Why educative school leadership based on anarcho-syndicalist principles will fail,but is still necessary: A conversation at the intersection of theory and practice

Abstract

This article takes a novel approach to thinking about the practice of educative leadership. An intellectual conversation between two academics and a school principal, it seeks to work through questions regarding the practicalities for a school principal in actually advancing educative leadership based on anarcho-syndicalist principles. Taking these questions seriously, the intention of this article is to think through these questions not from the ‘ivory tower’ but in dialogue. The aim was to write something that was more collaborative than an interview but less formal and academic than a philosophical dialogue. Instead, the authors worked together to have an intellectual conversation bringing together philosophical and practical reflection on how educative leadership based on anarcho-syndicalist principles might be imagined and initiated.

Introduction: How this conversation started

The literature on educational leadership is, unsurprisingly, generally unconcerned with matters such as anarchist organization. In the late 1970s, the journal Educational Administration (now Educational Management Administration & Leadership) hosted a number of papers engaging philosophically with hierarchy and anarchism as organizing principles and mechanisms for schools (Lambert, 1977; Packwood, 1977; Turner and Tutor, 1977). It is well-known that articles such as these have become far less common within the field of educational leadership and management, as models, case studies, and empirical evidence have come to dominate. Our view is that philosophical, phenomenological, and practical reflection on educational leadership – with education as its core concern – is needed. Moreover, we are interested in the possibilities for anarchist organizational principles in relation to educational leadership in a time where the field is heavily influenced by managerial approaches and practices. ¹

When we – Stephen and Elke – turned our thinking in a recent publication (Chatelier and Van dermijnsbrugge, 2022) to anarcho-syndicalist principles ² in relation to earlier theorizing of the notion of educative leadership (Duignan and Macpherson, 1992; Fay, 1975; Gunter and Courtney, 2021), it was based on our own experiences and practices of leadership in politically and culturally complex settings. Yet we ourselves are currently not working in positions of educational leadership such as that of a principal or dean.

When one of us (Elke) had the opportunity to share our initial ideas about educative leadership and anarcho-syndicalism with a group of school leaders studying a Master in Educational Leadership in the Netherlands, this allowed for the idea to be reflected upon and tried by those currently practising as school leaders. One such interested party was our co-author, Frank. He was immediately intrigued by the idea; perhaps sceptical and curious (if not inspired) in equal measure. Frank shared with Elke some of his immediate misgivings about educative leadership, but also his resonance with the desire to lead differently and his sympathy towards anarcho-syndicalist organizational perspectives. As Elke shared with Stephen about her discussions with Frank, it suddenly seemed so obvious that it would be worthwhile to formally engage with Frank to try and understand the challenges and potential for enacting educative leadership and anarcho-syndicalist principles within a school setting. And thus the idea for an exchange between a couple of academics (who had both previously held school leadership positions) and a current school principal was born.

Such an exchange did not seem to us best suited to writing a philosophical paper followed by a response (as was the case with the 1977 articles mentioned earlier). Instead, we wanted to engage in a dialogue of shorter reflections and responses, resulting in one article. The idea was to present a conversation that tried to critically reflect on anarchist ideas for educative leadership with the actual practice of leadership in schools in the foreground. To facilitate this, we decided that Frank, as a practising principal, begin the process by reflecting on his reading of our initial article. It was also important that he be free to respond in whatever way he liked, both in terms of being able to respond critically and robustly and being able to respond in a form that did not necessarily conform to the usual academic practice. Our sense is that voices such as Frank's are vital to any worthwhile further thinking and developing in relation to the notion of educative leadership and its connections with anarcho-syndicalism. We think there is both space, and a need, for thinking together about educative leadership philosophically, with a small ‘p’, as well as practically, as a response to the proliferation of models such as ‘distributed leadership’ (Bush, 2023).

We did not plan out the conversation, but instead started with the invitation for Frank to share his reflections on our earlier article (Chatelier and Van dermijnsbrugge, 2022). From here, our writing was a series of responses to each other. We wanted to cite important ideas from elsewhere, though this article was not about producing a literature review, but about thinking together – which sometimes meant thinking apart. Elke and Stephen initially jotted down separate responses to Frank before quickly realizing that we needed to work together – aided by shared online documents, which did not recognize the distance between the north of the Netherlands and the south of Australia – on one response.

The method for this paper moves between dialogue and conversation. As Bojesen (2019) notes, dialogue is often understood as involving subjects who are open to the challenge of a better argument (p. 652). This has been one part of the intention of this article. Each of us wishes to remain open to new and better ways of thinking about the practice of educative leadership and part of this has been to focus on our own positions and put them forward in response to each other's.

Yet, Bojesen also makes a distinction between dialogue and conversation. Dialogue, he writes, is concerned with self-representation and saying what we think (p. 650), progressing in a linear fashion toward the accumulation of knowledge (p. 652). Conversation's movement, however, is non-linear and does not function to produce a clearer sense of one's position. Rather, conversation keeps one always ‘on the move’ (p. 652), destabilizing knowledge through the priority of the movement of thought. In line with this, this article has not endeavoured to proceed in a linear way toward resolution, but to engage in conversation that destabilizes, opening new possibilities.

What follows, then, is the record of this dialogue/conversation, with some minor editing for length, repetition, and language. We acknowledge that this text captures our thinking at a particular point in time and therefore has its limitations. The reflections most definitely require further expansion, and we also acknowledge that our thinking is always in process. The purpose was to present our conversation with all its limitations, with the hope that some readers might provide further engagement through writing their own responses.

Frank, 26 April 2023

In response to,

Beyond instrumentalist leadership in schools: Educative leadership and anarcho-syndicates.

An article that is so close to being right that it almost isn’t wrong.

Or,

Why educative school leadership based on anarcho-syndicalist principles will fail, but is still necessary.

Anarcho-syndicalism is based on the presupposition that there is a group of people who refuse to be governed by an external authority and wish to organize themselves and set their own agenda (Oyinloye, 2023).

As such anarcho-syndicalism is a form of organization that relies heavily on solidarity. Given that educators participating in an anarcho-syndicalist form of organization have chosen to do so in support of a common cause (and not as a form of rebellion against leadership as such), solidarity will most likely, at least in the early stages of cooperation, be assured. But when working in a group without a hierarchical authority the common goals, group solidarity, and individual commitment (participation) need to be constantly reaffirmed.

This necessity for reaffirmation and renegotiation (Duignan and Macpherson, 1992) may lead to a change in the initial goals of the group or how to achieve these goals. This is problematic for two reasons. Firstly, a shifting of goals might estrange some of the participants in the group and thus challenge the foundational principles of solidarity and participation. Without these principles, anarcho-syndicalism cannot function. Secondly, schools (in the Netherlands) have to operate according to the school regulations as imposed by the school director and school principals and school legislation as imposed by the (Dutch) Ministry of Education. The (Dutch) education inspectorate regularly checks if schools adhere to these regulations and legislation and has the power to force schools to implement ‘improvements’ if they wish to receive a positive school evaluation. A group based on anarchist principles will, even in the absence of hierarchical leadership within the group, still have to submit to these superimposed rules and, therefore, will never really be free to formulate an agenda according to their own insights.

There is, however, a use for educative leadership based on anarcho-syndicalism. Not so much for what it might achieve in a practical sense, but more as a catalyst for future change. So even if anarcho-syndicalist educative leadership will in most cases be set to fail, it will still be successful in challenging the current paradigm of top-down management which is necessary if other forms of leadership (or lack thereof) are to be able to exist. Its early failures might well be its eventual victory.

Elke, 26 April 2023

I am writing this on a day that could have easily turned into dark and profound pessimism, after conversations I have had at our university about legal entry requirements, enrolment procedures, assessment approaches, etc. all the ‘stuff’ that bureaucracies impose upon us. What I have noticed is that I always turn to individuals who try to find work-arounds, find imaginative solutions to let the humans instead of the system speak, and refuse: those who are committed to being imaginative. And thus, my response focuses on what is possible, not on what chains us. It is as positive as I will ever get!

When I read your text, Frank, I was reminded of this quote from ‘Island’, the utopian novel by Aldous Huxley, often considered as the positive answer to ‘Brave New World’:

They never succeeded, of course,

in making the best of all the worlds;

but by dint of boldly trying

they made the best of many more worlds

than any merely prudent or sensible person

would have dreamed of being able to reconcile and combine. (Huxley, 2005: 129)

You are talking about the challenges that schools and school leaders face when trying to go against the very high-stakes requirements that external bureaucracies (e.g. inspectorates) impose upon them. Even within school organizations, school leaders often have to deal with tensions and resistance coming from staff, the Governing Board, the parental community, etc. The question is not whether transgressing these impositions can be successful or not, the question is whether we are willing to boldly try, not being too prudent, and not reconciling ourselves too quickly with a vision of one world for all.

Doing this becomes easier with allies, individuals who seem to express a similar desire to question, resist, and be imaginative. Listen to the murmurs in the staff room, read between the lines of conversations, and observe. What do you notice? Might there be some individuals in your school whom you could bring together based on shared values? For an anarcho-syndicate, the shared value-based is more important than a common goal or a desire to ‘achieve something’.

We argued in our article for a willingness to start a conversation, to work with tensions rather than to try and flatten them out. This is enough fertile ground for an anarcho-syndicate to emerge. Who might those individuals in your school be? What do you think they might talk about? What do you think would be the tensions that would surface? This could already be considered the start of change, a different world, however small. The anarchist David Graeber (2004) reminds us that, in the ‘attempts to create autonomous communities in the face of power … such acts can change almost everything’ (p. 45). In sum, do not underestimate what a small community in your school can do, as long as they are willing (as well as allowing themselves) to negotiate, to self-organize, and be imaginative about the process rather than an end goal. Imagination is key here. How can we ‘weaponize’ the imagination?

Stephen, 1 May 2023

Frank, I like the provocative way in which you have articulated your initial thoughts: that Elke's and my initial article was so close to being ‘right’ that it almost isn’t ‘wrong’. And that school leadership based on an anarcho-syndicalist ethos will fail but is still necessary. There is a deconstructionist sensibility here that is attentive to the ambiguity that exists in political projects such as this. Reading your response reminds me of Gayatri Spivak, to whom I will return shortly.

I think the deconstructive sensibility of your reading, Frank, is consistent with our own approach. While our argument has a normative dimension, to make some kind of proprietorial claim to what is ‘right’ or ‘just’ on behalf of others is colonialist. To not work toward justice in the face of injustice, however, is unethical. To think and work toward social change for a better world involves, as Gaytri Spivak tells us, the persistent critique of that which one cannot want (1990: 795). This is true of justice, education, schooling, anarchism, and educative leadership.

Frank mentioned solidarity as a component of the anarcho-syndicalist ethos that is important to our conception of educative leadership. It is a concept that needs to be persistently critiqued. There are two dimensions I want to address here.

The first is the possible assumption that solidarity is a necessary good. While we have witnessed social and political movements such as Occupy, MeToo, and Black Lives Matter, at the same time we have witnessed a rise in ethno-nationalist movements that have had a significant impact on the cultural politics of public discourse and political representation. One thing this tells us is that solidarity is not a simple ‘good’ insofar as it acts as any kind of guarantee for a just vision of the world or outcome for it. This leaves us with ongoing questions about how we conceive solidarity movements and what is required for such movements to be just. As you say, Elke, imagination is key. In the spirit of critique, we might ask the question: How can solidarity within educative leadership be imagined outside the (neo)liberal frame of individualism, thereby creating an educational imaginary that is a genuine and actual alternative to the centralized and neoliberal governance of education which Frank cites as a problem?

Secondly, like Frank, I have harboured concern, both conceptual and practical, about solidarity as being able to adequately deal with the inevitable problem of diversity and disunity within the collective. But in seeing ‘total’ agreement and its inevitable failure as a problem that needs to be overcome is to think of social and political organizations (such as schools) in ideological terms. This can too often be a zero-sum game. Resisting the logics of (Marxist) revolution, state power, and capitalist accumulation, dissent and diversity is built into the anarchist position. Such a position functions with a different temporality that is not oriented toward total and permanent change, which would simply involve replacing one authoritarian structure with another. As Scott Branson writes, ‘things don’t need to last forever’ and the anarchist approach involves ‘ending, moving on, letting go, and letting be’ (2022: 26). This seems to me to also be relevant to the question of how we imagine education differently in a context of neoliberal accountability regimes. Perhaps the first step is acknowledging not the inevitable failure of educative leadership, but its affirmation that things don’t need to last forever?

Frank, 10 May 2023

Closer still to the truth, but nonetheless set to fail.

To begin with I would like to point out that it seems to me the three of us agree on the necessity of experimenting with a form of anarcho-syndicalist leadership within the school system. The question is indeed (as Elke points out) if we are bold enough to try.

For me, this leads to a fundamental question. Who is we? If we are in part me, in other words, if I were to initiate a process of creating possibilities for anarcho-syndicalist leadership, would that not retrospectively contaminate the whole process?

Let me explain. As a school principal, the teachers at my school see me as someone who holds (hierarchical) power. So, to use the David Graeber quote ‘attempts to create autonomous communities in the face of power’ will turn into ‘autonomous communities created through power’, if I were to be the initiating force. It seems to me that this is at odds with the basic principle of anarcho-syndicalism.

This actually looks like a process you (rightly) critique in your article (Chatelier and Van dermijnsbrugge, 2022) when discussing how so-called distributed leadership (or teacher leadership) is implemented in schools, not leading to a real shift in power but merely a redistribution of it, with the school management still firmly in control.

This leads to the following axiom: School leadership can create a climate for something like anarcho-syndicalist leadership to exist, but it can’t be the driving force behind it.

This is where things get messy. Now I like a mess, and I know Elke does as well, but when your core business is educating other people's children there is something to be said for not letting things get too much out of control. A group of like-minded people that find each other, share common values, and have some sense of solidarity isn’t necessarily a recipe for something good, as Steve points out. It might well be a disaster in the making. Because what is this group moving towards?

So, when Elke points out that shared values are more important than common goals I’m not quite sure if I agree. It seems to me that they are at least equally important. If shared values are the rules needed to play the game, then the goal is the reason you’re playing the game in the first place. And succeeding or failing to achieve a goal seems to me to be necessary for the ‘ending, moving on, letting go and letting be’ that Scott Branson writes about.

And since Steve has brought these writings to my attention I have come to consider them fundamental in successfully working with anarcho-syndicalist perspectives. Groups need to dissolve because if they exist long enough it is inevitable that a new hierarchy will emerge. At first, this hierarchy will probably be grounded in competence, but given long enough it might as well switch to tyranny.

The act of working with anarcho-syndicalist educative leadership in itself will not lead to any real change, it is in thinking about the act that the paradigm shift will (hopefully) occur (Don’t act, just think – Žižek, 2012) but to think about it properly you need to experiment with it, otherwise, you’ll get caught in an endless loop of hypothesizing. And when I write about change I mean something akin to shedding skin. We keep all the good stuff and lose some of the bad stuff, or to quote Iggy Pop (2022) in a concert in Utrecht, the Netherlands: ‘I used to be young, poor and dirty. Now I’m just dirty’.

It is only after we shed our old skin that we can be reborn in something new. So indeed Steve, we agree, things don’t need to last forever. As a matter of fact, they shouldn’t last forever.

Stephen and Elke, 18 May 2023

You raise a number of important questions and problems, Frank. We wish to address two related issues here: goals and change. You appear to be driven by a desire for change and see the setting of goals as a necessary condition for this. Change (and ‘innovation’) is the credo of the current moment and is strongly connected to the still prevailing idea that progress (growth) is better than stagnation or de-growth. This results in a very goals-oriented climate, which is also tangible in schools: we have goal setting, KPIs, learning outcomes, etc. all of which point towards a constant change in an attempt to achieve ever-shifting goals.

The underlying principles of an anarcho-syndicate (negotiation, solidarity, provisionality, etc.) speak against a goal-oriented approach. The magic lies in the process, which should involve thinking as well as acting. While not an anarchist herself, ³ Hannah Arendt described this process well in her work on the vita activa. Arendt (1998) refers to Aristotle's notion of ‘energia’ which are ‘all activities that do not pursue an end’ (p. 206), but are ‘sheer actuality’ (p. 207) or a ‘concern to live well’ (p. 207). She goes on to note that there is an urgent need for action as well as thought to be equally present in the vita activa, as there is often over-emphasis on thought because of a frustration with the unpredictability, irreversibility, and anonymity of action (Arendt, 1998: 220). Action, without proper connection to thinking, therefore, is reduced to the mere ‘execution of orders’ (Arendt, 1998: 223), an issue that underpins the goals-oriented and progress-focused discourse that is part and parcel of life in the current moment. It is difficult to avoid instrumentalist approaches to social change if our work is aimed at achieving specific goals or outcomes. In practice, it is difficult to not have general aims, but it may be possible to move away from a culture of specific outcomes-driven leadership and education more generally.

Principles and values are important as they guide our ‘sheer actuality’ and allow us to shed skin, to begin anew, to reinvent ourselves as a collective. In practice, this is hard work as we are defined by our roles (job descriptions) and the profile we have created for ourselves or that others have created for us. Frank, your colleagues see you as the school principal, but you also see yourself in that role. This can be a limitation because of the assumptions – the values and principles – that guide what you and your colleagues understand a leader to be. The question, then, is how can your place in the school be imagined otherwise?

Jon Savage, as quoted by Beer (2014), describes a process of ‘deliberate unlearning’ (p. 25). While this may appear to be a goal, the end result of the unlearning remains open. Being comfortable with the unlearning of what is familiar, stepping away from roles, and seeking boundary-crossing interactions help us to move beyond our limitations (and the limitations of ‘the system’) and to engage with alternative ideas and practices.

If the focus is on values, principles, and the process of (un)learning and becoming, does all of this need to be ‘pure’? Could it be that an individual instigates an anarcho-syndicate? Of course, there is a risk when a defined leader with certain positional and perhaps charismatic power does this, but if the instigation is also an invitation, how much difference does this make? Maybe no one responds to the call? Maybe one or more do respond, out of deference to the principal? But if the values and principles of the anarcho-syndicate act as a guide, and involvement remains optional without any threat of recourse, then the unlearning of positional power will happen over time. And, yes, part of this unlearning and relearning will emerge from the breaking down of the role distinctions between leader, teacher, janitor, etc.

All of this brings us back to educative leadership: As an educative leader you create a climate that allows for negotiation, thought, and action, not simply the execution of orders. Groups will start to feel licensed to self-organize and negotiate their work. And no, things don’t need to last forever: individuals will come and go. Groups will evolve, disappear, and pop up again. What matters is the ‘sheer actuality’ of and in schools which are ‘spaces of human interaction with education at their core’ (Chatelier and Van dermijnsbrugge, 2022: 6).

Frank, 7 June 2023

Ok, one of my concerns was that initiating the forming of anarcho-syndicalist groups within the school as the formal school leader might corrupt the basic principle of anarchism as a force that evolves somewhat spontaneously often in resistance to formal hierarchy and not because of it.

However, you point out, and justly so, that ‘if the instigation is more of an invitation’ the whole process seems less contaminated by the hierarchical structure of formal leadership.

Besides being a formal leader some might view me as somewhat charismatic. So even if I succeed in tackling some of the assumptions that my colleagues have concerning my role as the formal leader, I fear that if I were to actively participate in the anarcho-syndicalist endeavour (as a member of the group that has formed) some might still view me as the informal leader. My conclusion therefore is that, as a leader, I can initiate, but not participate in the anarcho-syndicalist process. At least not in its early stages.

Then, concerning the subject of goals … It seems to me that there is a danger of getting caught up in semantics as we address this issue. We all agree that it is the process of working in anarcho-syndicalist groups that defines its true meaning. The freedom to self-organize and determine, as a group, a set of values and principles from which action is taken in whatever direction is fundamental for the ‘success’ of anarcho-syndicalist group formation. But for this process to take place there needs to be a reason for the group to come together. This can be a certain viewpoint or maybe a concern a group of teachers have. While grappling with these viewpoints or concerns (or whatever) the group will eventually formulate some kind of goal to work towards in order to address the issue that made them come together in the first place.

As I stated in some of my previous writings, if playing the game (the process) is what is of real value, then teachers (or students or janitors or whoever) first need some incentive to start playing the game (the goal) (Locke and Latham, 2006).

And when I write about goals I don’t necessarily mean the data-driven goals that can be measured and analysed (from a piece of paper) that seem to be prioritized in today's educational landscape, I mean goals that might have uncertain outcomes, that lead to messy truths. It might even be goals that are unattainable from the start.

And that's what I mean when I write that this whole endeavour is necessary but also set to fail. Teachers in my school see themselves as educators but not as educational leaders. Working in anarcho-syndicalist groups will seem and feel odd to them. And if they do manage to organize themselves this way (maybe after being invited to do so) things will most likely derail rather quickly. Our first attempts at things are in many cases our worst.

I immediately concede that this might not be the case in every school, but I know my teachers, in all the beautiful variety that they represent. I know the strengths of my team and also its weaknesses. And that is exactly the reason why I would wish for them to experiment with and ‘fail’ as an anarcho-syndicalist group. But their failure isn’t a failure, because their goal was not the goal. The goal was the process. Indeed, process and failure lie at the heart of anarchist thinking, which ‘includes within it an expectation of failure and acknowledgment, and attempts to try better. But our failure is also part of our refusal to give ourselves to a system out to kill us all. It's not perfect, there's no end goal, but it can lead to releasing us from unnecessary feelings of duty to abstract ideas of nation or identity, while strengthening our bonds to the people and the world around us’ (Branson, 2022: 24). Anarchism does indeed provide outcomes. Sometimes failure is one of them. And this failure might produce many good things.

In constructing this process for my staff I don’t have the answers either. I’ll be learning with and from the group which in turn will probably make me a better leader.

Thinking about the act, will lead to the act, and whilst acting you must think about how to proceed with the act. All three of us seem to be in agreement here (as are Arendt and Žižek although they formulate this in different ways).

I have however one fear, which concerns me constantly. I’m being a bit of a nihilist here, so I hope you will forgive me, but there is one thing that our species is quite good at and that's letting itself down. We never really seem to be that which we can be.

I fear that some of my teachers will fail to recognize the chance offered to them. To self-organize, to take control, to experience a certain kind of freedom. What if they have no desire to be free. To be free is to take responsibility. For many, certain kinds of responsibility are a burden too great to bear.

Nietzsche was quite right when he stated that ‘he who has a why to live, can bear almost any how’ (1889/1930). This means that if people are to take responsibility they need to be instilled with meaning first. They need to have a why. Why should they voluntarily lift a load?

It's much easier if I just decide for them. And there is a genuine argument to be made for that statement. Life is complicated enough as it is. And even for teachers working might just be something they do until the weekend starts.

Now I don’t want to believe that, and I see a level of commitment in a lot of my teachers that might even point to the contrary. But I can’t completely dismiss it as untrue either.

And if I am to give meaning to this process won’t that just make me the leader again? I guess there's only one way to find out.

Stephen and Elke, 20 June 23

The matter of leadership in anarcho-syndicates is undoubtedly a difficult one. In our more unreflective moments, often accompanied with frustration about the way things are, we find ourselves thinking of anarchism in the same way you have described it, Frank – as a resistance to formal hierarchy. This fits very nicely with the popular imagination of anarchism as a chaotic, disordered, and informal ideology. But these words of yours – ‘resistance to formal hierarchy’ – leaped out at us, causing us to wonder if we have been too strong in saying this ourselves, or at least implying it. On the one hand, we want to advocate for anarchist practices as acts of resistance and, often, this will probably involve formal hierarchies. However, this is not the same thing as saying that all formal hierarchies are to be resisted all the time.

We tend to overlook the fact that the well-known symbol for anarchism, the letter ‘A’ with a circle drawn around it, represents the phrase ‘Anarchism is order’, first uttered by famous anarchist Pierre-Joseph Proudhon (Shantz, 2005). Proudhon emphasized that anarchists, because of their self-organized and participatory approach, created ‘the very possibility for creative and peaceful human relations’ (Shantz, 2005: n.p.) to emerge.

We like the way political theorist, Alex Prichard, puts it when he says that anarchism is ‘a political philosophy that is predicated on the denial of any final point of authority’ (Morteza, 2023: n.p.). In this view, anarchism is not necessarily opposed to hierarchy, authority, or leadership. However, insofar as these matters are established in an arbitrary manner, or become established to the point of seeming permanence, they are a problem. Prichard continues, ‘anarchists are not anti-authority, anarchists are not anti-hierarchy … they are quite happy with all of those things, as long as they have a direct say in their exercise … [if] a hierarchy performs a function that is valuable to that community and if it's consensual and it's changeable and so on then there's really nothing wrong with it’ (Morteza, 2023: n.p.). Leaders in anarcho-syndicates are so because the community supports them as such. They are not the final point of authority, and their position is always open to question and changeable.

Given this, when you say, Frank, you have reached the conclusion that, as a leader, you may initiate but not participate in the anarcho-syndicalist process, we find ourselves thinking about the very reason why this dialogue is being attempted: because we are wanting to wrestle with the reality of engaging in anarchist practices within educational spaces, especially as a way of putting educative leadership into practice, because there is a real need for ‘creative and peaceful human relations’ and schools are some of the important places where this needs to be made possible.

We acknowledge that moving outside the dominant ways of imagining education, leadership, authority, and social organization is difficult. We also acknowledge that moving outside the dominant ways of imagining anarchism is difficult, hence why we are drawn to the notion of educative leadership as an expression of anarcho-syndicalist principles. Yet, in talking this through with you, we also feel hopeful. We are encouraged to further think about the (im)possibilities of educative leadership and anarcho-syndicalism, with others, to never reach a final point and always re-imagine ourselves.