAT HAVE BEEN IDENTIFIED Follow my/our path to desirable performance. to more entities/variables. THE SOLUTIONS Other possible pathways to desirability. between two to more entities/variables. WHAT IS REJECTED
- 23. The Co-determinist Organisations are not performing to the desirable levels and that they can be more effective / successful. tween two to more entities/variables. THE PROBLEMS THAT HAVE BEEN IDENTIFIED Find out how do organisations work and what works most effectively in bringing about desired outcomes. to more entities/variables. THE SOLUTIONS That high performance is not a universal possibility. Explanations that cannot be empirically verified. The subjective and the particular. between two to more entities/variables. WHAT IS REJECTED
- 24. The Conflationary That a single explanatory construct / concept has been broken into two or more separate parts. tween two to more entities/variables. THE PROBLEMS THAT HAVE BEEN IDENTIFIED Bringing the separated parts back together. to more entities/variables. THE SOLUTIONS Individual separate entities. between two to more entities/variables. WHAT IS REJECTED
- 25. The Relational Existing explanations of organising activity are limiting the possibility of alternatives. Contemporary attempts to move beyond orthodoxy do not provide alternatives but iterations of existing theories. tween two to more entities/variables. THE PROBLEMS THAT HAVE BEEN IDENTIFIED Illuminate the underlying generative assumptions of existing theorisations and methodologies. Inscription of organising activity in spatio-temporal conditions. to more entities/variables. THE SOLUTIONS Uncritical adoption of the ordinary language of the everyday. Static and forevermore conceptualisaton based on substantialist thinking. The separation of activity from time and space. Analytical dualism. Critique without the provision of alternatives.two to more entities/variables. WHAT IS REJECTED
- 26. Relations, relational, and relationalism Our underlying assumptions of relations are at once constitutive of and emergent from the social world.
- 27. Enduring issues Analytical dualism Structure / agency Universal / particular Individual / whole
- 28. Explanatory Relational scholarship offers both a theory and methodology. Empirical Research which does not crush the possibility of alternates at the outset.
- 29. The relational approach The systematic development of a research program grounded in relations.
- 30. Contact details For further information s.eacott@unsw.edu.au EMAIL Website - scotteacott.com Twitter - @ScottEacott SOCIAL CONNECTIONS Eacott, S. (2018). Beyond leadership: a relational approach to organisational theory in education. Springer. Eacott, S. (2019). Starting points for a relational approach to organisational theory. THE REAL, 4(1), 16-45. WORTH READING