Educational leaders (principals, superintendents, ministry officials) have a double role: on the one hand, they are obliged to fulfill a state educational mandate. They are therefore required to develop schools and the education system continuously. On the other hand, they are bound by the existing law (Hugo, 2025). Educational leaders are particularly challenged by the resulting tension between pedagogy and law. 

In a narrower sense, law or school law refers to all relevant regulations that are set specifically for schools (Avenarius, 2019). Relevant school law regulations can be classified into a hierarchy of norms (Kelsen, 1960/2020): From the constitutional level to the legislative (e.g., school laws) and ordinance level (e.g., school ordinances) to statutes. School law in a broader sense includes a large number of regulations that were not enacted specifically for schools, but which affect schools, such as general constitutional law (e.g. the fundamental rights of pupils or school staff), administrative law (e.g. recruitment regulations), criminal law (e.g. in the case of delinquent pupils), and so on. The sheer volume of these regulations repeatedly leads to legal uncertainty among educational leaders (Findlay, 2007; Butlin & Trimmer, 2018). 

Accordingly, the inadequate legal literacy of educational leaders is repeatedly criticized (Decker, 2014). Legal literacy refers to „understanding, skills, and values that enable practitioners to connect relevant legal rules with their professional practice, to appreciate the roles and duties of other practitioners, and to communicate effectively across [organizational] boundaries.” (Preston-Shoot & McKimm, 2013). 

However, legal literacy is a central prerequisite for educational leaders to make professional pedagogical decisions regarding the well-being of children and young people without overstepping legal boundaries on the one hand or leaving legal discretion, judgment, and scope for action unused on the other (Gilbert, 2017).   

The fact that educational leaders do not have sufficient knowledge and literacy raises the question of how these leaders deal with the tension between school development and pedagogical mandate on the one hand and formal legal requirements on the other, as outlined above. There has been no empirical research on this to date (Reuter, 2018).  

The paper addresses this desideratum with a focus on school principals and asks:  

What strategies do school principals use to deal with the tension between pedagogy and law? 

Since this is an explorative study, a group interview was conducted, which is suitable for generating further hypotheses (Merton et al., 1990). As authority over educational issues in Germany lies with the respective federal states, two federal states are examined: Hamburg as a city-state and North Rhine-Westphalia as a territorial state. First, an interview guideline was developed that matched the research question. It included open opening and closing questions to record any experiences that were not covered by the guide but were relevant to the participants. The guideline followed three sections: the tension between pedagogy and law, legal limits, and legal leeway. The school principals were asked about their perception of the tension, about specific cases in which they received law either as a limitation or as a facilitation, and finally how they dealt with it in each case. One interview per federal state (number of participants: nNW = 5; nHH = 3) was conducted by two previously trained research assistants. The group participants were selected along three criteria: the principals had to belong, firstly, to the same federal state, secondly, to an award-winning school as representative of° innovative school development, and thirdly, to public, not private schools. These criteria are based on the assumption that – in contrast to non-award-winning schools – these principals may have developed a variety of strategies for dealing with the tension between pedagogy and law on their way to the school award. Both interviews were recorded with an audio device, transcribed, and pseudonymized in accordance with data protection regulations. This led to a total of 168 minutes of audio transcription (durationi1 = 102 min.; durationi2 = 66 min.). The material was analyzed in three steps using qualitative content analysis (Mayring, 2022): In the first step, the sections of the guideline were deductively applied to the transcripts. In the second step, these categories were differentiated inductively. In the third step, the categories found were checked regarding disjunctivity and discreteness. If necessary, the categories were summarized and reorganized. The final code system was documented in a coding manual. The entire material was then completely double-coded by a second researcher using the coding manual (inter-rater reliability: 97.8% agreement, Krippendorff's alpha: 0.904; limit values according to Krippendorff, 2019).

The study resulted in 405 codings across the federal states. 39 relate to the perception of the tension pedagogy–law, 110 to examples of legal boundaries, 86 to cases of legal leeway, and 157 to strategies for dealing with the tension and/or the cases. In line with the research question, the focus lies on strategies: These can be traced back to four different resources: law, the principal's leadership role be it because orientation/security is found in the law; be it because they are aware of legal leeway/scope, consciously use it, or seek it to realize pedagogical goals. These legal strategies are supplemented by procedures that principals choose because of their leadership role (n=46). The participants report acting pragmatically, “just doing it”, “playing dumb” or “playing it cool”. In addition to pragmatism, they emphasize the need to build up a leadership culture with a vision for which the principals themselves are role models. Another set of strategies relates to communication (n = 34) with all those involved. This means not only parents, pupils, and teachers, but also superiors – although a few voices emphasize that it is sometimes necessary to exclude them. Finally, external resources (n = 13) were used, e.g. scientific findings, legal advice or third-party funds for financial freedom. The results illustrate how important legal literacy is for principals. If they are aware of the legal regulations, leeway, and gray areas, they can use this knowledge to enforce educational decisions – even against the guidelines or superiors. However, legal knowledge alone is not enough: other skills are also required. Although the participants came from award-winning schools, the results show that it is possible to train school leaders legally. This, however, seems to currently depend on the principal's initiative.

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