School governance in 50 years of Portuguese democracy: a diachronic analysis

Abstract

In the year in which Portugal celebrates half a century of achieving political democracy, reflections on this issue in the context of school organizations deserve to be highlighted, considering the privileged space of the school, which can and should be used to exercise democratic practices. The aim of this article is to examine the political-normative framework for the administration and management of Portuguese public schools from 1974 onwards, characterizing the context facing democratic school management today. The analysis developed makes it possible to understand that the school seems to be increasingly heteronomous, contrary to the discourse of autonomy that has been proclaimed for some time and constantly reinforced in the legislation created over the last few decades to regulate the management and administration of school organizations. In the current school government, collegiality has been replaced by one-man governance, which assumes the presuppositions of New Public Management, serving to respond to demands for efficiency and effectiveness in public services, extolling the image of the Principal as a manager, reducing the complexity and challenges of the school to trivial management and administration difficulties and, finally, leaving little room for democracy within it.