Labour Semi-autonomy of the Russian Teachers in a Bureaucratically Cumbersome School

Abstract

The Russian education system, including school education, is currently undergoing managerialization, and the teaching profession is becoming more and more bureaucratized. According to several social researchers, such institutional forces either impede the professionalization of the Russian teachers or contribute to their deprofessionalization, which is manifested in the loss of labor autonomy by schoolteachers. The author of this study tests this thesis based on the experience of a four-year participant observation conducted in two educational institutions of the Central Federal District of the Russian Federation, as well as on the materials of nine semi-structured interviews with the teachers. Analysis of the collected data shows that although the existing institutional environment does indeed limit the scope of teachers’ autonomy, through its elements they protect themselves from pressure of the students’ parents. In addition, the teachers deal with institutional rules in a ceremonial way, «decoupling» them from their real activities, and thereby providing themselves with an opportunity to act in the educational field in accordance with their own professional beliefs.