1 Introduction: School Leadership and Its Context -- 2 Understanding Distributed Leadership Practices in the Cultural Context of Singapore Schools -- 3 Leading and Managing Schools in Indonesia: Historical, Political and Socio-cultural Forces -- 4 Changing Practices of School Leadership in Taiwan: Evolving Education Reforms -- 5 System-Wide Educational Reform Agenda in Shanghai Supporting Leadership for Learning -- 6 Leadership for Teacher Professional Learning: A Case Study of Two 'New-High-Quality' Primary Schools in Shanghai -- 7 Vulnerability as a Gear for School Reform: A Case of Mr Toshiaki Ose -- 8 School Leaders in the Midst of Reforms: Crisis and Catharsis in the Philippine Education System -- 9 Leadership for Instructional Uncertainty Management: Revisiting School Leadership in South Korea's Context of Educational Reform -- 10 National Policies, Education Reforms and Leadership Training and Development: Towards Building a Critical Force of Scholar Leaders in Malaysia -- 11 Conclusion.

This book casts a refreshingly new light on current literature on school leadership, which has predominantly been viewed through Western lenses. Accordingly, key concepts and theories on leadership and school leadership have primarily been generated from thinking and research in the Western sphere. This is problematic, considering the fact that the leadership concept or construct, and its practices, are significantly influenced and shaped by contexts, and even situations. However, there are various contextual conditions and forces that can separately or collectively affect how school leadership is understood and practiced, including social, cultural, historical, geographical, economic and political conditions. In response, the book seeks to provide readers a better awareness of how the leadership construct or phenomenon is shaped by the varying contexts constantly affecting school leadership, while specifically focusing on the Asia Pacific region. In turn, it highlights various Asia Pacific contexts that shape school leadership, so as to ‘speak back’ to existing theories on school leadership.