Education and neoliberalism: the pedagogy of precarization and the formation of workforce under the logic of capital

Abstract

This article aims to analyze how the High School reform, guided by neoliberal rationality, operates as an instrument for the precarization of labor among Brazil’s working-class youth. In order to develop this study, a literature review was conducted addressing the theme of Education and Neoliberalism, as well as documentary research on high school educational legislation, especially Brazilian Law No. 13.415/2017. The theoretical framework underpinning this article is grounded in critical social theory. Education directed toward market purposes and the interests of capital loses its function as an intrinsic human right, shifting instead toward a logic of the pedagogy of precarization. As a result, it constitutes yet another evident expression of the social question. In light of contemporary challenges, Social Work, as an intervention-oriented profession whose object of practice is the social question, reaffirms its ethical-political commitment to contributing to the (re)thinking of collective forms of resistance that uphold the right to a comprehensive, universal, and critical education.