New Modes of Reproducing Social Inequality in Education: the changing role of parents, teachers, schools and educational policies

This article is based on the Keynote
Address to the European Conference on Educational Research (ECER), Crete, Greece,
21‑25 September 2004. One of the most consistent results in sociology of
education research has been the existence of inequalities in school results and
educational trajectories related to social factors. Despite an important increase
in number of years of schooling for all children in most European countries in
the post-war period, research still shows important differences between social
and ethnic groups and even a widening of the gap between the most advantaged and
most disadvantaged in some countries. Factors shown by previous studies to account
for these differences are still at work, but many of them are influential in new
ways. In addition to this, new factors have to be taken into account. Using available
sociological literature on European countries, while focusing specifically on
France as an exemplary case, this article presents some of the new constraints
on and opportunities for action by parents, teachers and schools that result from
both economic, cultural and educational changes and recent policy orientations.