THEORIES OF EDUCATIONAL

ADMINISTARTION
TWO BASIC THEORIES

1. Autocratic Educational Administration or Totalitarian Educational

Administration

2. Democratic Educational Administration

AUTOCRATIC EDUCATIONAL ADMINISTRATION

 Autocratic educational administration is similar to centralized educational management in

that authority and control are concentrated in the hands of a single person, group, or institution.
 In centralized administration the centralization of the power.
 It implies that all the policies and programmes are planned, directed by one central
agency.
 So when the powers and responsibilities center round a particular person or group then the
term authoritarian or autocracy comes into limelight.
EXAMPLES

 Kendriya Vidyalaya Sangathan

 National Council of Educational Research and Training
 National Bal Bhawan
 National Institute of Open Schooling
 Navodaya Vidyalaya Samiti
 Central Board of Secondary Education
 National Council for Teacher Education
 Theory of educational administration emphasises the following principles

a) Centralised authority

b) Willing acceptance of authority

c) Rigid conformity to rules and regulations

d) Crushing down of individuality

THEORY OF DEMOCRATIC EDUCATIONAL ADMINISTRATION

 According to John Dewey “Democracy is more than a form of a

government “.
 Kilpatrick explains the purpose of democratic educational organisation
in these words “ Everything connected with the whole school system
centres in this one thing, the educative development of the pupils”.
 The democratic theory of educational administration strikes at a
harmonious balance between the extremities of centralised and
decentralised types of educational administration.
 This theory has led to three types of educational authorities .

(i) The public – The Federal Government and the state government

(ii)The Quasi-public – The Universities and the local bodies

(iii)The private- Institutions organised by educational trusts,

Philanthropists( person who seeks to promote the welfare of others) and Missionaries
 Four basic principle of Democratic Educational Administration

1. Principle of respect for the dignity of man

2. Principle of Equalitarianism

3. Principle of freedom

4. Principle of sharing responsibility

 THEORIES OF EDUCATIONAL ADMINISTRATION BASED ON ORGANISATIONAL
CONSIDERATIONS

 Four identifiable theories of educational administration can be seen which are, in purist terms conceptual schemes
rather than theories. In fact, these theories owe their origin to organisation of business management

1) Classical Organisation theory

2) Critical Educational Administration Theory

3) Human Relations Approach

4) Behavioural Science Approach

1. CLASSICAL ORGANISATION THEORY

Classical Organisational
Theory

Scientific Administrative
Management Management
 Major contributors to the classical organisational theory are

 (a)Scientific Management

 Fredrick Taylor

 (b)Administrative Management

 Henri Fayol

 Luther Gulick

 Max Weber
 Various names have been assigned to this theory.
 March and Simon refer to it as, Physiological theory’
 Katz calls it as ; machine theory’
 Taylor describes it as ; scientific management’
 Primarily the theory takes the machine as the model for organising human activity
and prescribes the following principles of organising enterprise activity.
 Principles of Classical Organisational Theory

1. Scalar Principle : the person at each management level communicates with only those
directly above and below them

2. Unity Of Command: It involves receiving of orders from only one person.

3. Exception Principle: It involves delegate routine tasks and deal only with exceptions

4. Span of Control: This theory is limited to number of people reporting to the superior;
number of people can be (3 to 12)
A) SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT THEORY

 Main features

 It finds out best method for performing each job

 It selects employees by using scientific selection procedure

 It believes in having close relationship with management and employees

 It uses division of labour

 It tries to produce maximum output by fixing performance standards for each job

and by having a differential rate system for each job for payment of wages
 Principles of Scientific Management

1. Scientific Job Analysis

 Job should be analysed through observation, data gathering and careful measurement and

management.

2. Selection of Personnel

 Once the job is analysed, the next step is to scientifically select, train, teach and produce workers.

Previously, workers chose their own work and trained themselves.

3. Management Supervising

 Managers assume planning, organising and decision -making activities, whereas workers perform

their jobs. In the past, almost all work and the greater part of the responsibility were thrust on
workers.

4. Performance standards

 Taylor introduced fixed performance standards for time, cost and quality of work. As a result, the

efficiency of workers could be compared.

 5. Differential wage Rate System

 Low wage rate was fixed for those workers who did not produce the standard
output.

 Higher wage rate was fixed for those workers who produced standard output or more
than the standard output
(B)ADMINISTRATIVE MANAGEMENT THEORY

 Scientific management focuses on jobs of individual workers whereas administrative management

theory concentrates on the administration of entire organisation. This theory is related to the issues of
structure of organisation and management of organisation.

 Basic Functions of Administrative Management

 Planning

 Organising

 Commanding

 Co-ordination

 Controlling
 Henry Fayol’s Principles of Management
 Division of Work - look at the current skill sets of each employee and assign them a task

 Authority- there should be a balance between authority and responsibility. If there is more authority than
responsibility, the employees will get frustrated. If there is more responsibility than authority, the manager will
feel frustrated.

 Discipline-discipline is required for any organization to run effectively.

 Unity of command- receive order from one boss only

 Unity of Direction- one head and one plan for a group of activities

 Subordination of individual interest- individual interest conflict with an organizational interest must be
subordinated to the interest of the organization

 Centralisation- concentration of power in the hands of the authority

 Order -orderly placement of resources (manpower, money, materials, etc.) in the right place at the right time

 Equity- combination of kindness and justice

 Stability of personnel- no frequent termination and transfer

2. CRITICAL EDUCATIONAL ADMINISTRATION THEORY

 Critical Educational Administration Theory assumes the existence of both objective and
subjective knowledge. So, it incorporates the methodologies of both the objective and
subjective perspectives.
 Critical theory attempts to raise peoples’ consciousness about their living
and working condition through logic and debate, but in the process, it
relies on the generation and analysis of ideologies”.
 Critical theories evaluate the values and practices within schools which
maintain the ideological perspective of schools. Topics such as
curriculum, teaching and student issues display the inherent social values
in the schooling process. (Holy 1994)
3. HUMAN RELATION APPROACH THEORY

 This theory has been derived on the basis of Hawthorne studies

conducted in America by some social scientists notable Roethlisberger
and Mayo.
ELEMENTS OF HUMAN RELATIONS APPROACH

 A focus of people
 Human relations are important in motivating people
 Motivation depends on team work
 Teams must fulfil individual and organizational objectives
 Individuals and organizations desire efficiency by achieving maximum results with
minimum inputs
 In the similar way the human relation approach made relationships
between employees and supervisors, the most silent aspect of
management.
 It advocates the training of people in behavioural sciences such as
clinical and social psychology to emphasize building collaborative and
cooperative relationships between supervisors and workers.
 The major assumptions of the Human Relations Approach include the following ideas

 Employees are motivated by social psychological needs and by economic incentives.

 These needs, including but not limited to recognition, belongingness and security are more

important in determining worker morale and productivity than the physical conditions of the
work environment.

 An individual’s perceptions, beliefs, motivations, cognition, responses to frustration, values

and similar factors may affect behaviour in the work setting.

 People in all types of organisations tend to form informal social organisations that work

along with the formal organisation and can help or hinder management.
 Informal social groups within the workplace create and enforce their own norms and
codes of behaviour. Team effort, conflict between groups, group loyalty,
communication patterns, and emergent leadership are important concepts for
determining individual and group behaviour.

 Communication, power, influence, authority, motivation, and manipulation are all

important relationships within an organisation. In this approach, field study methods
as well as laboratory experiments were used to study the work environment and to
understand the employee behaviour in the workplace.
4. BEHAVIOURAL SCIENCE APPROACH

 Chester Bernard one of the scientist talk about the Behaviour Science Approach. He is best
known for his Cooperative system, which refers to integrate into a single framework human
relations and classical management principles.

 In the year 1938 Bernard stress on two conditions of cooperation and financial success
are to be maintained.

 Abraham Maslow and Douglas McGregor other major contributors to the Behavioural

Approach
 An organization is a socio technical system

 Interpersonal or group behaviour are influenced by a wide range of factors

 Organizational goals are to be harmonized with human needs

 A multitude of attitude, perceptions and values are prevalent

 Some degree of conflict is expected

 In the year 1978 Abraham Maslow the psychologist advanced a theory of human motivation later adopted
by Managers

 Theory of Maslow was based on Motivation and he considered three view points.

(i) Human beings have needs that are never completely satisfied

(ii)Human action is aimed at fulfilling the needs that are unsatisfied.

(iii)These needs can be classified in a hierarchy from the lowest to the highest
These needs can be classified in a hierarchy from the lowest to the highest
Abraham Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs theory