Educational Governance in Algeria as an Arena of Struggle: A Sociological Analysis of the Role of Teachers' Unions in Confronting Executive Decree 25-54

Abstract

This paper departs from the problematic that educational governance in Algeria cannot be reduced to a neutral technical tool for sector management. Instead, in light of the trajectory that produced Executive Decree 25-54, it manifests as a dynamic arena of struggle where the exercise of power and strategies of resistance between the Ministry of National Education and teachers' unions interact. The study aims to analyze the contentious role played by these unions, not merely as pressure groups defending material interests, but as symbolic actors seeking to redefine the terms of governance and their position within the educational "field." Drawing on conflict theory as formulated by Ralf Dahrendorf (power and resistance), Pierre Bourdieu (field and symbolic capital), and Lewis Coser (functions of social conflict), the paper adopts a qualitative-interpretive methodology based on documentary analysis of the decree, union statements, and media declarations. The study covers the period from May 2, 2021 (the date of presidential instructions to amend the law) to March 3, 2025 (the suspension of the protest movement). The findings reveal that the conflict did not arise solely from the content of the law but from the procedural path of its preparation, which was described as "exclusion" and a "flawed methodology" that betrayed a "symbolic pact" made by the highest authority in the state. In response to this exclusion, the unions produced a multifaceted "overt resistance," ranging from a technical-negotiating discourse to a mobilizing-threatening one, seeking not only to amend the law but also to impose recognition of themselves as essential partners in governance. The paper concludes that educational governance in Algeria is not a state of equilibrium but a permanent process of conflict, and that ignoring the dynamics of power and recognition empties any reform of its substance. The paper contributes theoretically by proposing the concepts of the "symbolic pact" and its "betrayal" as explanatory mechanisms for the outbreak of conflicts in charismatic bureaucracies.