Rektorns beslutfattande om skolans organisation: Navigering utifrån beslutslogiker i oländig terräng

Abstract in English

Over the past several years, there has been a greater demand for accountability of principal´s for the education they provide. Through the Education Act (SFS 2010:800), the Swedish parliament has increased the regulation and clarification of the principal´s responsibility in several areas, for example the responsibility to decide on the school’s internal organization. This thesis takes an interest for the principal´s decision-making, more accurately the aim is to develop knowledge about the principal´s decision-making through logics of decisions (Brunsson & Brunsson, 2017).

The concept of logics of decisions is central in this study and are used as an analytical framework to understand and explain how the principal make decision about the internal school organization. Through a reflexive research process (Alvesson & Sköldberg, 2017) the aim is explored thorough three methods: a survey, observations and interviews (Creswell). The results demonstrate thorough logics of decisions that even if principal´s experience mandate, legitimacy and authority, they have a limited room for action options in their decision-making.

In the discussion, I argue from a decision-theory perspective that the state, the school board, the staff and the local community essentially control the principal preferences. The legal regulations make the logic of appropriateness with its focus on laws and regulations visible in decision-making. Since the legal regulations are governed by a rationality where there is a best way for the principal to make decision, the logic of imitation will also appear in the decision-making. I also argue that the logic experimentation which is rather invisible in the principal decision-making possibly create at different way for decision-making from those that dominate today. The logic of experimental can become a means of critical examination in the principal own decision-making and practice.

Overall, the thesis theoretical contribution is to use a decision-theoretic perspective through the conceptualization of logics of decisions to provide new dimensions of the principal´s decision-making in a context where it has not been used before, the school context.