Inclusive education leadership in non-western contexts : towards developing a new "heuristic" inclusive education leadership framework

Inclusive education is universally accepted as a useful policy to promote the learning of all students in one classroom. While actual teaching practices are pivotal to achieving the goal of having all students study in one classroom regardless of any difficulties and differences they may have, the 'change agents' in schools are leaders who are expected to lead the process. Over the years, there has been discussion on the contributions of school leaders towards the successful practice of inclusive education. However, efforts towards the implementation of inclusive education in especially developing countries have stalled. Indeed, the process towards practicing inclusive education has been led by developed countries that have provided resources and a 'policy blueprint' for developing countries. In this chapter, the authors demonstrate how 'Western leadership' frameworks are unworkable in developing countries and recommend an alternative framework for training inclusive leaders.