Teaching unionism under discussion: contributions from Gramscian thought

Abstract

Teacher unionism has its origins in the struggle for public education, which permeates the Federal Constitution (1988) and the Education Guidelines and Bases Law (LDB) of 1996. In view of this, the objective of the text is to establish a relationship between the concept teaching union in Gramsci's view and its relationship with the class struggle. The methodology used is anchored in historical-dialectical materialism. Even before the existence of unions, teachers were already organizing themselves into associations, creating agendas to combat capital. For Gramsci, the existence of unions was a duality, because at the same time that these institutions were supposed to guide the counter-hegemonic dispute between capital and labor, they were often bureaucratic and ended up moving away from their purpose, which was social transformation. Despite this criticism, Gramsci recognizes unions as tools that seek to alleviate the disadvantages of capital vis-à-vis the working class.