"The Aesthetic Dimensions of Educational Administration and Leadership "provides an aesthetic critique of educational administration and leadership. It demonstrates the importance of aesthetics on all aspects of the administrative and leadership world: the ways ideas and ideals are created, how their expression is conveyed, the impact they have on interpersonal relationships and the organizational environment that carries and reinforces them, and the moral boundaries or limits that can be established or exceeded.
The book is divided into three sections.
- Section I examines various philosophical traditions in aesthetics as they inform administrative life, focussing on major modern traditions arising from Kant, romanticism and Nietzsche, Collingwood, the pragmatic school, and critical theory.
- Section II explores four aesthetic sources for administrative critique - architecture, literature, film, and movement - as they serve both to understand the social construction of administration and leadership and provide a critique of values, roles, power and authority.
- Section III examines more topical and applied problems of charisma, heroism, and authority in practice, concluding with a discussion of the aesthetic analysis of politics and power within the context of contemporary educational administration and leadership theory.
While presenting a significant departure from conventional studies in the field, the international contributors reflect a continuity of thought on the creation, use and abuse of administrative and leadership authority from the writings of Plato through to contemporary theory. This book should appeal to school administrators and leaders and thoseaspiring to these roles.

Eugenie A. Samier is a Senior Lecturer and coordinator of the EdD program at the British University in Dubai, and an Honorary Lecturer at the University of Birmingham. She is also editor of Ethical Foundations for Educational Administration and principal editor of Aesthetic Dimensions of Educational Administration and Leadership. Her research interests are in administrative and leadership philosophy and theory, particularly in ethics and aesthetic critiques.

Richard Bates is at the Deakin University, School of Social & Cultural Studies in Education in Australia.

Introduction: Foundations and History of the Social Aesthetic. Part One: Philosophical Foundations. Imagination, Taste, the Sublime, and Genius in Administration: A Kantian Critique of Organisational Aesthetics. The Art and Legacy of the Romantic Tradition: Implications for Power, Self--Determination and Education. Collingwood on Imagination, Expression and Action: Advancing an Aesthetically Critical Study of Educational Administration. The Metaphysical Sources of Pragmatic Aesthetic Leadership. On the Contribution of Critical Theory to Educational Administration and Leadership: Aesthetic Experience as Resistance to the 'Iron Cage' of Dominative Administrative Rationality. Part Two: Aesthetic Sources for Administration and Leadership. Aesthetic Leadership: Leaders as Architects. The Victorian Hangover: A Lively Discussion of Colourful Headmasters in the works of Mr. Dickens and Ms. Brontë. A Narrative Looking Glass for Leadership Studies in Organization: Cinema and Literature as Source and Reflective Medium. Living Aesthetically and the Poetics of Dailiness for Leadership. Part Three: Critical Applications to Administration and Leadership. The Aesthetics of Charisma: Architectural, Theatrical, and Literary Dimensions. Aesthetics and Art and their Place in the Theory and Practice of Leadership in Education. Aesthetics, Heroism and the Cult of 'the Leader'. Towards an Aesthetics for Educational Administration. Notes on Contributors. Name Index. Subject Index