Education: the role of education in society Flashcards
The functionalist perspective on education: info
Functionalism is based on the view that society is system of interdependent parts held together by a shared culture or value consensus- an agreement among society’s members about what values are important. Each part of society, such as the family, economy or education system, performs functions that help to maintain society as a whole.
The functionalist perspective on education- Durkheim: Solidarity and skills
Durkheim identified 2 main functions of education:
-Creating social solidarity
- Teaching specialist skills.
The functionalist perspective on education- Durkheim: Solidarity and skills
(1. Social solidarity)
Durkheim argues that society needs a sense of solidarity; its individual members must feel themselves to be part of a single ‘body’ or community. He argues that without social solidarity, social life and cooperation would be impossible because each individual would pursue their own selfish desires.
The education system helps to create social solidarity by transmitting society’s culture- its shared beliefs and values- from one generation to the next. For example, Durkheim argues that the teaching of a country’s history instils in children a sense of shared heritage and a commitment to the wider social group.
School also acts as a ‘society in miniature’, preparing us for life in wider society. For example, both in school and at work we have to cooperate with people who are neither family not friends- teachers and pupils at school, colleagues and customers at work. Similarly, both in school and at work we have to interact with others according to a set of impersonal rules that apply to everyone.
The functionalist perspective on education- Durkheim: Solidarity and skills
(2. Specialist skills)
Modern industrial economies have a complex division of labour, where the production of even a single item usually involves the cooperation of many different specialists. This cooperation promotes social solidarity but, for it to be successful, each person must have the necessary specialist knowledge and skills to perform their role. Durkheim argues that education teaches individuals the specialist knowledge and skills that they need to play their part in the social division of labour.
The functionalist perspective on education- Parsons: meritocracy
Parsons draws on many of Durkheim’s ideas. Parsons sees the school as the ‘focal socialising agency’ in modern society, acting as a bridge between family and wider society. This bridge is needed because family and society operate on different principles, so children need to learn a new way of living if they are to cope with the wider world.
Within the family, the child is judged by particularistic standards; that is, rules that apply only to that particular child. Similarly, in the family, the child’s status is ascribed. (fixed by birth). For example, an elder son and a younger daughter may be given different rights or duties because of differences of age and sex.
By contrast, both school and wider society judge us all by the same universalistic and impersonal standards. For example, in society, the same laws apply to everyone. Similarly, in school each pupil is judged against the same standards (for example, they all sit the same exam and the pass mark is the same for everyone).
Likewise, in both school and wider society, a person’s status is largely achieved, not ascribed. For example, at work we gain promotion or get the sack on the strength of how good we are at the job, while at school we pass or fail through our own individual efforts.
Parsons sees school as preparing us to move from the family to wider society because school and society are both biased on meritocratic principles. In a meritocracy, everyone is given an equal opportunity, and individuals achieve rewards through their own effort and ability.
The functionalist perspective on education- David and Moore: role allocation
Functionalists argue that school also perform the function of selecting and allocating pupils to their future work roles. By assessing individuals’ aptitudes and abilities, schools help to match them to the job they are best suited to.
Davis and Moore see education as a device for selection and role allocation. They focus on the relationship between education and social inequality.
They argue that inequality is necessary to ensure that the most important roles in society are filled by the most talented people. For example, it would be inefficient and dangerous to have less able people performing roles such as surgeon or airplane pilot. Not everyone is equally talented, so society has to offer higher rewards for these jobs. This will encourage everyone to compete for them and society can then select the most talented individuals to fill these positions.
Education plays a key part in this process, since it acts as a proving ground for ability. Put simply, education is where individuals show what they can do. It ‘sifts and sort’ us according to our ability. The most able gain the highest qualifications, which then gives them entry to the most important and highly rewarded positions.
The functionalist perspective on education- Evaluation of the functionalist perspective
The interactionist Dennis Wrong (1961) argues that functionalists have an ‘over-socialised view’ of people as mere puppets of society. Functionalists wrongly imply that pupils passively accept all they are taught and never reject the school’s values.
Neoliberals and the New Right argue that the state education system fails to prepare young people adequately for work.
Functionalists see education as a process that instils the shared values of society as a whole, but Marxists argue that education in capitalist society only transmits the ideology of a minority- the ruling class.
The Marxist perspective on education: info
Marxist see education as based on class division and capitalist exploitation. He described 2 capitalist systems:
-The capitalist class or bourgeoisie are the minority class. They are the employers who own the means of production (land, factories, machinery, offices etc). They make their profits by exploiting the labour of the majority- the proletariat or working class.
-The working class are forced to sell their labour power to the capitalists since they own no means of production of their own and so have no other source of income. As a result, work under capitalism is poorly paid, alienating, unsatisfying and something over which workers have no real control.
This creates the potential for class conflict. For example, if workers realise they are being exploited, they may demand higher wages, better working conditions or even the abolition of capitalism itself. Marx believed that ultimately the proletariat would unite to overthrow the capitalist system and create a classless, equal society.
However, despite this potential for revolution that capitalism contains, it is able to continue because the bourgeoisie also control the state. A key component of the state is the education system, and Marxists see education as functioning to prevent revolution and maintain capitalism.
The Marxist perspective on education-Althusser: the ideological state apparatus
According to Althusser, the state consists of 2 elements, both of which serve to keep the bourgeoisie in power:
- The repressive state apparatus (RSA) which maintain the rule of the bourgeoisie by force or the threat of it. The RSA include the police, courts and army. When necessary, they use physical coercion (force) to repress the working class.
- The ideological state apparatus (ISA) which maintain the rule of the bourgeoisie by controlling people’s ideas, values and beliefs. The ISAs include religion, the media and the education system.
In Althusser’s view, the education system is an important ISA. He argues that it performs two functions:
- Education reproduces class inequality by transmitting it from generation, by failing each successive generation of working-class in turn.
- Education legitimates (justifies) class inequality by producing ideologies (set of ideas and beliefs) that disguise its true cause. The function of ideology is to persuade workers to accept that inequality is inevitable and that they deserve their subordinate position in society. If they accept these ideas, they are less likely to challenge or threaten capitalism.
The Marxist perspective on education- Bowles and Gintis: schooling in capitalist America
Bowles and Gintis argue that capitalism requires a workforce with the kind of attitudes, behaviour and personality-type suited to their role as alienated and exploited workers willing to accept hard work and low pay. In the view of Bowles and Gintis, this is the role of the education system in capitalist society- to reproduce an obedient workforce that will accept inequality as inevitable.
The Marxist perspective on education- Bowles and Gintis: schooling in capitalist America (The correspondence principle and the hidden curriculum)
Bowles and Gintis argue that there are close parallels between schooling and work in capitalist society. Both schools and workplaces are hierarchies, with head teachers or bosses at the top making decisions and giving orders, and workers or pupils at the bottom obeying.
Bowles and Gintis refer to these parallels between school and workplace as examples of the ‘correspondence principle’. The relationships and structures found in education mirror or correspond to those of work.
Bowles and Gintis argue that the correspondence principle operates through the hidden curriculum-that is, all the ‘lessons’ that are learnt in school without being directly taught. For example, simply through the everyday workings of the school, pupils become accustomed to accepting hierarchy and competition, working for extrinsic rewards and so on.
In this way, schooling prepares working-class pupils for their role as the exploited workers of the future, reproducing the workforce capitalism needs and perpetuating class inequality from generation to generation.
The Marxist perspective on education- Bowles and Gintis: schooling in capitalist America (The myth of meritocracy: the legitimation of class inequality)
Because capitalist society is based on inequality, there is always a danger that the poor will feel that this inequality is underserved and unfair, and that they will rebel against the system responsible for it. In Bowles and Gintis’ view, the education system helps to prevent this from happening, by legitimating class inequalities. It does this by producing ideologies that serve to explain and justify why inequality is fair, natural and inevitable.
Bowles and Gintis describe the education system as ‘a giant myth-making machine’. A key myth that education promotes is the ‘myth of meritocracy’. Meritocracy means that everyone has an equal opportunity to achieve, that rewards are based on ability and effort, and that those who gain the highest rewards deserve them because they are the most able and hardworking.
Unlike functionalists such as Parsons, Bowles and Gintis argue that meritocracy does not in fact exist. Evidence shows that the main factor determining whether or not someone has a high income is their family and class background, not their ability or educational achievement.
Myth of meritocracy serves to justify the privileges of the higher classes, making it seem that they gained them through succeeding in open and fair competition at school. This helps persuade the working class to accept inequality as legitimate, and makes it less likely that they will seek to overthrow capitalism.
The Marxist perspective on education- Willis: learning to labour
Willis’ study shows that working-class pupils can resist such attempts to indoctrinate them.
As a Marxist, Willis is interested in the way schooling serves capitalism. However, he combines this with an interactionist approach that focuses on the meanings pupils give to their situation and how there enable them to resist indoctrination.
The Marxist perspective on education- Willis: learning to labour (The lad’s counter-culture)
Willis studied the counter-school culture of ‘the lads’- a group of 12 working-class boys- as they make the transition from school to work.
The lads find school boring and meaningless and they flout its rules and values, for example by smoking and drinking, disrupting classes and playing truant. For the lads, such acts of defiance are ways of resisting the school. They reject as a ‘con’ the school’s meritocratic ideology that working-class pupils can achieve middle-class jobs through hard work.
Willis notes the similarity between the lads’ anti-school counter-culture and the shopfloor culture of male manual workers. Both cultures see manual work as superior and intellectual work as inferior and effeminate. The lads identify strongly with male manual work and this explains why they see themselves as superior.
It explains why the lads’ counter-culture of resistance to school helps them to slot into the very jobs- inferior in terms of skill, pay and conditions- that capitalism needs someone to perform. For example:
- Their acts of rebellion guarantee that they will end up in unskilled jobs, by ensuring their failure to gain worthwhile qualifications.
The Marxist perspective on education- Evaluation
- Critics argue that Willis’ account of the ‘lads’ romanticises them, portraying them as working-class heroes despite their anti-social behaviour and sexist attitudes. His small-scale study of only 12 boys in one school is also unlikely to be representative of other pupil’s experience and it would be risky to generalise his findings.
-While Marxism centres class inequality, it may not fully address other intersecting forms of oppression, such as race, gender, or disability, in the education system. While class plays a crucial role in education, the modern educational landscape also includes considerations of racial and gender disparities that may not be fully explained by a strictly Marxist framework.
-Postmodernists think that Marxism focuses too much on class and money, making society seem much simpler than it is. They believe that society is much more complicated and shaped by many different things, not just class struggle. For example, postmodernists believe culture, language, individual experiences, and power relations all play a role in shaping society. They argue that you can’t explain everything just by looking at class or money alone.
