Social Class Inequality in Ireland: What Role does Education Play?

While inequalities outside of education impact on those within, the internal life of education neutral in class terms. Education, or more accurately, the schooling system, is intimately bound up with the reproduction of the class structures of our society. To begin with, the school system is largely designed, managed and controlled by those who are already the successful beneficiaries of that system, and these tend to be the same people who have power, status and money in other areas of economic, cultural and political life. Those who plan schools, design curricula, set and assess examinations are generally part of the cultural elite of society. And while the cultural elite (most of whom are middle class or upper middle class) are not necessarily part of the economic elite, there is deep overlap between the owners of wealth and the owners and controllers of cultural and social capital in Ireland and elsewhere (Bourdieu and Passerson 1977; Courtois 2018).