This discussion focuses on the intersection of two dissonant concepts of importance in today's educational scene—democracy and accountability. In this article, we describe how these conflicting ideologies might be resolved, theoretically and practically, through democratically accountable leadership—that is, the dual necessity of educational leaders to successfully function as change agents working for social justice. Understanding how educational leaders conceive of these phenomena is an important starting place toward preparing future educational leaders to deal more effectively with them. Hence, we investigated the idea of rethinking accountability around democratic principles and incorporating it into leadership preparation. Specifically, we present results from a study involving doctoral students (i.e., educational leaders) who were asked to link the principles of democracy and accountability to the application of social justice. As such, the article contains suggestions for implementing democratically accountable leadership into practice.
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