Conceptualising middle leadership within the South African schools' context: A semi-systematic review

Michael Moreti Mahome^*Letuma Calvin Motsekiso

• University of the Free State, Bloemfontein, South Africa

Globally, there is currently no shared or decided upon definition of middle leadership, and South Africa is no exception. This study aimed to identify and analyse empirical peer reviewed articles on middle leadership to understand how middle leaders are defined within the South African context and propose an operational definition. The search was restricted to South African full-text literatures in English published in the last 20 years, 2004-2024. To minimise selection bias, consistent inclusion and exclusion criteria was applied following the Spar-4-SLR protocol, that resulted in a total of 10 articles included for review. A semi-systematic review was steered using Google Scholar, ERIC, and DAOJ. Thematic analysis was employed to analyse the identified articles, incorporating NVivo15. Consequently, the following three findings emerged that are presented as themes: 1) middle leadership is conceptualised through various lenses characterised by certain similarities and connections; 2) middle leaders operate as school managers and classroom teachers; and 3) the enactment of middle leadership include teaching and learning managers, curriculum managers, and monitoring and controlling of teachers' work. The study demystifies the confusion of the position, albeit being clearly defined within the South African education policy documents. Presents an operational definition suitable for the South African context and calls for more South African studies in this field for the realisation of a consensus definition of middle leadership as a distinct theoretical lens.