This Article Full Text (PDF) References Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Citation Map Services Email this article to a friend Similar articles in this journal Alert me to new issues of the journal Add to Saved Citations Download to citation manager Request Permissions Request Reprints Add to My Marked Citations Citing Articles Citing Articles via HighWire Citing Articles via Google Scholar Citing Articles via Scopus Google Scholar Articles by Johnson, B. L. Articles by Fauske, J. R. Search for Related Content Social Bookmarking                   What's this?

Principals and the Political Economy of Environmental Enactment

Janice R. Fauske

Using Weick’s notion of environmental enactment as a sensitizing concept, this study explores how principals enact and structure the internal and external environment of the school. By examining what in the environment captures the attention of principals and why, an incipient theory of the environmental attention-structure is offered. The critical-incident technique, a grounded approach to theory building, generated 77 incidents of prolonged interaction with the environment among 18 principals. Findings suggest that the environmental attention-structure of the principals is driven by concerns for the potential accumulation and loss of legitimacy capital. Principals describe their cognitive processes for deliberating, weighing, and assessing the environmental entities and events in terms of gains or losses of legitimacy. Public choice theory, a variant of political economy theory, provides a useful lens for making sense of these processes.

Educational Administration Quarterly, Vol. 36, No. 2, 159-185 (2000)
DOI: 10.1177/0013161X00362002


CiteULike    Connotea    Del.icio.us    Digg    Reddit    Technorati    What's this?

This article has been cited by other articles:

				S. M. Printy Leadership for Teacher Learning: A Community of Practice Perspective Educational Administration Quarterly, April 1, 2008; 44(2): 187 - 226. [Abstract] [PDF]

				B. L. Johnson Jr. Those Nagging Headaches: Perennial Issues and Tensions in the Politics of Education Field Educational Administration Quarterly, February 1, 2003; 39(1): 41 - 67. [Abstract] [PDF]