The Postmodern Turn in Educational Leadership: From Managerialism to Reflexive Praxis

Abstract

Contemporary educational leadership remains largely trapped within the logic of managerialism an ideology that privileges efficiency, control, and performativity over meaning, ethics, and reflection. This article argues that the postmodern turn represents a necessary epistemological and moral shift away from technocratic rationality toward a reflexive praxis of leadership. Drawing on postmodern thinkers such as Lyotard, Foucault, Derrida, and Bauman, this conceptual interpretive study deconstructs the dominant managerial discourse that has colonized educational institutions. Using hermeneutic and deconstructive analysis, the paper explores how power or knowledge relations shape leadership practices and how reflexivity can reorient leaders toward dialogical, ethical, and context-sensitive action. The proposed model of reflexive praxis leadership integrates critical awareness, ethical responsibility, and continuous self-reflection as core dimensions of educational leadership in liquid modernity. Rather than seeking certainty and control, postmodern leadership embraces ambiguity, multiplicity, and the moral imperative to “lead with consciousness.” This paradigm shift redefines educational leadership not as administrative management but as an ongoing act of meaning-making and ethical engagement with others. The study concludes that a postmodern approach offers a transformative framework for rehumanizing educational institutions and cultivating leadership as a practice of critical consciousness and moral imagination.