This paper examines and compares the recent emphases in school education and school leadership training in Australia and the state of Tasmania as they relate to the democratic purposes of schools. It finds a strong emphasis on the democratic purposes of schools and congruence between these purposes and the means of achieving them, in respect of school principal training at the national but not state level. This finding raises a major issue in respect of the ongoing pervasiveness of educational bureaucracies and whether they continue to be the best means of delivering educational outcomes (including principal training) in, and for, a democratic and increasingly knowledge society. (Contains 4 notes.)