Statutory Curtailment of School Autonomy: Recent Movements on the Centralization-Decentralization Continuum in South African Education

The South African education system has been perceived as a decentralised and democratized education system and the National Development Plan proposes that greater management autonomy should be granted to public school principals by recommending that principals should gradually be given more powers as the quality of their leadership improves. This paper however, argues that contrary to the objectives of the National Development Plan, recent and current amendments to legislation is indicative that the government is moving in the opposite direction and that school governance and management autonomy is being curtailed. This is evident through an analysis of the effect of relevant sections of the Education Laws Amendment Act 31 of 2007 and the draft Basic Education Laws Amendment Bill (2017).