Speaking at a school in south London, the Prime Minister said he wanted to empower parents to get involved with their children's education.
If enough parents in an area are dissatisfied with the choice of schools, local authorities will be forced to provide alternatives.
This could mean new school federations, which is when the governing bodies of two or more schools merge, additional places at top performing schools, and entirely new schools in some cases.
Schools will also be required to make it easier for parents to track their child's education. By 2010 all secondary schools will use online reporting to talk to parents about a range of issues. The same will happen in primaries from 2012.
By September 2010 all secondary school pupils will have a personal tutor, Brown pledged.
The Prime Minister also announced plans to expand initiatives to encourage schools to work together.
He said many more schools should work in federations and chains, or be led by executive heads. Chains of schools are groups of schools run by one organisation and executive heads are school leaders who run more than one school.
The plans will be set out in full next month when Children's Secretary Ed Balls publishes the government's 21st Century Schools white paper.
Other measures will include a move to give schools more control over their improvement targets and a guaranteed entitlement to professional development for teachers.
Brown also announced plans to introduce a new primary school improvement strategy before the summer. This could equate to a National Challenge for primary schools, focusing on persistently poor performing schools.
Christine Blower, general secretary of the National Union of Teachers, said Brown's parent power proposals were unnecessary.
She said: "This initiative for parents is simply another piece of populist spin."
