NB Papers P950, 951, 953, 954, 955, 956 should be considered together, for scheduling consecutively. For more than two decades the understanding of school governance and management has developed from a technical, rationalistic one to a neo-rationalistic one. Governing and managing in the early years was supposed to follow from what was stated in laws and regulations. Central concepts are now objectives, assessment and outcomes. Rather than regulating behaviour in detail the tendency is to reduce national curricula to a minimum and give greater responsibility to directors of local education authorities, to heads and to teachers as professionals. To secure the outcome we have hade an explosively increased interest in quality programs etc. Analysing policy documents and contemporary theories of educational government and school leadership in Sweden I find that the emphasis on communication, dialogue and adherence to objectives is neither in accordance with technical or neo-rationalistic understanding of schools, their leadership and governance. The technical one being a fairly simple model of top - down relationships. The neo-rationalistic one, although it claims mediating variables between policy declarations, regulative decisions and expected outcomes does not recognize the social and constructive character of leadership as it is negotiated inside and outside school. Understanding school as a predominantly verbal and communicative institution makes successful negotiations on different levels a prerequisite. The rationality then being communicative rather than technical or neo-rationalistic.