The relationship between teachers’ and principals’ decision-making power: is it a win-win situation or a zero-sum game? JIANPING SHEN and JIANGANG XIA Is the power relationship between public school teachers and principals a win-win situa- tion or a zero-sum game? By applying hierarchical linear modeling to the 1999–2000 nationally representative Schools and Staffing Survey data, we found that both the win- win and zero-sum-game theories had empirical evidence. The decision-making areas characterized by the win-win theory are much more than those characterized by the zero-sum-game theory. The practice of win-win is more prevalent at the elementary than at the secondary level. Whether it is win-win or zero-sum depends on the decision-mak- ing areas and the school level. Theoretical and practical implications of the findings are discussed. In the literature of leadership and policy in general, and educational leadership and policy in particular, there are various arguments regard- ing ‘Is the amount of power a fixed pie or an expandable pie?’ or to put it in another way, ‘Is the power relationship between or among actors a zero-sum game or win-win situation?’ The metaphor of a fixed power pie assumes the zero-sum-game theory—with one party gaining more power, the other party or parties necessarily losing power. The metaphor of an expandable power pie points to the win-win situation theory—with actors gaining the amount of power simultaneously. As the literature review will indicate, there are substantial advocacies for both theories. However, the theories of zero-sum game and win-win situation are primarily proposed as theoretical hypotheses, and direct testing of the validity is very limited. In the current study, we test the validity of the two theories by applying hierarchical linear modelling (HLM) to the 1999–2000 nationally representative Schools and Staffing Survey 1 (SASS) data, and capitalizing on the nested nature of the decision-making power between teachers and principals. Jianping Shen is the John E. Sandberg Professor of Education in the Department of Educational Leadership, Research and Technology at Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo, MI 49008, USA. Email: shen@wmich.edu. He has published extensively on educational leadership and policy. Jiangang Xia is a PhD candidate in the Department of Educational Leadership, Research and Technology at Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo, MI 49008, USA. Email: jiangang.xia@wmich.edu. INT. J. LEADERSHIP IN EDUCATION, APRIL–JUNE 2012, VOL. 15, NO. 2, 153–174 International Journal of Leadership in Education ISSN 1360–3124 print/ISSN 1464–5092 online Ó 2012 Taylor & Francis http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13603124.2011.624643