The 2024 election and the rise of Trump have sparked concern on the Left over the state of democracy in the United States and the consolidation of power under the incoming administration. This widespread concern about the health and strength of American democracy may be valid, but it fails to consider targeted efforts to subvert local democracy and remove decision making power from elected officials that has been occurring for years: school takeovers. State takeovers of schools harm American democracy because they specifically target certain districts, and are used as a tool to remove power from Black elected leaders. Despite using legal paths to take over schools, these actions are antidemocratic because they further marginalize local communities and push them further from decision making centers.
State takeovers are an act committed by state governments to take control of a local school district, normally from an elected school board. Since the 1980s and the rise of the school accountability efforts, states have taken over more than 100 school districts across the country. Currently 33 states have laws that permit takeovers, so state governments use completely legal pathways to takeover schools, but the motive and results of state takeovers over the years call into question whether takeovers are as well-intentioned as they seem. According to a report by the Brookings Institute, states tend to seize control because of two reasons: “low academic performance and fiscal challenges,” but these goals are rarely achieved and sometimes existing issues are exacerbated. In an attempt to revive schools that are considered failing, state governments will take power from locally elected officials in hopes of improving student achievement and financial troubles, but other intentions underlie these decisions.
Domingo Morel, a political science professor at NYU, explores this in his book Takeover which documents the disproportionate use of state takeovers on districts with Black elected leaders. Most notably, takeovers that chose to abolish the locally elected board occurred in 33% of majority Black districts whereas only 4% in majority white ones. State takeovers are a method for state governments to consolidate power by controlling a local school system, and removing power from communities–more often Black ones. This not only strips those elected of power but removes decision making away from the communities that are impacted, threatening the essential democratic principle that Dahl lays out: Government institutions for policymaking depend on votes. Instead during state takeovers, state-wide officials who were not chosen to govern schools hold the power. The motivations behind state takeovers underscore their existing threat to American democracy as they subvert local governments and use schools as part of a larger political project. Moreover, a Brown University study found that “takeovers tend to happen in states with both a Republican governor and a Republican-controlled legislature.” The deliberate act of takeovers by Republicans-run state governments target specific communities in order to undermine their authority and political power. Morel argues that this contributes to a growing understanding that Republicans used their state power to disempower Black communities after the civil rights gains in the 1960s. The current takeovers call attention to how these same tactics are utilized on non-white districts disproportionately, and may be part of a continued effort to undermine Black political power.
Capitalizing on an emergent need to address failing schools, states strip local officials that were voted in by constituents and threaten local democracy by removing power from communities, especially non-white ones. Similar to how Levitsky and Ziblatt lay out how authoritarian leaders will seize power in times of crises as citizens are more tolerant of these actions during emergencies, state governments take similar actions and abuse their legal ability to take over districts by portraying crises in the school systems.
Providence Public Schools District was taken over by the Rhode Island State Government in 2019. Citing crumbling buildings and low functioning classrooms, the state declared that PPSD was “a broken system.” Similar framing tactics were used in Houston in 2023 and are at risk of happening in San Francisco now. Although not all of these states are Republican run, the active choice to depict schools as if in complete crisis, plays on citizens’ susceptibility to allow for democratic consolidation when an emergency is occurring.
School takeovers are not identical to national democratic erosion as state governments are also composed of elected officials and school policies are often set at the state level. Despite this, the backlash from communities affected by state takeovers and their disproportionate impact on non-white districts, regardless of academic performance, indicates that the other motives: to disempower Black leaders, are critical. Additionally, state takeovers simply do not improve achievement in districts. The lack of success in takeovers in improving student outcomes, especially those of non-white students, has been documented since their rise in the 1980s, yet they only continue to increase. Without evidence backing the success of takeovers, the motives remain questionable with clear indicators pointing to their antidemocratic goals of taking power from district officials. For example, Providence’s takeover is not supported by the city council, elected school board, nor the mayor but was recently renewed this year per recommendation by a state council with the potential to last until 2027. Community pushback from families and teachers was ignored as achievement has not improved since the takeover, yet the state remains in power regardless of what the community impacted wants.
Eroding democracies are a cause for concern around the globe, with frameworks and trends that are used to explain how politicians consolidate power. State takeovers follow some of these same patterns as school control is being utilized as a weapon by state governments in order to remove Black elected officials from power and hurt American democratic norms of representation. More attention must be paid to how democracy is eroding on all levels of government in the United States as schools and local governments are at risk too.
I was aware that elected officials were meddling in public schools, but I did not make the connection to democratic erosion until reading your blog post! It is hard to imagine any other context in which a larger layer of government can organize a hostile takeover of a smaller layer. When framed in this way, it seems like an obvious case of democratic erosion. The arguments that state governments use to justify school board takeovers are remarkably similar to those used by want-to-be authoritarians. Having said that, these arguments only exist because they can be quite convincing. Everyone wants the best schooling possible for their children, and if parents perceive the schools to be failing, they may be amenable to this kind of authoritarian takeover.
One point I was surprised not to see mentioned here was the moral policing of schools that has become a hot topic in recent years. Between anti-LGBTQIA, anti-CRT, anti-DEI, and all the anti-‘Woke’ crusades filling media headlines, I initially expected that to be an important part of your analysis. However, after reading your post, I think it was wise to avoid the culture wave shenanigans. From what I can tell, moral panics like these are often more akin to targeted harassment campaigns, rather than direct school board takeovers.
Overall, a great post analyzing democratic erosion in an unexpected area!
I really liked your decision to “look local” with your blog post, while still utilizing the frameworks we’ve discussed this semester. I learned a lot through your post, especially since this is a topic I have not read much about. I thought your point about how school takeovers remove decision-making powers from certain communities definitely connected well to principles of democracy as described by Dahl. When states strip local officials from power during perceived emergencies, this definitely goes against the democratic principle that leaders are chosen by the people. Additionally, I was interested in your analysis of how disempowerment of Black leaders in anti-democratic, since deliberately trying to limit the voice of part of the population certainly maps onto discussions of how undemocratic leaders will attempt to silence different viewpoints in the population. I’m now more curious about the implications of these school takeovers, specifically regarding changes to school curriculums and structures. Are state-controlled schools more likely to have more limited discussions on certain topics in classrooms, or shifted priorities? What does this state-controlled school look like, and how is this specifically anti-democratic?
Also, I’m curious about if there was any notable pushback to school takeovers, and what this looked like. Were people on the local level calling out the state for trying to take power away from local leaders, specifically belonging to marginalized communities?
Great job delving into this topic through a more local perspective!
I enjoyed the way in which this article bridged democratic institutions and theory to an analysis of specific social policies. My understanding of your thesis is that school takeovers are undemocratic because they undermine local control over education. I am curious if you believe that on a procedural or institutional level, local control over education is necessarily preferable to state or national control because it allows for greater community control. Alternatively, are there certain circumstances in which local control is better and others in which centralization is preferable? If so, how do we craft a theory that differentiates whether local, state, or national control is best in different circumstances? Specifically, I am thinking about how federal control over education has historically been important to promoting civil rights and desegregation; opponents of desegregation often appealed to ideas of local control in order to oppose federal intervention. Similarly, the federal government conditions funding of schools (both K-12 schools and colleges) on them adhering to certain civil rights requirements, such as Title IX. If schools were willing to meet such requirements on their own, then these laws would be superfluous. But perhaps there is something about takeovers that are uniquely problematic in the way in which they take away community decision-making, as opposed to merely setting particular rules that schools must follow.